Comments on: Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox

By: Intel SSD Toolbox 3 Released | My Blog

Intel SSD Toolbox 3 Released | My Blog — Sun, 30 Oct 2011 03:46:51 +0000

[...] Intel’s SSD Toolbox has recently been released in version 3. We have covered both the initial Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox release and Intel Solid-State Drive Toolbox 2 release before. Lets see what’s new in the third [...]

By: Intel Solid-State Drive Toolbox 2, Now With System Optimizer, Secure Erase

Intel Solid-State Drive Toolbox 2, Now With System Optimizer, Secure Erase — Thu, 27 Jan 2011 10:54:26 +0000

[...] new version a few days ago.I have reviewed the software previously here in an earlier version (see Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox for the review). Intel has added two new modules to version 2 of the SSD software that justify a [...]

By: Intel Solid State Drive Toolbox 2 Released

Intel Solid State Drive Toolbox 2 Released — Tue, 14 Sep 2010 19:09:17 +0000

[...] the Intel SSD Optimizer was included as a management tool in previous versions of the toolbox (see Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox for a full review). The latest release however has seen two additions that add to the value of the [...]

By: Abel

Abel — Tue, 18 May 2010 11:46:43 +0000

PS: mine’s a G2R5 (generation 2, release 5, I believe), packed date 21 January, old enough to be supported you’d say.

By: Abel

Abel — Tue, 18 May 2010 11:44:43 +0000

160GB X25-M, most recent firmware, all drives (two partitions for the X25-M) show “Error connecting to drive”. Can’t do a thing, everything grayed out. Pity Intel gives so little information on this tool.

By: Jan

Jan — Tue, 18 May 2010 09:42:11 +0000

The first prob is, that when owning an older nForce chipset (e.g. 590) and when using the Microsoft AHCI-Driver, the performance of the SSD is measurably worse than with the original driver by NVidia.

The second prob is, that the older NVidia nForce chipsets (e.g. 590) do not support AHCI, in which case you won’t benefit from the MS AHCI-Drivers support for AHCI … :(

But in order to use the toolbox you are bound to use the MS AHCI-Driver. :(

By: Rodalpho

Rodalpho — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 21:39:28 +0000

Yep, exactly correct. If trim is working, you don’t need the optimizer.

By: Martin

Martin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 21:06:11 +0000

Okay, so if the Os is Windows 7 and the storage driver is Microsoft AHCI then you do not need to run the optimizer but you need to run it otherwise.

By: Rodalpho

Rodalpho — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:48:40 +0000

Also see the chart at the top of page 5, which spells it out very clearly.

By: Rodalpho

Rodalpho — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:46:20 +0000

It does basically same thing as trim; it examines the filesystem then tells the SSD which blocks should be marked empty. Trim does this every time a file is deleted while the optimizer works across the entire drive. The only reason to install it on windows 7 is if you wrote to the X25-M G2 before applying the firmware update. In that case you would run it once to optimize previous writes and anything following would be handled by trim. I did that myself, actually. From intel’s whitepaper:

When using the latest Microsoft Windows* 7 operating system with Microsoft AHCI storage drivers the OS will contain native support to execute the Intel® SSD Optimizer on an Intel SSD without requiring any user interaction

http://www.intel.com/support/ssdc/hpssd/sb/CS-030992.htm

By: Martin

Martin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:01:48 +0000

Have you an official link for that statement? The tool mentions that it optimizes the SSD including trim functionality.

By: Rodalpho

Rodalpho — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 20:00:28 +0000

If you run windows7 with the microsoft drivers and have trim working, you do NOT need to use this program. It does basically the same thing that trim does.

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 16:41:55 +0000

Fixed it. Needed to update my nForce drivers, then switch out the SATA ones manually for the default Windows IDE controllers. All’s fine now!

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:46:27 +0000

I have. And I’ve got an nForce mobo, which I’m reading is the cause of the problem. Grr.

By: Martin

Martin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:45:53 +0000

You can check in the device manager, if it says G2 you got a second generation drive I think.

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 15:30:53 +0000

Is the 34nm the second generation, and the 50nm the first? Mine’s the silver-coloured one, I’m fairly sure it’s the newer of the two. I’m just about to try another firmware update, perhaps something weirded out the first one.

By: Martin

Martin — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:45:39 +0000

Have the same drive, second generation though with the latest firmware, works fine

By: Luke

Luke — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:39:51 +0000

Hmm, this won’t connect to my 80gb X25-M 34nm. Error connecting to drive in the drive list. Latest 02HD firmware. Bizarre.

By: Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox | Windows 7 News

Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox | Windows 7 News — Mon, 01 Mar 2010 14:12:18 +0000

[...] here: Intel Solid State Drive (SSD) Toolbox Tags: amplification, files, garbage, intel, result, smart, solid, solid-stage, state, toolbox, [...]