Re: Recommendations for SSDs in production?

On Wed, Nov 2, 2011 at 12:01 PM, Benjamin Smith
<lists(at)benjamindsmith(dot)com> wrote:
> Well,
>
> After reading several glowing reviews of the new OCZ Vertex3 SSD last spring,
> we did some performance testing in dev on RHEL6. (CentOS)
>
> The results were nothing short of staggering. Complex query results returned
> in 1/10th the time as a pessimistic measurement. System loads dropped from 2+
> to 0.1 or less.
>
> Wow.
>
> So after months of using this SSD without any issues at all, we tentatively
> rolled this out to production, and had blissful, sweet beauty until about 2
> weeks ago, now we are running into sudden death scenarios. We have excellent
> backup system, so the damage is reduced to roadbumps, but are looking for a
> longer term solution that doesn't compromise performance too much.
>
> The config is super-basic, basically no tuning at all was done:
>
> # fdisk /dev/NNN;
> mke2fs -j $partn;
> mount $partn /var/lib/pgsql;
> rsync -vaz /var/lib/pgsql.old /var/lib/pgsql;
> service postgresql start;
>
> I don't mind spending some money. Can anybody comment on a recommended drive
> in real world use?
>
> After some review I found:
>
> 1) Micron P300 SSD: claims excellent numbers, can't find them for sale
> anywhere.
>
> 2) Intel X25E - good reputation, significantly slower than the Vertex3. We're
> buying some to reduce downtime.
>
> 3) OCZ "Enterprise" - reviews are mixed.
>
> 4) Kingston "Enterprise" drives appear to be identical to consumer drives with
> a different box.
>
> 5) STEC drives are astronomically expensive. (EG: "You're kidding, right?")
>
> 6) Corsair consumer drives getting excellent reviews, Aberdeen Inc recommended
> in use with RAID 1.
>
> 7) Seagate Pulsar drives, XT.2 drives are expensive SLC but can't find a
> vendor, Pulsar .2 drives are more available but having trouble finding reviews
> other than rehashed press releases.
>
> Thanks!

The X25-E is now essentially being replaced by the 710. I would look there.

merlin