SSD more musical than HDD!

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Quantum
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Post by Quantum »

I have tried this. There is no musical difference between the two. This was with three listeners but obviously each to their own.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

Music Lover wrote: 2011-02-23 09:49 Installed an Intel SSD 80GB yesterday in my NV+, WOW.
Sadly it's just a loan from a dear friend... :(
SSD is not exactly low cost but BOY they are great. More music AND better sound.

Full name is Intel X25-M SATA SSD, 80GB 2.5" with 3.5" adapter included (just connected the SSD without adapter directly in the SATA slot)
This SSD is Intel SSD generation2 (=G2)

Soon is generation3 (G3) here, expect lower prices.
http://www.anandtech.com/show/3965/inte ... s-revealed

I have taken the decision to replace my HDDs.
See my add.

Now we need to compare SSD's, anyone up to it?
I promise, you’re not going to regret it!
Fascinating look into the history of the work done here. One of the SSDs I tested relative to the Intel 320 Series used the same SandForce SF-1200 controller as the 320 and X-25m. But whether it was different firmware or some other design difference, my OCZ Vertex 2 sounded terrible.

It's also very interesting that the 320 and X25-m were seen by Intel as the mainstream series. I'm sure you guys tested the premium Intel 510 series with the Marvell controller.

This was pioneering work by Music Lover, Linnofil and others. I'm very grateful to all concerned for finding the Intel SSDs that have such musicality! I tried a whole raft of more modern SSDs, microSD PCIe card, M2 SSD etc. Nothing comes close to the Intel series.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by teatime »

FairPlayMotty wrote: 2020-08-02 22:52Nothing comes close to the Intel series.
While I don't entirely distrust the results (I've never tried the Intel disks myself), after all this time, I do wish someone could come up with some sort of explanation for this, or at least a hypothesis. What could it possibly be? Are they unusually well shielded? Are they unusually mechanically solid (less vibrations)? Do they draw current in a particularly uniform way or something - producing some kind of ideal load for the power supply?

Because it's not about data integrity, everyone agrees about that. What's more, data isn't even being read from the disk for more than maybe a second or two of the first play of a song (the OS is probably done reading from the disk by the time you hear the first note out of your speakers). After that, the OS will have put the entire file into the disk cache (RAM) and the file will be portioned out from there. And if you play the song again (and who doesn't, during comparisons?), the OS will not touch the disk drive at all, as all the data is already in memory.

So... something that is effectively not used, sounds better than something else (a different disk) that is also not used. It really is mind-boggling. I for one would really like to know how this can/could possibly be.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

The two Intel SSDs that passed the test back then used the same SandForce SF-1200 controller but so did my OCZ Vertex 2. The memory chips and other circuitry could be different. I suspect the "other circuitry" is where the difference is. The effect on the musicality compared to every other SSD or other OS storage device isn't subtle.

Like you teatime I'd love to understand the exact reason for the difference.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

Kept reading about how great Intel Optane PCIe was for SQ. Bought one on eBay and will test it relative to the Intel 320. I expect it to sound worse than an Intel 320 based on everything else I tried but I'll find out early next week,

It's used in the Taiko Extreme and was top of a group test of os memory. We'll see - if it's better than the 320 I'll be delighted.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by matthias »

FairPlayMotty wrote: 2020-09-12 19:17It's used in the Taiko Extreme and was top of a group test of os memory. We'll see - if it's better than the 320 I'll be delighted.
Interesting comment from Taiko Audio to this topic:

"As files sourced from streaming services are cached on your OS drive before playback, which is an Optane PCIe drive in the Extreme, we were forced to move towards PCIe storage for locally music files, as streaming was outperforming local music files stored on SATA SSD drives."

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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

Thanks Matt, interesting.

The group test I saw was done by a group of guys using largely the same hardware as the Extreme (motherboard, CPUs, RAM etc.) and their consensus was that the Intel Optane was the best for the OS. My prior experiments with PCIe (M2 or microSD card) were not close to the Intel 320 in SQ but if the Intel Optane is better it'll be a step forward.

Additionally I'm on the verge of having my first Intel 320 failure (in a Streacom-based NAS). The intermittent drive failure may be due to the drive age and/or the poor heat dissipation from a case rather full but it's a reminder that SSDs don't last forever.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

matthias wrote: 2020-09-13 15:37
Interesting comment from Taiko Audio to this topic:

"As files sourced from streaming services are cached on your OS drive before playback, which is an Optane PCIe drive in the Extreme, we were forced to move towards PCIe storage for locally music files, as streaming was outperforming local music files stored on SATA SSD drives."
Your quote led me to the following posted by Romaz on the same forum. I'm heartened to see he used to use an Intel X-25. That SSD is a close predecessor of the Intel 320 and was the SSD of choice here before, I believe, MusicLover found the Intel 320.
My statements about SSDs are purely subjective and have been well documented on another site. SSD-related noise has been reported upon by others including the likes of Paul Pang, @Marcin_gps, @lmitche (on AS), and @Superdad and so I will give credit where credit is due. As some are aware, MacOS allows you to boot from an SD card and so back in 2017, this is what I was doing with my modified Mac Mini and the drop in harshness versus an SSD was astonishing. Even with the SSD powered by a battery or an LPS-1.2, the harshness (while less) was very much still there.

Going from a Samsung EVO SATA III SSD to Samsung EVO NVMe SSD lead to better immediacy but even more harshness and so there was an obvious tradeoff. I found that the harshness was not worth the improved immediacy and so I found NVMe SSD (via either M.2 or PCIe) to be the worst possible option.

I began using an Apacer SLC compact flash drive as an OS drive and this was better than an SD card and resulted in the lowest noise floor but this presented challenges as some operating systems (like Windows Server) will not boot from a CF drive. Ultimately, the biggest downside of flash media is they are very high latency drives and while the presentation is very relaxed, I feel like I am sitting way back in the balcony. If I had my way, I would be on the stage with the performers as I crave immediacy.

It is the same problem with SATA SSDs. The slower SATA II SSDs have less harshness than the faster SATA III SSDs with the SLC SATA II SSD sounding less harsh than the MLC variety. For some time, I was using the Intel X25-E as my SSD of choice. I experimented with various SATA cables and they made a difference and my preference was for the Pachanko SATA Reference. I also liked what the SOtM SATA II filter offered. Powered by an LPS-1.2, the noise floor was very low but once again lacked immediacy.

Optane drives are based on Intel's 3D XPoint technology and while not exactly memristor storage, according to @lmitche, it behaves similarly requiring no refresh activity to hold data. With traditional SSDs, there is constant refresh activity. This is why Optane, in theory, is so quiet -- it is quiet until you access it -- and it is so fast that the windows of activity are much smaller. Regardless of what is happening underneath, I have compared M.2 Optane versus M.2 NVMe SSD (Samsung EVO) and the Optane matches the immediacy of the Samsung EVO but does not have the harshness. These differences are not necessarily stark if the motherboard is being powered cleanly, however, to my ears they are fairly easily audible and over a span of a few hours, there is fatigue. Feel free to do the experiment yourself. It's not expensive to do.
I'm looking forward to testing the Intel Optane.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by matthias »

FairPlayMotty wrote: 2020-09-13 20:19 Your quote led me to the following posted by Romaz on the same forum. I'm heartened to see he used to use an Intel X-25. That SSD is a close predecessor of the Intel 320 and was the SSD of choice here before, I believe, MusicLover found the Intel 320.

I'm looking forward to testing the Intel Optane.
I respect Romaz highly, he tried a lot, but noone tried on servers as much as Emile Bok from Taiko.
So I am curious what you think about the Optane.

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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

matthias wrote: 2020-09-13 21:22 I respect Romaz highly, he tried a lot, but noone tried on servers as much as Emile Bok from Taiko.
So I am curious what you think about the Optane.

Matt
Thanks Matt! He's very careful in his approach, I suspect Emile is too. You probably know he is. The Optane is highly promising, hopefully it's a step forward. The Optane SSDs are eye wateringly pricey. The PCIe Optane at £12 may be a real bargain for the os if it sounds good. Watching several forums pays dividends in my experience so far.

As an aside the Apacer RAM popular on a couple of forums seems to be made using Samsung dies. By sheer chance I've been using Samsung 1R RAM for the last few builds. Sometimes you get lucky, but mostly by trying a host of alternatives.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

The cheaper version of Intel Optane is here, unfortunately Intel chose the least common NGFF for NVME. But the necessary adapters are in the post from Aliexpress. My experience of PCIe so far for any os is unwelcome noise so I hope my chosen adapter path (which is applicable to Hakai and non-Hakai streamers) proves beneficial. Plan B is PCIe which would only work in my Intel motherboards.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

The adapter solution for the Intel Optane (which is an Orico NVME case with a USB C port) arrived around an hour ago. The only way I could see to use it with a Gigabyte motherboard was via the main motherboard USB header. Several forums indicated it wouldn't work as a boot device except under Windows.

The install of the software was very simple after formatting the NVME.

I was very sceptical about this Intel Optane compared to an Intel 320 after trying numerous SSDs, M.2 SSD via PCIe etc. However my initial and very early impressions are that it is better than the Intel 320. I'm going to let it burn in for a day or two before posting clips but it's highly promising.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

rps20200925_211516.jpg
That's the case. It has a metal heat sink and is small enough to fit inside the PC case with ease.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

Orico case in situ.
rps20200925_212654.jpg
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

The total cost to install the Intel Optane was less than £30. It could easily be used with a Tinkerboard just via the Orico case which comes supplied with two USB cables, one USB C to USB A and USB C to C.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by fatjulio »

Looking forward to the clips
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

teatime wrote: 2020-08-03 20:00
FairPlayMotty wrote: 2020-08-02 22:52Nothing comes close to the Intel series.
While I don't entirely distrust the results (I've never tried the Intel disks myself), after all this time, I do wish someone could come up with some sort of explanation for this, or at least a hypothesis. What could it possibly be? Are they unusually well shielded? Are they unusually mechanically solid (less vibrations)? Do they draw current in a particularly uniform way or something - producing some kind of ideal load for the power supply?

Because it's not about data integrity, everyone agrees about that. What's more, data isn't even being read from the disk for more than maybe a second or two of the first play of a song (the OS is probably done reading from the disk by the time you hear the first note out of your speakers). After that, the OS will have put the entire file into the disk cache (RAM) and the file will be portioned out from there. And if you play the song again (and who doesn't, during comparisons?), the OS will not touch the disk drive at all, as all the data is already in memory.

So... something that is effectively not used, sounds better than something else (a different disk) that is also not used. It really is mind-boggling. I for one would really like to know how this can/could possibly be.
What separated Intel X-25 and Intel 320 drives from the competition as far as audio is concerned was simply that both were the only two Intel SSD drives to have the Intel controller PC29AS21BA0. That seems to have been the difference between the musicality of these drives and the subsequent Intel drives that used other controllers.

https://www.extremetech.com/extreme/210 ... -ssds-work

The attached article explains how different drive types work. The frustrating part for audiophiles is that it's not a straight line between improved drive speeds etc. and improved musicality. It's still pretty much a suck it and see approach to the new technology. In all likelihood it will be a simple coincidence that a new drive type improves on the Intel 320 for audiophiles. However, the evidence of such improvement with Intel Optane is growing. Audiophiles whose default was either an Intel X-25 or Intel 320 seem to prefer Intel Optane.

I hope that the forthcoming clips prove the point. On night one I certainly like what I hear which is a first for me except for an Intel 320.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by springwood64 »

Are you testing a 16GB M.2 Optane?
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by FairPlayMotty »

springwood64 wrote: 2020-09-26 07:30 Are you testing a 16GB M.2 Optane?
Yes.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by Spannko »

Are you using Tune Dem to evaluate?
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

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Spannko wrote: 2020-09-26 14:37 Are you using Tune Dem to evaluate?
Is that a serious question?

You may want to examine your past posts Spannko - you haven't always practiced what you preach,
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

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springwood64 wrote: 2020-09-26 07:30 Are you testing a 16GB M.2 Optane?
Pete,

This was the cheapest way to get an idea of what Intel Optane was capable of. There are other relatively affordable ways to use (probably) higher quality versions. This series of Intel Optane has a model number of M10 and NGFF B&M keys. The next series of M2 NVME (the H10 model with an NGFF M key) has a form factor that would be easier to use on PCIe equipped motherboards and significantly higher capacity - 256GB for less than £60. That form factor also makes the array of available and high quality adapters wider. But I wanted to use something at this stage that was applicable to all of the motherboards I have including the Asus Tinker Boards. The Intel Optane SSDs are extremely expensive.

In my mind Intel Optane had to prove its worth before investing more money. For PCIe equipped motherboards the adapter of choice seems to be an Asus Hyper M.2 card - those require a case with at least one expansion slot. My two cases of choice are Swedish and have expansion slots.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by Spannko »

FairPlayMotty wrote: 2020-09-26 14:51
Spannko wrote: 2020-09-26 14:37 Are you using Tune Dem to evaluate?
Is that a serious question?

You may want to examine your past posts Spannko - you haven't always practiced what you preach,
Of course it’s a serious question.
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

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Spannko wrote: 2020-09-26 16:51 Of course it’s a serious question.
Spannko,

I don't know how often you'll ask me the same question when you already know the answer.

Thanks, you have me listening to an often underrated Paul Simon album from 1980. Happy days ;-)
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Re: SSD more musical than HDD!

Post by Spannko »

Actually, I don’t know whether you use Tune Dem, due to you never being clear about your evaluation criteria.

The impression I get is that you don’t, and my guess is that the mod’s don’t know for sure either.
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