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No performance drop at all. Normally
in most cases a drop would be seen from
even the most advanced of SSD's. Though
once more we have to take away that this
is not an SSD but a drive. The drive
itself functions much better the more
memory you place into the system; the
better the performance across the whole
I/O. One point the showed this clearly
was within SPECviewperf® 11 and the
viewsets of Lightwave, Maya and
SolidWorks that utilise the whole system
I/O. Within these three viewsets we see
increases in scores not normally
obtained from spindle disks or SSD's.
Therefore one has to take away, obtain
faster results within these viewsets
then in theory the application will
obviously benefit the speed-up also.
One completely I/O hungry application is
that of Adobe After Effects and its
render outputs. With the information we
have delivered below then to the most
obvious this application most definitely
will benefit from the Fusion-io drive.
Breaking results down to one that many
look for within the gaming industry from
both the PCMark 2005 and PCMark Vantage
we see results never witnessed before
from a drive. Many will be reeling with
shock at the astonishing speeds that
this drive produced. For the old guard,
an overall HD score of 71083 from the
PCMark 2005 it certainly took us by
surprise. On several reruns the result
remained the same throughout. With the
newer PCMark Vantage the HD test really
took us wholeheartedly by surprise with
a tremendous overall HD score of 58416.
Many gaming studios will now be sitting
back thinking looking very carefully at
these results, as the usage of this
important piece of equipment can and
will be used in many important phases of
production. Remember this is a PCI
Express X4/X8 card that can be readily
switched quickly between systems. With
footprints of some workstation
mainboards are getting much smaller,
more powerful CPU's requiring smaller
heat sink fans and supporting 2 PCI
Express lanes or more, yes monocells are
on overdrive in the potential usage of
this drive.
Support, Fusion-io has an excellent
range of tools and a quick registration
allows you to updates easily deployable
to the unit. Firmware updates are few
which shows how well the product has
been produced and is always a good
sign. For those in doubt Fusion-io have
an online chat support mechanism
supported by Fusion-io staff which
allows those who just might hit the odd
curve ball an instant response to fix
the issue to hand instantaneously and
saving once more time and cost saved by
a telephone call. For those who prefer
forum support Fusion-io has a good forum
support. What is nice to see is the
quick support response to the end-user
and the personalised response to each
individual - the way things should be
done.
Questionably some analysts will be
sceptical at the cost, however once more
we are back to our ever so faithful
statement of "fast is good we want fast
and fast today is what you have got".
For those wishing the ultimate in
workstations that require the ultimate
in high speed productivity, reliability
and stability, then look no further.
The negative Nellie's will be sitting
back aghast. We reiterate that all
walks of life will benefit fully from
the power from the Fusion-io drive and
will see a huge rapid return of
investment - in saving time, manpower
and ultimately getting the finished
product out to the client on time
without fear of downtime.
We stipulated that this is without a
doubt the future of drives to come,
therefore we must also look briefly to a
possibility. Could this drive be
embedded onto a mainboard direct and cut
down on more hardware to be added at a
later point, and like in some instances
have an upgrade slot of adding in more
modules to increase the drives
capabilities. Once more we think of
reduction in cost in many topical
areas. Time will tell, though it well
and could be a viable probability.
Ultimately, the smart people from
Fusion-io have taken us aback at their
products complete adaptability. This
drive and the others from within the
range can be found in many places
supporting so many operating systems,
huge SQL databases, Film and Artistic
studio's which will and does increase
productivity output; Quadrupled in some
instances.
The proof is already out there from one
recent case study. The beneficial
list is endless and this is one piece of
equipment that has to be seen to believe
for those even thinking on outlaying on
a huge 15K array.
Therefore with these last few thoughts
to take away. If you fear a dropped
drive or raid controller going down in
your raid array's - think Fusion-io. If
you fear severe disk fragmentation
downtime - think Fusion-io. If you
can think of 40 artists sitting still
for 2 - 4 hours from either of the
latter scenario's - think Fusion-io.
These few simplistic daily occurrences
are all too often found, totally out way
the initial costings of 1 drive.
Here we are thinking - what next for
the Fusion-io. |
