Intel 730 Jackson Ridge SSD Review

Intel 730 Jackson Ridge SSD Review
– Today will will take a look at the Specs, Hashrate, CPU performance and also a testing of this SSD Drive. We will go into more details as it regards to the testing in the article below.

Contents hide

1 Acquaintance, packaging, packaging and visual inspection

2 Related posts:

Intel at one time became one of the pioneers of the solid-state drive market and its products were probably the most widespread among all SSDs of that time and popular among advanced users. Suffice it to recall the Intel X25-M series. However, the popularity was exactly the same as the price allowed: not everyone could afford to spend about $ 850 in 2008 for 80 GB. But it was they who rocked the market and actually paved the way for the massive distribution of SSDs. However, two years later, they asked for $ 240 for Intel X25-M G2 of the same volume. The price per gigabyte has dropped three and a half times.

At the same time, the company almost completely provided itself with everything necessary: flash memory of its own production, its own controller, printed circuit board and firmware of its own design. At a certain point in time, it was such that even third-party manufacturers like A-DATA and Kingston bought ready-made solutions from Intel and then sold them under their own brand (by the way, documentation about such models can still be found on the Kingston website).

But then Intel’s position changed: at a certain point, the company stopped relying on its own developments. The last retail drive on the original controller was the Intel SSD 320 (G3) “Postville Refresh”. It happened on March 28, 2011. A kind of farewell gesture, for a little earlier, on March 1, Intel introduced the 510th family, based on the “outsider” Marvell 88SS9174. But it was not Marvell that began to dominate; Intel turned its attention to another developer.

On February 6, 2012, the era of LSI SandForce controllers domination in Intel retail products began – the Intel 520 family was officially presented: its own PCB design, proprietary firmware, 5,000 rewriting cycles, a five-year warranty, proprietary and feature-rich SSD Toolbox utility. Not every brand can offer such a combination of characteristics to this day. But you have to pay for such a pleasure: Intel solutions turned out to be noticeably more expensive than other models based on SF-2281. It should be noted that they waited a year for the release – the SF-2281 controller itself was presented in early February 2011.

It is worth saying that such an update did not cause much enthusiasm for a certain part of users. But the fact that Intel has one of the lowest return rates for solid-state drives (for example) has pretty much cooled the ardor of the debaters.

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However, the Intel 320 family (the latter on Intel’s own controller) managed to show itself in a sad way for its “lucky” owner: under certain conditions, as a result of a failure, the drive turned into a “pumpkin” and acquired a volume of 8 megabytes. Intel claimed that the problem was in the firmware, however, judging by the reviews, even a new version of the microcode released after numerous complaints, and then subsequent ones, did not always save you from disaster.

A damaged drive is reanimated in most cases, and an ordinary user can do this without any special equipment, but no one guarantees that this will not happen again. And in this case, you need to say goodbye to data. For the sake of particular accuracy, it should be noted that the last deliveries of Intel X25-M G2 had a similar “sin”, although it was very rare there. Here is such a “farewell gift” from Intel to fans of its controller.

But Intel has also gone through the SandForce controllers in its chipsets. I wonder what would have happened if the company had released its 520s not at the beginning of 2012, but earlier, together with other manufacturers? News headlines would be colorful: “Intel SSDs are incompatible with its own chipsets” … However, history does not know the subjunctive mood.

The aforementioned 520 family was followed by 330, 335, 525, 530. It would seem that everything in Intel retail drives is now dominated by SandForce. But a year and a half ago, in November 2012, the first bell rang – the Intel DC S3700 family of server products, based on Intel’s own controller, was presented. Interface – SATA 6 Gb / s. Mass deliveries began in April 2013. A few months after the start of DC S3700 deliveries, in the summer of 2013, the second bell rang – the release of Intel DC S3500. This model had a price that was already sane for an ordinary user and it was possible to pay attention to it.

But God is known to love the Trinity. And the third hint-bell of the imminent release of something new rang in early September 2013: at the PAX Prime event held in Seattle, Intel showed everyone a test stand with a 480 GB DC S3500 installed in it. At the stand was launched the proprietary Intel XTU software package (supplied with Intel motherboards), but a non-standard version with open access to the internal settings of the solid-state drive – controller and memory frequencies.

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But who needs to overclock a server drive? Business is afraid of overclocking like fire: the equipment is operated there exclusively with the frequency settings that the manufacturer initially prescribed. Overclocking potential is for the retail consumer. Now even the most inept it became obvious that the arrival of a new Intel controller in retail as part of a new series of drives is only a matter of time.

At the end of February the company presented a new series of its own drives – Intel SSD 730. And it was only an announcement, and they went on sale with some delay. And this material will be dedicated to them.

Acquaintance, packaging, packaging and visual inspection

About six months ago, a 120 GB Intel DC S3500 solid-state drive visited the laboratory, even then it attracted attention with its price and characteristics, which quite allowed it to be included in the system unit of an ordinary user.

DC S3500 is based on Intel’s own controller, and at the time of the publication of that review it was already known that Intel, in principle, was not averse to launching it in regular retail, since experiments on its overclocking were openly set up. However, eight months elapsed between the release of the DC S3500 and the release of the 730 series.

There are only two models in the family, differing in volume: for 240 and 480 GB (and we will find out why this is so). Intel provided Overclockers.ru with samples of both sizes. Unfortunately, in the so-called OEM configuration, which is a simple box made of technical cardboard, inside of which the drive itself is packed on a soft seal packed in a vacuum antistatic bag.

In addition to the device itself, only a proprietary sticker is included in the box, intended for sticker on the case of the system unit. Therefore, it is rather difficult to judge the retail configuration and packaging. However, it is unlikely that there will be any serious differences from the 530 series.

But on the other hand, we can boast of something else: thanks to the Moscow representative office of Intel, for review, completely serial samples were obtained that had just arrived in Russia, while most other resources (including foreign ones) were content with engineering samples with the engineering version of the L2010400 firmware.

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In this case, version L2010410 was flashed into both solid-state drives, and the devices themselves were produced quite recently: February 27 (480 GB) and March 6 (240 GB) this year.

Taking into account the already mentioned close relationship of the novelty with the DC S3500, one sample of this model with a volume of 240 GB was taken for the test, which has not yet been reviewed.

Thanks to this, it will be possible to see the difference (if any) in the level of performance and other consumer characteristics. Note that DC S3500 is supplied only in OEM version, in completely identical packaging and configuration.

Continuing the review of Intel 730, I will say that the company, like any other manufacturer, is not alien to design delights. The brand name has recently been the stylized skull symbol, which can also be found on motherboards produced under this brand.

The Intel DZ77GA-70K motherboard, which, by the way, had a very good overclocking potential (four completely separate, each with its own PWM controller, processor power converters – this was difficult to find on more expensive and branded products), as well as rich in settings and unusual BIOS.

But at the same time, decorating the lid, the Intel designers bypassed the bottom of the drive and unattractive aluminum again appears before us. It’s good at least the stains that the previous models adorned with are now removed.

Part of the bottom is hidden by a sticker with information about the device. From it you can find out the name, serial number, volume and version of the firmware installed during production at the factory, as well as the level of energy consumption. It should be noted that the latter betrays the server roots of the product: if ordinary drives are supplied with power only on the +5 V line, then it is directly indicated here that a +12 V power supply is required.

A decorative sticker with a skull on the case lid also serves as a seal: one of the four mounting screws is hidden under it.