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Intel has a feature where you can use one of their SSDs as a cache. It's fantastic. Except they limit you to 64 gigs no matter what the size of the SSD. Incredi
by arielweisberg 9y ago
Intel has a feature where you can use one of their SSDs as a cache. It's fantastic. Except they limit you to 64 gigs no matter what the size of the SSD. Incredibly annoying since what I need cached doesn't remotely fit in 64 gigabytes.
I get to experience lovely things like performance falling off a cliff when stupid programs preallocate 30-40 gigs at a time. If I could use the rest of the SSD it would be no problem.
What desktop user needs fast write caching for synchronous writes? I mean really. It's all buffered writes for programs that work right. Cache size is going to give power desktop users what they need from spinning rust not a small fast cache that won't even fit a single AAA game. 32 gigabytes is a step backwards.
And what is with requiring hardware RAID? It really makes me think all the rapid response stuff is just for marketing.
- wtallis 9y ago> "And what is with requiring hardware RAID?" Intel doesn't really do hardware RAID, just software RAID that the motherboard firmware has a compatible implementation of for boot purposes. There is one hardware feature that Intel relies on for RAID or caching involving NVMe drives: the PCH can remap the PCI registers of NVMe drives so that the NVMe drive is only accessible through non-standard interfaces on the SATA controller. This prevents non-Intel NVMe drivers from binding to the NVMe drive and getting in the way of their caching or RAID. It's a hardware hack Intel created to work around poor software architecture.