An SSD on the TF330 ?

[Rochabian]

Hi!

CF cards seems to be the most common storage for CD32 but what about a SSD?

The price of a 120GB SSD is quite ridiculous now compared to a CF card

I was wondering if it's possible with the adapter below?

Apparently the adapter doesn't need extra power

I assume SSD will not run at full speed but can it be better than a CF or same transfer rate ?

[CDTV1991]

Interested in this one.

I've bought a few 60GB SATA SSDs for £15 each for a few retro PC projects (with adapters) and they work well for low cost

[Vypr]

120Gb, even 60Gb is massive overkill, you'd be better off with one of these and an SD card.

[Rochabian]

Why it is overkill ?

I halready havee 64 GB CF and had a lot of things to add on it.....

And 120GB SSD are cheaper than a 120GB MicroSD or SD card

[Vypr]

I have an A1200 otowerized with a 16Gb card in it into which I have loaded every single WHDLoad game I can get my grubby mitts on, it all fits with room to spare on a 6Gb partition.I;ve got another 6Gb for applicaitions and 3Gb for storing data with the last 1Gb for Workbench (mostly empty).

Even with only 16Gb I am struggling to fill that single card.

[project23]

The only real issue is a lack of convenience. It's helpful to be able to easily put the SD card into my PC to move files in winuae.

[Rochabian]

As i use a HDD dock, it wouldn't be a problem for file transfer.
Except cutting the case or remove the RF module and put the SD module instead to be able to remove the SD without opening the case, you have to open the case to remove the SD.

As the price is quite affordable for this, i want to test it, i think there coudn't be any compatibility issue

[Vypr]

I use an SD card extender on my 1200's, On the tower it's in a 3d printed cover plate on one of the 3.5" bays. On the 1200 in the original case it leads to the expansion port, again with a 3d printed cover on it.

[demolition]

Originally Posted by Rochabian

CF cards seems to be the most common storage for CD32 but what about a SSD?

The price of a 120GB SSD is quite ridiculous now compared to a CF card

I was wondering if it's possible with the adapter below?

Apparently the adapter doesn't need extra power

I assume SSD will not run at full speed but can it be better than a CF or same transfer rate ?

I have tried a couple of those adapters as I also wanted to use a SATA SSD but couldn't make them work in an Amiga with the native IDE controller, however I do not have a TF330 so I can't say for sure whether that will work any better.

I think that proper SSDs are more trustworthy than CF or SD cards as they may have better controllers that are better tailored towards being used as a system drive. Using SD cards with the Amiga is not too bad though since it doesn't have any log files or similar that is repeatedly written to like you will find in Windows and most Linux systems.

[Rochabian]

@Vypr

Well Done !

It seems it's easier to integrate this SD Module in a A1200

On a CD32, only the RF module port can be used for that i think

Originally Posted by demolition

I have tried a couple of those adapters as I also wanted to use a SATA SSD but couldn't make them work in an Amiga with the native IDE controller, however I do not have a TF330 so I can't say for sure whether that will work any better.

I think that proper SSDs are more trustworthy than CF or SD cards as they may have better controllers that are better tailored towards being used as a system drive. Using SD cards with the Amiga is not too bad though since it doesn't have any log files or similar that is repeatedly written to like you will find in Windows and most Linux systems.

Ah! So there could be a compatibily problem.....

[demolition]

Originally Posted by Rochabian

Ah! So there could be a compatibily problem.....

I can add that I am now using the converter with a SATA SSD in a 486 PC so it is not faulty.

[grelbfarlk]

I have several SSDs in my Amigas. SSD on A4000 IDE works fine. SSD to IDE to SCSI adapter works on Warpengine, CSPPC, GVP Trexx-II. CF is also fine but price to GB is not nearly as good as an SSD and the price of the adapters is about the same.
Though it seems like there is some cache on the SSDs that the CFs don't usually have so that might be of some slight benefit.

However on my MorphOS machine that I mainly use for compiling I only get about six months out of an SSD before they start developing bad blocks due to the lack of TRIM support. But for a real Amiga that's mainly just reading from them it should be fine.

Some SSDs however are "different" in some way perhaps they don't fall back to the old PIO mode we are using or they don't like 1k blocks, I'm not sure what the issue is, they may appear to work at first but as soon as you start writing to them they start getting read errors all over the place, massive corruption starts up and in a matter of minutes it's all over with. Reformatting them they still work on the PC.

Can't speak for the TF330 or the rest of the TF series since I've not had the opportunity to use any of them.

[nogginthenog]

I use a mSATA drive with an IDE convertor in my A4000. It's mounted on a blank Zorro/PCI card.

A trim command allows an operating system to inform a solid-state drive (SSD) which blocks of data are no longer considered in use and can be wiped internally.

I wonder how hard it would be to implement TRIM support? Probably not as part of the filesystem, but as an external command.

[patrik]

Originally Posted by nogginthenog

I use a mSATA drive with an IDE convertor in my A4000. It's mounted on a blank Zorro/PCI card.



I wonder how hard it would be to implement TRIM support? Probably not as part of the filesystem, but as an external command.

This is an interesting idea. On Linux you have a command called fstrim for this.

[hooverphonique]

Originally Posted by patrik

This is an interesting idea. On Linux you have a command called fstrim for this.

I think a command like this would require the filesystem in question to be able to return a list of unused blocks back to the command. As far as I can see, Amiga filesystems generally don't support a packet that returns this info.

[Rochabian]

Ok i've bought an adapter on Amazon and a 120Go SSD
It's recognized by my SX32 and my TF330
Setup with PFS 3 Aio and a first partition of 2Gb
Copying files from Winuae works but i'm obliged to transfer files with the adapter, it doesn't works if the SSD is directly attached in SATA
I'll try some tests adding some partitions and check if it doesn't get corrupted

As it will be used most of the time in reading mode, i think trim command is not very usefull for me

[demolition]

Originally Posted by Rochabian

As it will be used most of the time in reading mode, i think trim command is not very usefull for me

And if you leave some part of it unwritten, say 10-20%, then performance should not really suffer, and I guess you are not planning on filling a 120GB SSD any time soon. Just remember to only do a quick format so you don't accidentally fill it up (all zeros are also considered data).


But then again, the interface to the Amiga is so slow that even a 100% stuffed SSD should still be able to keep up the speed with erasing cells when you write to it, so I don't really see a reason to worry about trim..

[Rochabian]

Well. it's good in WinUAE but with real hardware it doesn't work

The SX32 shows the partitions but they get corrupted when booting (read errors then unusable )

The TF330 doesn't see the partitions at all....and doesn't boot from SSD

[Rochabian]

Finally i think it's not possible to use a SSD with a SATA to IDE converter on a CD32 without modifying the CD32 rom to have a newer scsi.device that is able to recognize those peripherals. Or a more " Amiga Friendly" version of this adapter perhaps

I've digged in my stock and i've found an old 80GB IDE HDD 2.5" and i think i'll use it for now. I don't think there will be such performance difference

[Puggsy]

Your system wouldn't be able to deal with the necessary "trim" stuff modern OSes do, I would not do that, you'll trash the ssd.

If you are worried about cost, use a SD to IDE adapter instead. SD cards are much cheaper than CF ones.