AS SSD:
AS SSD is a relatively new benchmark designed specifically for solid state drives. The application contains five synthetic tests used to determine the sequential and random read and write performance of a drive.
AS SSD also includes a copy benchmark. This test copies an ISO (two large files), program (many small files) and game (small and large files), returning the speed and duration of each.
HD Tune Pro 4.61:
Next, I ran a series of tests using HD Tune Pro. This hard disk utility measures a drive's performance by testing its sequential read and write speeds as well as its access time, burst rate and CPU usage. For this review, I'm also going to use it to benchmark the V30's random read and write speeds, random access times and the number of operations per second.
 Silicon Power V30 120GB - HD Tune Read Benchmark |
 OCZ Agility 3 120GB - HD Tune Read Benchmark |
 Silicon Power V30 120GB - HD Tune Write Benchmark |
 OCZ Agility 3 120GB - HD Tune Write Benchmark |
The V30 performed very well when benchmarked with HD Tune. The drive had average read and write speeds of 491.4 MB/s and 409.2 MB/s, respectively, as well as a burst rate of 329.6 MB/s when reading.
 Silicon Power V30 120GB - HD Tune Random Access Read |
 OCZ Agility 3 120GB - HD Tune Random Access Read |
 Silicon Power V30 120GB - HD Tune Random Access Write |
 OCZ Agility 3 120GB - HD Tune Random Access Write |
The V30 didn't disappoint when doing random reads and writes. When reading 4KB blocks, the drive reached 12697 IOPS and had an average speed of 49.601 MB/s. The V30 was even faster when writing, reaching 16523 IOPS with an average speed of 64.544 MB/s.
Iometer:
Lastly, I ran a series of tests using Iometer. This tool can be configured to benchmark a number of things. In this case, I used it to measure the V30's read and write speeds and the number of operations per second. The tests were run using random bytes and a queue depth of 3.
The V30's performance was very similar to what we saw in our other tests. With highly compressible, repeating data, the drive was able to read at 501.01 MB/s and write at 460.06 MB/s. When tested with random data, the drive's read and write speeds dropped to 199.27 MB/s and 138.07 MB/s, respectively.
The V30 did not perform as well as some of the other SandForce-based drives when doing random reads and writes. Even with repeating data, it reached a maximum writing speed of only 144.41 MB/s.
According to Silicon Power, the V30 can deliver a maximum of 85,000 IOPS when randomly writing 4K blocks. The drive came no where near this number in our tests, reaching 33,841 IOPS with random data and 36,968 IOPS with repeating data.
