OCZ Agility 3 SSD review - SSD Performance PCMark Vantage HDD

PCMark Vantage HDD test suite

PCMark vantage has a very good test suite to benchmark storage performance. The software will look at tasks you normally perform with your PC and will try to measure what kind of an effect that has on your user experience by testing eight different segments, stressing the storage unit.

• HDD1 - Spyware is very common on systems without protection against it, letting Windows Defender scan & protect your system is recommended.
• HDD2 - Streaming data from an HDD in games allows for massive worlds and riveting non-stop action.
• HDD3 - Importing digital photos to Windows Photo Gallery is where a high performance HDD shines.
• HDD4 - Starting Windows Vista is a rather demanding task for the storage device, but a fast HDD will notably decrease the loading time.

The tests include a series of reads, writes and copies under a set of specific conditions and applications.

Now first off, have a very good look at the traditional HDD drive, the Western Digital Velociraptor, it's totally in disarray from the SSD drives. Let's fire up the second round of real-world performance tests:

• HDD5 - Home video editing with Windows Movie Maker can be very time-consuming – unless you have a high performance HDD.
• HDD6 - Windows Media Center with a high performance HDD can handle simultaneous video recording, time-shifting, and streaming to an Extender for Windows Media Center, such as Xbox 360™.
• HDD7 - Cataloguing your music library is a breeze for fast and powerful HDDs.
• HDD8 - Starting various applications can take a long time – unless you have a high performance HDD.

I always mention this, just compare it a little to the Western Digital Velociraptor HDD to visualize and grasp the performance difference. We personally feel that this series of tests is the most representable for real-world performance on your computer. The Agility 3 in real-world perf definitely is a chunk slower then the Vertex 3, but would you ever notice the difference on your PC ? we doubt it.

PCMark Storage Score

Above you can see the overall HDD/SSD score as derived from PCMark Vantage. Again, if there is one test series we feel is a great example of real-world usage, it's this test. And yes look at the WD Velociraptor again, that's score is not a mistake.