Reviews - OCZ Synapse SSD cache

[HEXUS]

Cheaper and more flexible than the RevoDrive Hybrid?

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[Ulti]

I think the idea in this is brilliant. For users who don't want to manage their data and handle an SSD this is pretty good. It seems to me that you are paying for the performance of the SSD without having to manually install programs and "maintain" your SSD, allowing you to write everything onto your HDD as usual and letting the SSD automatically boost your PC.

I guess for less tech savvy users it would be great, for example installing this for your parent's pc and not having to worry about it much.

I'm not sure if the capacity will be an issue and how much maintenance is required in the long run so it'll be interesting to see what happens with this "idea".

[Transmitthis]

Intresting.

Would need to know if the SSD could be used as a standalone SSD, if needed.
It would also be nice to be able to force some programs or files to Always be cached - important if the rotating cache is pretty small.

Not keen on the 64GB is really 32GB, as the review points out, that's on the shady side of transparency but we are talking about OCZ

Caching a HDD is a great idea, as it saves on managing the files yourself, which can be pretty tiresome. Also it means that when backing up, you still have only the one drive to clone.

Not sure if OCZ's offering is any better than the Intel® Smart Response Technology, when you consider that motherboards are out with SSD's intergrated and used for cache already, (GIGABYTE Z68XP-UD3-iSSD) for example. I think personally I will wait till I upgrade my socket/MB and then look at it again.

[Kumagoro]

Cache SSDs would be useful in corporate boxes I think. Though it being sandforce and a lot more expensive than an equivalent normal SSD is off putting.

What software is out there which can do the same thing for any SSD? any free ones about?

[KillaKingDL]

I have a question: Can this be used as a cache with raided hdd's? And, can the cache drives themselves be raided? If the answer to both is yes then, once raided, can the synapse cashe then also be attached to raided hdd's?

I pray the answer to all of these is "yes" but fear a hat-trick of "no!'s"

[KillaKingDL]

sorry guys, just answered one of my own questions. On the OCZ website it states they can be added as a cache to an existing raid set-up