SSD testing tools

[blueznl]

I'm typically not very active in here anymore - as I'm just too busy with other stuff - but I do write my own tools whenever I need them.

Now, I wasn't planning to write anything for testing SSDs, but I just can't find something simple that helps me testing SSDs during long, extended periods of writing. (I found SlowMark, which is getting close.)

Does anyone know of a decent tool that helps me deduce behavior of an SSD once it runs out of buffer? (I know and tried Atto, ASSD, CrystalDiskMark, the usual suspects.)

It's probably not that hard to write, but I feel a little lazy, and someone must have written something better than I ever could

[User_Russian]

it runs out of buffer?

Do you mean SLC cache?
There are applications Aida64 and Victoria which can write the entire volume of an SSD and display a graph of the write speed.

[blueznl]

Yeah, stuff like that. But I'd prefer some free tool.

[andrillcaptai]

Good question — most common benchmarks don’t sustain writes long enough to show post-cache SSD behavior.

If you just want to observe how throughput drops once the SLC cache is full, try these:

- Fio (Linux/Windows): flexible, scriptable, great for long sequential or random write tests.
- Iometer: older but still solid for extended custom workloads.
- DiskSpd (Microsoft): good Windows command-line tool; you can define long-running write tests.
- Anvil’s Storage Utilities or HD Tune Pro can help visualize performance over time, though they’re less flexible.

If you want the clearest data, use fio — you can sustain writes for hours and log IOPS or MB/s to see exactly when the cache gives out.