SSDs are typically great at random reads, but not so good at random writes, particularly when you start rewriting the device (see http://www.acunu.com/2011/04/l

SSDs are typically great at random reads, but not so good at random writes, particularly when you start rewriting the device (see http://www.acunu.com/2011/04/log-file-systems-and-ssds-made-for-each-other/ http://www.acunu.com/2011/04/log-file-systems-and-ssds-made-...). The attraction of append-only structures is in alleviating the random writes; but you still need to be careful. For example, CoW trees and log file systems often have a big space blowup, which translates into a slowdown in insert rate, and potentially random IO in the log cleaner/GC. That's a scenario in which the Stratified B-tree does a lot better.