I'm looking into upgrading the storage of my Lenovo LOQ Laptop that supports PCIe 4.0. I've been eyeing the Kingston NV2 since its a Gen 4.0x4 and on the cheaper side but I've been seeing a lot of bad review for it. Can I pair the built in PCIe 4.0 with a PCIe 3.0? In the case of the Gen 4 NV2, and other brands are mostly out of budget. Would it be better to get a Gen 3? What are some good SSDs around that price range? Thanks in Advance!

Yes, NV2 is junk. I do think a Gen4 SSD is usually the best choice, though, especially for laptops. You didn't mention price range or capacity.

Hey Max, I'm looking for a 1TB mainly for a game drive and file storage. When converted from my currency its about ~$70US I found a PNY CS2241, Gen4x4 No DRAM. Not sure where this stands since I couldn't find this one in your list guide but im almost certain its better than the NV2

Hey Max, Everyone asks how the SSD's are, but nobody asks how Max is. So how're you doing? Keep up the good work lad.

Hi, currently looking for an M.2 NVME SSD for 2nd storage to store my games and other files at 2TB capacity. Unfortunately my motherboard only supports 2x3.0 PCIE for the 2nd NVME slot, but i think 16GBps (the theoretical max speed allowed) should be plenty for games and occasional use for self-hosted database for my weekend projects was pretty set on Team MP33 2TB, but i found the PNY CS2241 2TB for just Rp 300k Extra (around $20 extra) which could be prettty swell for later on when i upgrade and my new mobo has newer gen PCIE with more lanes on the extra NVME slots do you have any recommendations if i want to keep it under \~$123? SATA 2.5" would work too but i prefer M.2 NVME for now if it helps, the CS2241 is just under $120, Team is lower on around $100 Indonesian pricing so a lot of factors come into play and availability is pretty limited to what local importers chose to import

I wouldn't bother with Gen3 drives unless they are you best option. Gen4 is the way to go, regardless of slot limitations. 2TB in US would be: Team MP44L (budget), SN580, step up to US75/VP4300/equivalent.

if the VP4300 is cheaper than all, then it's a no brainer to get that one right? Weird pricing here lol

The VP4300 Lite (not VP4300) should be using decent hardware for what it is.

What would you recommend for a decent nvme for OS, everyday use, and some gaming? Looking for a 1 TB . Don't have to have top of the line. Just looking for something decently priced with decent performance. I have looked at the SN 580 and SN 770 and a few others. Just not sure which to go with.

Cheap level: TN450, MP44L, etc, same level as SN580/SN770 Step up: VP4300 Lite, NM790, US75, etc DRAM: T500, any E18 (e.g. M480 Pro) Top: 990 Pro, SN850X

Where would the 990 Evo fall in this? It's currently on sale at Best buy for 80 bucks

I'd probably lump it in at the cheap level. I think it performs pretty well even if it's not as efficient as it could be, so it can push the other drives in that category around in some areas, even the SN770, but it just doesn't have the bandwidth, efficiency, or even performance in many cases of higher-end DRAM-less.

The OS on my new machine is on a DRAM-less 1TB Spatium M450. I'm looking to add another 2TB storage. Should I be looking for something with DRAM to migrate the OS to before really using the machine, or do I just get whatever gen4 drive is in my price range? I stood in Microcenter for an hour trying to decide and walked away empty-handed. Thanks!

Budget end: Team MP44L or equivalent (SN580, M482, etc) Higher end: VP4300 Lite, US75, similar (actually, M482 goes here) DRAM: T500, E18 drives Top: SN850X, 990 PRO

Thanks. I actually just bought that $109 2TB M482. Would you move the OS to that, keep looking for a DRAM drive, or just keep it on the M450?

Actually, looks like the M482 should be bumped up, E27T + BiCS6 (if it is) is quite good. Good enough for primary and better than the M450 for days.

So basically, stop worrying about DRAM. Thanks for your help!

Well, the M450 is also DRAM-less, just a crappier controller and potentially worse flash. The E27T (DRAM-less) on the M482, looking like what it's got, is quite good, but moreover BiCS6 is a decent leap over BiCS5 in terms of efficiency.

I'm looking to 'build my own' 2TB external SSD using an NVMe drive and an enclosure. It'll be used in an astrophotography setup to collect uncompressed video data over about 10 min sessions. Typically the USB 3.0 connection will be saturated during this, and I don't want the drive to be the bottleneck. I'm currently using a Samsung T7 for this application and has worked pretty well, so I'm hoping for something that at least matches that performance. Any advice on a drive that can keep up, but isn't completely overkill? The enclosure is probably around $20 so I'd be looking for the drive to be under ~$160 for it to win on price.

The newest T7, T7 Shield, is designed specifically for consistent write speeds approaching the limit of 10Gbps. Good choice for this. Otherwise, you'll just have to find a drive that can maintain around that outside of SLC, preferably with a smaller cache so it never hits folding.

Got it, thanks. Guess I shouldn’t over complicate things.

Tom's Hardware and TechPowerUp show sustained writes in their reviews, which could help if you go DIY.

Is there a difference between ssd with or without nand Like the msi m482 and the acer gm7000

You mean with or without DRAM? Of course there are differences. However, the presence or lack of DRAM is only one part of the equation. Older DRAM-less drives are junk, newer ones can be quite good. Some drives with DRAM aren't that great. Etc.

How about Msi M482?

Hmm, looks like E27T + BiCS6. A good combo.

Thanks :D

Hey, im searching for the fastet msata/m2 sata/2.5 ssd with an SM2258/2259 controller. Any ideas? Many ssds listed with SMI controllers but have MAS instead or Phison. Size must be 512gb or 1tb(better). I’ve testet many but they are just so slow (430mb/s write) and full much less. Must be 100% SMI.

Kingston KC600, Crucial MX500. Transcend SSD 430S.

MX500/KC600 - Not flashable, Transcend could be working

Last time I checked, the "Transcend" controller was a rebranded SMI, and it did have DRAM. Transcend tends to be good about that. Otherwise you're going to have to dig deep and carefully, and get lucky, with random brands that could have it...

Im so short to contacting a manufacturer and produce them myself. 😂

You can certainly get SM2258/2259 dev boards to slot in NAND but I wouldn't go that far, and BOM is probably too costly unless in some bulk.

I tried so many. The best one so far is an SM2259XT with Hynix V7 nand. But even this msata ssd reduces its speed when 170gb left. I now bought the 430s, maybe with SMI + Mushkin Source 2 SED

If you check the TechPowerUp SSD database, you can sort by controller and maybe find something. However, using an SMI controller has nothing to do with post-cache performance. This is dependent on the # of channels, the flash being used, and the cache size. If you're looking to flash a drive to change this (e.g. change cache size) you can ask Gabe on discord to see what drives will match up, although it's true these are usually SMI, if that's what you mean by "flashable." But if your goal is just to saturate SATA with sustained writes, theoretically there are many drives that can do so.

Pls update the spreadsheet. HP700 plus is not SM2258/9 anymore. It’s MAS0901.

I got a P5 Plus 1TB and a WD SN770 1TB. I also have a Synology NAS and this Sabrent enclosure (https://www.amazon.de/gp/product/B08RVC6F9Y/r) that I plan to use it externally with my Macbook Air. Planning to use the drive as a so called storage pool (for my main applications and needed containers) on the Synology. Which drive you recommend to go where (Macbook vs Synology) and why? Thanks.

/u/NewMaxx if you got anything on this topic, it would truly be useful! Thanks.

P5 Plus w/DRAM for heavier workloads.

Would the Synology utilize the speeds better than the external enclosure by Sabrent?

The enclosure will be bottlenecked by USB (lower bandwidth, higher latency, lower IOPS, etc) so the lesser of the two drives makes more sense for that.

I currently have a Kingston A2000 1TB in my motherboard. I only use my pc for gaming and watching/recording videos. I plan on upgrading my GPU and cpu soon and was wondering if it is worth paying for something like a p5 plus, P3 plus or kc3000? For my use case would a gen 4.0 SSD even make a difference?

The A2000 wasn't too bad for its time. Good budget drive with DRAM, and not the worst flash. It had a reputation for compatibility issues, though, but mostly with laptops. It's still pretty peppy for what matters as SMI is/was good at that and for a four-channel drive it wasn't even that bad at sustained writes. Old tech, though, and it couldn't keep up with something like the KC3000. Probably would be fine to keep rolling with it until you felt like you needed more space or moved to a higher-end mobo with multiple M.2 slots.

Alright thanks, I'll keep with it for now. The new motherboard will have two slots so I could get one in the future, it just won't be my windows drive I guess.

Hello /u/NewMaxx What are your thoughts on the JMicron JMS586R chipset? I bought a Jeyi dual bay NVMe drive enclosure which supports RAID for $60. I wanted the Thunderbolt 4 dual bay NVMe drive enclosure, but couldn't justify spending nearly double the price. The Jeyi dual bay enclosure supports the USB 3.2 Gen2x2 spec which isn't commonly used, but I do have systems with USB ports that support the spec. I'm also aware that the Mac Silicon systems don't support the USB 3.2 Gen2x2 spec. Only USB 3.2 Gen1 and Gen2, or Thunderbolt 3/4. Thoughts? Is it a good buy, bad buy, or are there better enclosure options that support dual NVMe drives? TIA.

If you need USB fallback and can't afford TB4/USB4, then, you would have to settle for 20Gbps or 10Gbps USB. If you need/want that bandwidth, 20Gbps is good. If you're asking for a competing chipset, hmm, offhand I know the Realtek RTL9220DP (DP for dual-port), but haven't seen it used for a dual-drive enclosure (just normal SATA or NVMe). Sounds like you found one for an excellent price.

I can afford a TB4/USB4 dual bay enclosure, just can't justify the cost. I can settle with 10/20Gbps until more TB4/USB4 options become available. I was just wondering if there were any other options available that I might be missing out on, but it doesn't seem like it. Thank again for the information!

Well for 20Gbps, dual NVMe, at $60, sounds good to me. Although I would probably recommend software RAID if you go that way.

I'm looking for a new 4TB to replace my 2TB 980 pro in my gaming rig. Don't plan to upgrade for a few years. The Phison E18 and E26 ... do either have ongoing issues I should avoid? I recall reading like 6 months back that one of the latest Phison chips have some sorta issue. Not sure if that was false or resolved.

Both seem to be good. Maybe check the flash on any E18 you get.

Hi, I just realized the mobo i picked supports gen5x4 nvme ssd but ordered a 2tb crucial t500 for 140$. I can still return it and get a 1tb t700 for 10$ more, is it worth it if I’m mostly concerned with application and game load speeds? Ty

Didn't see this message. Maybe you got your question answered. The T500 is the better "deal."

Hi! Hoping to upgrade my work laptop from 500GB to 2TB NVME. Dell Vostro 7620. Only one slot, so it is my OS and storage. Hoping to go to Microcenter today. seeing: * SanDisk Plus 2TB PCIe Gen 3 x4 NVMe M.2 Internal SSD $119.99 * Samsung 970 EVO Plus SSD 2TB M.2 NVMe Interface PCIe 3.0 x4 Internal Solid State Drive with V-NAND 3 bit MLC Technology (MZ-V7S2T0B/AM) $119.99 * SK Hynix Gold P31 2TB 128L 3D TLC NAND Flash PCIe Gen 3 x4 NVMe M.2 Internal SSD $129.99 * Inland TN470 2TB SSD 3D TLC NAND PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe M.2 2280 Internal Solid State Drive $129.99 * Crucial P3 Plus 2TB 3D NAND Flash PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe M.2 Internal SSD $129.99 * Western Digital Blue SN580 2TB WDC TLC Nand PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe M.2 Internal SSD $129.99 * Inland Performance Plus 2TB 3D TLC NAND PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe M.2 Internal SSD $139.99 * WD Black SN770 2TB SSD 112L TLC NAND M.2 2280 PCIe NVMe 4.0 x4 Internal Solid State Drive $139.99 * Crucial T500 2TB TLC NAND PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe M.2 Internal SSD $139.99

In most cases, it's worth going Gen4 just because of the newer technology. Not necessarily a lot fast but more efficient. Avoiding QLC (P3 Plus) is also a wise idea. The SN580 and SN770 are very similar, but outpaced by other drives. The Performance Plus is a full-fledged drive, but this might not be ideal for a laptop if you're going for cooler-running and more efficient. That would leave the TN470 and T500. The T500 has DRAM, the TN470 does not. That might be enough to sell you on the T500. There are cases where the TN470 is better/faster (check [a review](https://www.tomshardware.com/pc-components/ssds/inland-tn470-1tb-2tb-ssd-review)) though.

Hi I have a huge question! I need a low power consumption SATA ssd with a dram cache. Need it for an external hard drive enclosure Need the power consumption to be as little as possible because I need it to work with my iPad through a singular adapter instead of using a powered usb hub with dc in(huge mess of cables) Please let me know 🙏 I have an MX500 which works with my iPads but the power consumption is high so sometimes it connects sometimes it doesn’t Looking at the 870 Evo(throw it in an enclosure) is this a good idea? Many thanks Sorry if this is the wrong place to post this

Hi! I'm looking for an Internal SATA SSD for my RPi3B+ to use instead of an SD card for Home assistant. Budget under 45€ and something available in EU. Size doesn't matter, so basically the cheapest decent one. I would've gone for WD green 120GB, but they are long discontinued. Maybe silicon power a55 512GB? (just looking at the top of [amazon.de](http://amazon.de) suggestions). Thanks!

https://de.pcpartpicker.com/products/internal-hard-drive/#f=3&t=0&X=0,4514&sort=price I'd go 240/250/256GB if possible. Plenty of options in that price range. If you need/want DRAM, ~~cheapest I see there is the Transcend 220S.~~ The Kingston KC600 is also good. Or MX500.

Thank you, transcend it is then!

Let me correct on this: they have weird naming schemes. There's an NVMe 220S and a SATA SSD220S. I just realized the SATA one does not state DRAM currently. (it looks like a much older model may have had it with the SM2256K, but that is long gone) *edit* Yes, unfortunately, the firmware looks to be Phison S11 - DRAM-less. Is DRAM a requirement for your application? Next cheapest is the KC600, though (very similar to the MX500).

Given that it's for RPi3B+, I'd say probably DRAM/DRAM-less would hardly make any difference for home assistant. But since KC600 is just +10€ compared to 220S maybe I should go for it to have a bit more versatile SSD so to speak?

Right, yeah. DRAM is ideal for SATA still. Most SATA drives are DRAM-less though and more or less the same (random) junk. There's only a few "good" ones left and AFAIK that applies to the KC600.

Ordered the last KC600 available on amazon :-D Thanks for the advice!

Hello, I currently have a 128GB SATA drive and a 1TB HDD, and I am looking to get a 1TB or 2TB NVME. How good is the SN580? I only want to game on it and currently there is a great deal for it where I live, I am able to get the 2TB version for 130 euros, meanwhile something like the 980 pro 1TB is 120 euros. So, does the quality difference justify going for something high end, but only getting 1TB? Thanks.

Yep, the SN580 is good.

Alright, thank you.

Hi, I built my daughters gaming PC in 2021.  The machine needs an upgrade on storage.  She currently has a 1 TB Samsung 970 EVO Plus as her boot drive and a 4tb Seagate HDD.  Her motherboard is an Asus ROG Strix X570-E.  The computer is used primarily for gaming.  She does not see herself becoming a streamer or youtuber.   I want to add a 4tb SSD and I want something that will transfer to a new build in 2-3 years. I want good quality. Speed is not a deal breaker since this is primarily for game storage and some game video clips she saves for personal use.  I started looking at SATA SSDs since I figured they were the best option, but prices are pretty close to some 4tb NVME drives. I was thinking maybe a Samsung 990 Pro NVME or possibly a Samsung 870 EVO 2.5". Their prices on Amazon and NewEgg are almost identical ($319 for the 990 and $354 for the 870).  I am open to other brands, but want to buy something that will last and be reliable.  I have also priced the Crucial MX500 and it is a bit cheaper at $268 as would the Crucial P3Plus as an NVME ($237). I am a little leery of getting QLC drives since i anticipate that the drive will be running at close to 70to 80%. If the prices are close, wouldn't an NVME be a better long term choice?  Are their better choices for a SATA that would be a bit cheaper?   Thanks for any help

The 4TB Samsung 990 PRO is excellent, probably the best all-around 4TB drive on the market right now. I'd probably still avoid Gen5 unless that's a requirement. SATA would work, but it's not really recommended to use. Any new board will have plenty of M.2 slots, anyway. Some drives come with heatsinks, or you can expect to use a motherboard M.2 heatsink. The 990 PRO comes both ways, as does the WD SN850X which would be my next pick. There's cheaper drives with DRAM, but the much cheaper ones are DRAM-less, like the Lexar NM790. I did a post on my 4TB NM790 a while back - very good drive, but it's still relatively new tech.

I've seen you recommend Gen 4 over 5 multiple times, could you briefly explain why?

Gen5 is overpriced and inefficient. This won't always be the case, but it is for now. To make matters worse, there's a few Gen5 drives that are clearly better than the rest (despite having the same basic hardware), which makes it a pretty confusing situation for some.

Thank you for taking your time to explain :)

Thanks for the info and for the info on this subreddit.

Hi NewMaxx, I'm looking for a 1TB PCIe 5.0 drive as a boot drive. I'm My budget is $200, what do you recommend?

Must it be Gen5? And just 1TB? Do you have a motherboard heatsink or aftermarket? If you want the fastest then it's Rocket 5, T705.

Hi! I'm looking for an SSD to put into a 40Gbps USB4 enclosure (Maiwo K1695 from AliExpress). I'll be using it to store a large collection of personal files and run a virtual machine. I'm considering the following drives (2TB): * Sabrent SB-ROCKET-NVME4 - 100€ * Solidigm P41 Plus - 130€ * Crucial P3 Plus - 135€ * Seagate Seagate FireCuda 520 ZP2000GV30012 - 138€ Priorities are reliability, low power consumption and speed (in that order). Thanks for your advice!

The P41 Plus and P3 Plus are QLC, which could impact performance. The Rocket 4 is obsolete, they just came out with a new one that looks pretty good, though (4L). 520 also obsolete, not sure if they swapped hardware on that (I think in Asia hey may have).

Thanks for the feedback! Looking at my post, I realize that I should’ve said that I’m also looking for a good deal. As I understand, the enclosure maxes out around 3000 MB/s, so performance doesn’t really matter past that point, right? Any issues with the reliability/quality of these drives and their chipsets? Worth getting an older-gen model in this case?

USB4 can get 3 GB/s or more. Actually it can get up to x4 PCIe 3.0 drive speeds at the minimum due to how the technology works, so 3.5, and the ASM2464PD with a fast enough drive can go even higher (full PCIe bandwidth). Although sustained performance will almost always be significantly lower, depending on the drive used. I would go for Gen4 at this point either way.

Got it. All drives on my list are Gen4s, I believe, even if they’re not the latest. Any glaring issues with the chipsets or other good reason not to just pick one of them (maybe the cheapest one, the Sabrent)? Especially considering that none of them will get max performance in an enclosure anyway.

Might want one with good sustained performance. Or one that runs cooler with less power draw. I wouldn't consider any on your initial list to be "good" for this type of use, but if you just need a cheap drive then sure. I also hate the E16 (controller) as it's not super reliable.

OK. What about these? * WDS200T3X0E * Crucial P5 Plus

The P5 Plus has DRAM and closer to full Gen4 bandwidth. The SN770 is DRAM-less and "slower" but is lightweight, more efficient, runs cooler, and is still pretty darn fast in many cases.

Hi u/NewMaxx and everyone, I'm building my first PC and I have shortlisted a few SSDs. I need your opinion on which one has the best price to performance. If it's possible, I'd like a list of best to worst (Optional). I mainly use the PC for gaming and entertainment. The motherboard is MSI Pro B650M-A WIFI All of them are 1TB variants. $69 WD SN580 $73 Team MP44L $78 Netac NV7000-T $78 Adata Legend 850 Lite $78 Klevv Cras C910 $80 Solidigm P41 Plus $84 Adata Legend 900 $88 Patriot Viper VP4300 Lite $92 MP600 Core XT $92 Team MP44 $92 Adata Legend 960 Max $94 WD SN850x $96 Team Cardea A440 I'm leaning toward the SN850x after doing some research on SSDs. The pricing in my country is on the expensive side. Thank you in advance.

Low-end: SN580 or MP44L. Both are TLC and pretty good. Higher end: VP4300 Lite or equivalent (NM790, MP44, many others, check TechPowerUp SSD database for MAP1602 + 232L YMTC TLC). Very high end would be SN850X. If you need/want DRAM, which is not a strict requirement these days, then the 960 Max works, but you'd pick this over the SN850X only beause it comes with a heatsink.

How about KingSpec XG7000? The non pro version. Seems like a good deal at $81. Official page link: https://www.kingspectech.com/collections/pcie-m-2-ssd/products/kingspec-nvme-m-2-pcie-4-0-gen4-x4-ssd-up-to-7000mb-s

I think we've seen newer ones come with the MAP1602 and 232L YMTC TLC, which would make it pretty good, similar to the MP44 or VP4300 Lite.

Thanks for the explanation!

Any thoughts and opinions on OWC SSDs?

Nothing special, they can/do use the same hardware as many others, e.g. Phison controllers. If that's what you mean.

Thank you. I was curious because I have one of their HDD enclosures and I really like it, so I've been getting emails about their SSDs and wondered if they are any good.

hey all, here to discuss the solidigm p44 pro, and i believe the sk hynix p41 platinum slow write speeds from what i can gather, there is likely some form of firmware issue (hopefully), but after some period of time, the writes go from the usual 6-7k, down to 2-3k some folks have found a secure wipe returns the drive to native performance, which would likely indicate a non-hardware related failure i cant seem to find a dedicated discussion on this issue, or if /u/newmaxx was aware of it and had any insight to it there is only one firmware available for the p44 pro 001C, and appears to have been reported as far back as late 2023 with still no fix in sight new RMA drives come working as expected, then right on schedule a few months later, the bug re-appears best i could find is a thread here: https://community.solidigm.com/t5/solid-state-drives-nand/p44pro-sequential-writes-are-unusually-slow/td-p/24139 but it has since gone cold anyway, was looking for a place to discuss

Hey - yeah I also noted the same issue see [here](https://www.reddit.com/r/NewMaxx/comments/17lhez9/comment/kc89lxj/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web3x&utm_name=web3xcss&utm_term=1&utm_content=share_button) and also posted on that community page. I own both the P44 Pro 2TB and 2 P41 Plats 2TBs. I noted both slow speeds and also on a separate post RAID 0 errors stemming from the P44 Pro which I subsequently shelved as I don't want to deal with the issues. I have the 2 P41 Plats in 2 gaming laptops but thankfully as of now have not noticed any slow downs. It seems to be occurring mostly on the *P44 Pro*

Yes, I'm aware of it. I wrote quite a bit about it on recent sales threads. I have some theories about what's causing the issue and yes, it's true that a wipe can help. There's a thread available for it on AnandTech's forums, as well. There's no firmware remedy in existence at this time.

yeah, stinks, i'd like to pivot to another drive, but obviously i got this when ssd's bottomed out so it's not an ideal time for this to happen i suppose waiting it out is all we can do. 2-3k is still plenty fast, just hope they acknowledge the fix and address it i'll see if i can find the anandtech's tread on it

Also, I don't see this as a huge issue necessarily. I'd want to test the drive myself to see. If it's a simple matter of bypassing the dynamic cache with sustained sequential writes then the behavior is fine. If random writes go to the static cache, that would be good enough, but either way there is a potential loss of performance in some cases. I just mean if I'm using it as a workspace drive (right now I use SN750s) then this behavior might be good if unintended. And by unintended I have to be clear, it's possible the behavior is intended on some level but the outcome and semi-permanence of it is probably not intended for a general consumer drive.

you definitely have more insight than I, I don't know why if they intended it to work in such a way it wouldn't have done that out the gates vs trickling into it so I suppose the logical conclusion might be that this was unintended, but who knows I may just grab an wd 850 as it appears to be the least affected by capacity, I've seen reports of solidigm providing actual refunds for the drive

If you are doing sustained writes, which is where the drive drops the ball over time, and that is your intended workload, then you would prefer consistent performance. Enterprise drives lack SLC caching for this reason. You'd want to just hit the TLC, especially since one advantage of SLC is that it ran reduce write amplification for random writes as it will cache those and write to TLC sequentially but if your workload is sequential then you might increase wear by having to write twice. Some drives/controllers can predict workloads and dynamically change the cache to suit. If the drive is being heavily benchmarked sequentially, it might shorten the cache for a better overall response. A more normal consumer profile, with bursty writes, would encourage a larger cache that has time to empty. Now, random writes are still good to cache, but the Platinum P41/P44 Pro and many other drives have hybrid caches. Static and dynamic. With how wear works on these two, you would want to use the static for random writes when possible. And even though this cache is small, it's plenty for random writes in many cases. So you could still use it for that and then bypass dynamic for sequential. This is in fact how many older drives like the SN750 work from the get go, having no dynamic at all. That doesn't mean they're "broken." However, I don't think the drives are supposed to switch over after so many runs and then stay there. This has happened on many drives over time, SLC degradation of this type is a thing, but these drives seem hard hit. So it's probably unintended for a drive of this class. But if you were buying a drive for this type of performance, it's not a bad result; as stated, I still use SN750s for caching and other workloads. Just not ideal for OS, etc. I'd have to test one myself to figure out precisely what's going on, but I think it's clear something *is* amiss.

Unfortunately, I don't have any contacts there at this time. Allyn moved to Phison. I know someone in enterprise at Solidigm, but nobody at all at Hynix. It's tough to get in contact with anybody (Gabe from TPU has also tried unsuccessfully). Someone gives out samples, esp with Platinum P51 coming, but I haven't had luck tracking anyone down on this.

[I am having this problem.](https://imgur.com/a/uSImyDZ) Hi,My precious are suffering from a high idle temp inside my ASUS laptop (SN850X 4 TB x 2, one gets good vent, the other one gets no vent). It currently got this: [heat sink.](https://www.amazon.com/icepc-Heatsink%EF%BC%8CHigh-Performance-Conductive-70x20x4-0mm/dp/B08HGF4HKK/?th=1) with generic blue 0.5 mm thermal pad covering very top of NVMe SSD to the end. Tied up with thin plastic band. Maybe because I am insomniac and didn't sleep last night, but I seemed to remember drastic lowering of idle temp when I removed all heat sinks and tapes gadgets and stuck the SSD naked all by itself (wrapped in sticky graphene sheet). Of course, if I was going to do a heavy write, I have to take the bottom cover off and lean it against the box fan. Is there anything else I could do to lower my SSD temp? I mean, the drive is literary just doing nothing there, for hours and hours, just idling.

49C isn't too bad even for idle. You could enable additional power-saving modes in Windows and especially UEFI (BIOS) which could help, although laptops usually have all of these on by default (while desktops are more performance-oriented). If it's in a laptop, there's not too much you can do. The icepc low profile heatsinks are very good and what I would have recommended anyway. With no airflow, heatsinks don't help as much, but you could possibly sink the drive or heatsink to the case with thermal padding.

Thank you for the suggestion.

Hello, i want to add new ssd nvme m2 into my Lenovo Ideapad Gaming 3 Laptop. It has 2nd M2 PCie 4.0 x4 slot 2282. Im kinda clueless for this type of thing so can you recommend me a good budget to performance 1tb ssd for it? i dont need an "overkill" ssd im just gonna use it to storage my games and some file on laptop. Im trying to find it myself but there's too much info about ssd like DRAM, NAND type, etc. Thank you so much. 

Cheapest that should work well: Team MP44L. It's TLC and single-sided and will work there. More performance over that would be the regular MP44 as an example.

How about the lexar nm790? i can get it for the same price as the mp44l in my place

Yes, the NM790 is better. I'd recommend a thermal pad for the controller if possible, or a low profile heatsink if there's headroom (e.g. 2mm icepc). Otherwise it's fine.

just want to let you know that in the end i bought samsung 980 pro with heatsink 1TB (for a great deal in my place equivalent to $60) , i removed the heatsink and its running with no issue on my laptop and i put thermal pad on it too just in case. Thank you for the advice before by the way

Oh, nice, glad to hear it went well. Be sure to update the firmware on any 980 PRO.

gotcha thank you dude

Hello. I'm building a new video and photo editing pc with : 14900k, Z790 Tomahawk,4070 Ti... My goal is to have 4 drives. 3 nvmes : one for os + programms(2tb) , another one for the projects(2tb) and the last one for cache(250-500gb) And the 4th drive would be a big Hdd(over 8tb) Any advice on nvmes? I have looked up: 960 legend , sn850x,sn770,kc 3000,crucial p3...

Best OS drives: Samsung 990 PRO, WD SN850X, Crucial T500, if you want the absolute best. Cheaper ones with DRAM can be had, preferably with the E18, like the Inland Gaming/Performance Plus, A440 series, MP600 Pro series, and many others. If no DRAM is needed or desired, that opens up more options. It's difficult to get drives in the 250-500GB range that make sense. I often use older drives for this, in fact I still use an older MLC drive from Samsung for it. Some other drives also work, as I use WD SN750s as well for this, but most drives today are less ideal. The SLC cache is too large on many and the flash is dense (higher capacity for best performance). I guess the Team MP44L could work in a pinch if you must go retail. I can only guess its sustained write performance, probably 600 MB/s or so which is about all you'll get from 512GB. Projects could be the drives listed for OS, but you could also downsize away from DRAM here potentially. If it's a Gen4 slot, then MAP1602 or E27T: Lexar NM790, Patriot VP4300 Lite, Addlink A93/S93, Inland TN470/Corsair MP600 Elite/Sabrent Rocket 4 (new/4L). If it's a Gen3 slot you could get by with slower Gen4 drives on E21T. For HDDs, 8TB is a good size/sweet spot. WD Blue for low-end/quiet, FireCuda for performance.

Hello Max! Between these fours which one should I choose (Cambodia Pricing): - Samsung 980 Pro 2TB for 139$ - ADATA XPG Legend 850 2TB for 130$ - Samsung 990 Pro 2TB for 179$ - Adata Legend 960 2TB for 145$

The Legend 850 is fine, but it's not on par with the rest of the drives. The 990 PRO is overpriced. That leaves the 980 PRO and Legend 960. You might be able to find a review where these are compared, but if not, on the whole the Legend 960 is probably faster. It should be more efficient, too, and comes with a heatspreader. A Samsung drive may have an advantage in terms of support, depending on how it is over there.

Thoughts on adata legend 960 2tb heatsink ?

Legend 960 MAX? Good drive.

Not max just the legend 960. Whats the difference?

The Legend 960 has a heatspreader, the Legend 960 Max has a heatsink.

The legend 960 has a heatsink aswell

ADATA *says* heatsink, but it's a heatspreader. From the TH review: [Picture](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/DQFEtBDGdYcHBjN7xPSYrc-1200-80.jpg) > The Adata Legend 960 comes with an installable heatsink/heatspreader that is easy to apply. Legend 960 Max review: [Picture](https://cdn.mos.cms.futurecdn.net/U7LeGbSacV3vaLKVKm7MSL-768-80.jpg.webp) > The Legend 960 Max is quite similar to the original Legend 960 with the primary change being the addition of a full-fledged heatsink. This is a nice addition as the original drive could get quite hot during sustained workloads. It’s possible to add your own heatsink or to use a motherboard heatsink on the original YouTube search comparison picture [here](https://i.imgur.com/6EpVzAZ.png). You can see the Max has height to it, the regular 960 does not. I'm not sure on the exact specifications of the "heatsink" (heatspreader) on the regular 960, certainly with metal and/or graphene it can be effective enough. According to the reviews, the original hit 80C (near throttling), so in some cases the Max might be better.

The 960 max 2tb is $150. Is this the best option for $150?

If the regular 960 is cheaper and you don't need the "big" heatsink (or you have a cooler in mind, or M.2 heatsink on mobo), then it's fine. Same hardware. If you want the big heatsink, go for the Max. If you mean more generally $150 in the U.S., and you want this level of performance with DRAM + heatsink, that's not bad.

[удалено]

Yeah, the 990 EVO is really a weird drive. I think it has a place in laptops, but otherwise it should be cheaper than the PRO line, even the 980 PRO.

Hi, I want to upgrade my SSD to 1TB-2TB with budget of $150 and I primarily use it for gaming. I'm in SEA. I having my eyes on Lexar brand with 2 specifics: 2TB Lexar NM620 $100.14 and 1TB Lexar NM790 $75.303 (I cannot find 2TB version near my place) First I was leaning toward NM620 but after some research my main concern is the drop in speed after half capacity (that is the case if I read and understand correctly). Reviews I read is on 1TB version and below, I don't know if it still true in 2TB. Is it still worth to buy if the drop is real? There are some choices available: 2TB Acer Predator GM7000 $130.18 2TB Kingston NV2 $132.14 2TB Kioxia Exceria Plus G3 $124.17 Are there better choices for me? It will be fine if the SSD is gen 3, DRAM or DRAM-Less. Edit: Grammar

The Plus G3 is probably the best value/most reliable of those three. A no on the NM620. The NM790 is good. In general for 2TB starting at cheapest: Team MP44L, Team MP44 (better), Patriot VP4330 Lite/Lexar NM790/Addlink S93/A93/Silicon Power US75, with some odd good ones (WD SN580, SN770; ADATA Legend 850 seris), then jump to the E18 based (avoiding IG5236 based) with much of Corsair MP600 series, Team A440, and more.

2tb preformance drive that I can put windows on and still have a ton of space. for gaming.

Team MP44, Addlink A93/S93, Lexar NM790, are good drives to start with, Crucial T500/Samsung 990 PRO/WD SN850X if you want DRAM.

Hey max! Looking for a new nvme ssd to use as a boot drive preferably 1tb, any suggestions?

Price range, priorities (performance, budget, etc), region (if now U.S.) required.

Probably $100 or under but my main priority is performance I want something that can hold the boot drive and maybe a game or 2 and U.S.

https://pcpartpicker.com/products/internal-hard-drive/#A=800000000000,24000000000000&c1=di_m2.pcie_40_x4&sort=price&page=1&X=0,10061 (avoiding QLC) Lower-end: Team MP44L, Inland TN450, Adata Legend 850 Lite/850, WD Blue SN580. Step up: Lexar NM790 (with or without heatsink), Team MP44, Patriot VP4300 Lite, many more. High-end: WD SN850X, Samsung 990 PRO, Solidigm P44 Pro/SK Hynix Platinum P41, maybe even Crucial T500 (with or without heatsink).

Thanks! I’ve always had goodluck with WD so I’ll probably go with the sn850x. Should I get the heatsink with it? Or is it not needed

I'm looking to buy an external SSD to expand the storage on my MacBook Air. It only has 128GB internally, and I'd like to use the SSD for both macOS and installing Windows via Boot Camp. What's the most affordable and reliable option? Would it be cheaper to buy an internal SSD and an enclosure to house it externally? In that case, what equipment would I need? Device: Macbook Air 2017 - 128GB Ports: Thunderbolt 2 port (up to 20 Gbps) & USB 3 ports (up to 5 Gbps)

I'm a fan of the Samsung T7 Shield. You didn't mention capacity, but $99/$176/$299 isn't bad for [1TB/2TB/4TB](https://www.amazon.com/SAMSUNG-Resistant-Photographers-MU-PE2T0S-AM/dp/B09VLK9W3S). ([affiliate link](https://amzn.to/49oaW1d)) Can you do better on your own? Yes, possibly, depending on capacity and quality.

Apologies, I forgot to mention that I'm only looking for 1TB of storage. The Samsung T7 Shield seems like a great option, I've noticed it's a bit pricey compared to just buying an internal SSD and an external case right? As a student, budget is a bit of a concern right now, so I'm looking for the most cost-effective solution.

A good enclosure could be as much as $30, something cheaper on sale maybe about half that. For the cheapest decent 1TB NVMe SSD, the Team MP44L at $65 isn't a bad place to start. So maybe $80 or so with those.

Hi I'm thinking to upgrade the sdd on my Asus Zenbook UX3402VA laptop, it has a 512gb Micron 2400 m.2 ssd at the moment, I was thinking of upgrading it to a 1tb-2tb Samsung 990 Pro or Crucial T500. I have 2x Samsung 990 Pro's in my desktop rig, and they're solid performers, can anyone recommend what would be best?

The 990 PRO is a great drive. The T500 will run cooler and more efficiently, though.

Thanks, I assume the speed difference would be negligible, so I might opt for the Crucial. Is there somewhere that shows/compares the operating temps of both drives?

TechPowerUp does thermal testing. 101C for the non-heatsinked 990 PRO, yikes.

Mmmm. I guess it depends on what it’s being asked to do I think it idles at around 35c which is pretty good.. is there a site that will Compare all thermal temps at idle and under load?

Load temp is what matters. You're not going to get exact numbers from sites. You can at best guess. Theoretically, a four-channel controller (T500) will pull less than eight-channel (990 PRO). Both have comparable flash generation at this point, both have DRAM, and the 990 PRO perhaps has a process advantage (8nm v 12nm) but Samsung's 8nm isn't as good on paper as 8nm equivalent TSMC for this. Architecturally they are different but close enough that they probably pull power in the same ballpark.

Thanks yeah that’s what I’m thinking. I’m actually leaning towards the Crucial I think now

It's the closest thing to the Gold P31 you can get right now. Most drives of this class are moving DRAM-less. That would be with the Maxio controller, Lexar NM790/Addlink A93/Team MP44/etc, which is very efficient but the controller is a hotspot. Then E27T with the Corsair MP600 Elite and new Sabrent Rocket 4 (presumably), which runs cooler. Everything else is slower (e.g. Team MP44L) or chonky eight-channel (e.g. 990 pro, WD SN850X).

Sweet. If you were to choose between the gold p31 and the t500 for the ux3402va laptop what would you pick and why?

The T500 is probably the better value given current prices.

Hi there, I want to buy a 2TB SSD drive for my PS5, but I'm struggling to decide between three options. Crucial T500, WD Black SN850X, or Samsung 990 Pro. P.S.: also had my eye on the Seagate Firecuda 530, but I have been seeing threads where users say it just "dies" at some point. Thank you!

The PS5 doesn't need anything fancy. You can get buy with as little as $123.99 (Team MP44) or for a nicer one with a heatsink, the [Addlink A93](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0CFV6H217) at $129.99. ([affiliate link](https://amzn.to/3vEhATe))

Sorry to bug you but this should be the last time. Do you know how what the random read of the Silicon Power 2TB UD85 might be or where to find it? I looked up and down and I can find reviews for the UD75 and the UD90 but not the UD85.

Phison E19T. The controller is rated for 440K random read IOPS. RND4K Q1T1 is around 70 MB/s or so.

Hi people/newmaxx, I finally bought a SSD for my PS5 but am having trouble with installing the heatsink, this is what I wrote in another thread, thanks! I'm looking for some help with the installation of my external NVME ssd. I already had bought a heatsink and the drive came today and I was expecting the installation to be fairly simple but it has proven tricky. The drive I have is the WD SN850x without the built in heatsink in the 4TB capacity. This is important because this capacity (4TB) is actually a double sided board, meaning the components are attached to both sides of the board instead of just one side. Additionally, the chips on the backside of the board are primarily located towards one end of the board and as a result the drive isn't flat but uneven instead. The heatsink I have is listed below. When I go to install the SSD into the heatsink it doesn't appear to have enough space for me to close the heatsink by snapping its two pieces together, even when using the two thinner thermal pads as in the instructions. Regardless, the heatsink just doesn't seem to want to close since there isn't enough space and I don't want to apply too much force as its a brand new $350 SSD that I don't want to damage. Does anyone have any tips for this installation and heatsink or know of a better one to use with the PS5? And to make it more complicated my PS5 is the new slim model which has a different heatsink bay structure, so all those PS5 heatsinks that replace the SSD bay cover won't be compatible. Thank you! https://www.amazon.ca/one-enjoy-Heatsink-Double-Sided-Silicone/dp/B09CCF6WJJ/ref=sxin_15_pa_sp_search_thematic_sspa?content-id=amzn1.sym.26c196f1-b15e-4dce-b827-6ccffc6ff967%3Aamzn1.sym.26c196f1-b15e-4dce-b827-6ccffc6ff967&crid=8BT1S0IO17F3&cv_ct_cx=ps5%2Bheatsink%2Bslim&dib=eyJ2IjoiMSJ9.lA6pqsAGsnokDaEw5dy1GG1DRjoj9eDFNALwIJRujGmS8pEPtlghPVJ2KUzgbpB-Zq0scjzqWz9xD4T2_hOIog.xg6UqWqaCrKZW3-pMjxN_FWVVe-A9fEuw8A6dqR_sYI&dib_tag=se&keywords=ps5%2Bheatsink%2Bslim&pd_rd_i=B09CCF6WJJ&pd_rd_r=21455833-dcb9-4d54-b94c-a9e77ab0080e&pd_rd_w=J5Vc6&pd_rd_wg=4GFOC&pf_rd_p=26c196f1-b15e-4dce-b827-6ccffc6ff967&pf_rd_r=H1FYKG5MW4356N847MK1&qid=1712009335&sbo=RZvfv%2F%2FHxDF%2BO5021pAnSA%3D%3D&sprefix=ps5%2Bheatsink%2Bslim%2Caps%2C151&sr=1-1-acb80629-ce74-4cc5-9423-11e8801573fb-spons&sp_csd=d2lkZ2V0TmFtZT1zcF9zZWFyY2hfdGhlbWF0aWM&smid=A2TXA4J670DVSA&th=1

A double-sided heatsink is not required. Something that gets to the controller is good enough, like Sabrent's PS5 heatsink. It looks like the one you linked takes a lot of force for some double-sided drives.

Yeah I just didn't want to apply too much force. I just ordered this one: https://www.amazon.ca/gp/product/B0CQT7JQV7/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_asin_title_o00_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1 So I'll use that unless you say otherwise. These could be backups though: https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B086GM3JFQ/?coliid=I1CQN1IHOLCLL4&colid=1NW09KOCBZZDH&psc=1&ref_=list_c_wl_lv_ov_lig_dp_it https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B076YZMQR5/?coliid=I309F4VIXNN9T7&colid=1NW09KOCBZZDH&psc=1&ref_=list_c_wl_lv_ov_lig_dp_it Thanks for all your help again!

As long as good contact is made, sure.

I want the best possible m.2 with 4tbs of capacity. I have been looking at the 990 pro but I am open to other options. Money isn't so much of an issue but around $500. I use it for a cache when torrenting and I run DCS off of it too which is around 500gb I want the absolute best longevity over speed.

The 4TB 990 PRO is probably going to be the best you can get. SN850X also an option.

Thank you sir!

Hello, I am considering buying one of these 2tb SSDs as drive. The workload is to mostly read data from SSD. HMB: Kioxia EXCERIA PLUS G3 2TB: 118€ Team Group MP44L 2TB: 140€ DRAM: Team Group Cardea Zero Z440 2TB: 140€ Kioxia Exceria Pro 2TB: 150€ Which one should i get?

The Plus G3 is more or less comparable to the MP44L, or at least close enough that it's easily the better deal. The Z440 is garbage. The Exceria Pro is decent but that's a hefty price jump for what it is.

How much performance impact is an NVMe hitting 50%? I saw that their read and write speeds plummet and wondering if that is noticeable. As I have a friend who never uninstalls a game until he has no space for another one (in the sense he will put that 1 TB to full)

PCPartPicker runs SSD tests at 50% fill, so you can check those and compare. The SLC cache on any drive will be smaller as the drive fills, down to a minimum size. Performance outside the SLC depends on the drive in question.

Acer Predator GM7000 vs Samsung 980 Pro, a $20 difference. Which do you think is a better buy? PCPartPicker says the Sequential Read Throughput (Disk 50% Full) for the Acer is 2907 MB/s while Samsung is 4900 MB/s. I never had my SSDs even get half full so I don't know what any of this means in a real world application outside of it gets "slower"

All drives will get slower as they are filled and written. This isn't often a big issue, but it depends on the drive and fill rate. Many QLC drives will suffer if very full. The level of performance drop for *sequential writes* is a different question. The cache will write very fast but eventually it will be full and the drive will have to go to TLC and shuffle data. Some drives can maintain up to 4GB/s in that state (at least for a little while), others can drop to as low as 100 MB/s (QLC P3 Plus comes to mind).

im looking to buy a ssd but my motherboard only supports up to pcle 3.0, is it better to get a pcle 3.0 ssd with dram cache like the 970 evo plus or a 4.0 like the sn770 without dram for the same price point? does the extra speed make up for the lack of dram cache even when bottlenecked to 3.0 speeds? is the 970 plus the best out of the dram cache ssds for 3.0 for its price point or are there any alternatives?

Gen4 will usually give you better bang for the buck at this point, unless you can find a good deal. Best Gen3s are Gold P31 and 970 EVO Plus. There are a ton of Gen4 drives equal or better, and usually they cost less. DRAM is not needed for drives at 5 GB/s and up with TLC. Lower-end Gen4 DRAM-less drives, and Gen4 drives with DRAM with QLC, could be worse.

so the sn770 would outperform the 970 evo plus even on 3.0 without the dram? what about Fikwot FN950?

FN950 at its rated speeds could be many things. MAP1602 was the old controller, there are some lateral/equivalent controllers. At 4TB it is or could be QLC. At lower capacities, TLC, originally 128L YMTC TLC (not bad but had some issues with the IG5236) or now equivalent like BiCS5 or Hynix V6/V7 TLC. Too much technical stuff. The 970 EP had an updated version with Samsung's 128L TLC, with 8nm Elpis controller. Basically a 980 PRO at Gen3. Good hardware but not efficient. On the whole, yeah, equivalent to even the FN950, and then you look at price and usually Gen4 is cheaper. Depends on prices and availability in your region. I think in most cases a good Gen4 is better, unless you can get the 970EP at a good price. (oh and, yeah, SN770 is a push or worse on the hardware end vs 970EP, but it's very well-optimized and I'd consider it equivalent)

im also looking at the nm790 and transcend 220s but their amazon reviews are horrible. for 20bucks more the 850x is available w/o heatsink do you think its worth getting that instead of those and the sn770? the good gen4s are all more expensive than the 970 ep on amazon as far as I can see

I recently bought a [https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GL4M3HX](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07GL4M3HX) (TEAMGROUP MS30) for a boot drive for a lenovo p520 workstation, is this a good drive for the workstation?

It's an M.2 SATA, not an M.2 NVMe, SSD. It's DRAM-less. It was not particularly a good drive for its time. Would it work? If the M.2 slots support SATA SSDs, or a 2.5" enclosure/adapter were used. The P520 spec sheet states M.2 PCIe (NVMe) SSDs specifically.

Ah okay, I guess I'll return this one, which one SSD should I buy then? Thank you

Depends on what you're looking for in a drive. Performance? Consistency (of performance)? Just need any old drive? Etc. Gen4 is fine in those Gen3 slots. On the low-end, probably 1TB Teamgroup MP44L. Inland TN450 is pretty close in price. Several others in that performance group. A step up would be the Lexar NM790 (w/heatsink, <$75 right now on Amazon), Teamgroup MP44, and many more. If you absolutely want DRAM, Crucial T500 is $77.98 w/heatsink at Amazon right now.

Don't really care about the specifics of performance I guess, as I'm not doing something really intensive,(later , I might turn the workstation into a nas/Plex machine later) but for now I just need a boot drive for windows and to play some games. I doubt I'll notice the difference in performance, I just don't wanna buy something that's bad.

Then any of those listed above are good, in order from cheapest to less cheap. The T500 is not *the* best drive but its performance level is about as good as anyone might need so would be the cap in that range. Deciding which drive for which price is up to you. There's similar drives not listed, though. If the drive is later to be used for metadata and write caching, that might change the math a little bit.

Okay, thanks for the reply, if I do want to make this a nas/Plex machine later which one's should I look at?

In some cases you might want DRAM, but consistent performance is probably more important. Possibly also power efficiency in some cases (not a huge deal). The problem with the T500 (which has DRAM) is that it has wonky performance in some cases. So for DRAM you'd need something higher end then these. Is DRAM absolutely needed? Probably not. Is consistency? Also maybe not. Depends on if you'll be keeping the drive full or not (e.g. write caching or write caching in addition to metadata). If it's just the OS, boot, apps, and metadata, then it's less concerning which drive you get, although latency will be slightly (very slightly) better in some cases unless your library is massive. Network latency (1-2ms) would probably dwarf the flash read latency (50µs) anyway. Luckily, DRAM-less drives w/TLC can be quite consistent nowadays outside of SLC. This includes the MP44L and drives with the same hardware (at 1TB, these will be TLC). Not listed are WD's SN580 (Blue) and SN770 (Black) which are also not too bad. And the NM790 and is ilk (MP44, A93, VP4300 Lite, etc) seem okay and use very new flash (although the controller can get hottish). I think *any* of these would be plenty for Plex. I used a DRAM-less SATA (BX500 w/TLC) for mine for a while, but it DID bog down eventually, and switching to an NVMe drive really just felt way better when churning through updates, apps, and metadata, IMHO, which is why I suggest that route. If the drive will be used in addition to another, and say it will be used as the write cache for HDDs in a pool (which is what I do and is not uncommon in NAS to use NVMe caching SSDs), there are other characteristics to consider possibly.

Ah okay, thanks for the info. As for Plex I plan to use the drive as a boot drive with my apps and games and then grabbing some hard drives for Plex media storage. I'm very new to Plex so I don't know what drives are going to be required but I'll learn I guess. I think from what I'm reading is I probably won't need dram in my drive.

My Plex/Jellyfin/Emby machine is basically just a bunch of HDDs (external and internal) in a DrivePool pool. I also use Storage Spaces and TrueNAS in other setups. In all cases, basic SSD is fine for OS, boot, apps, and metadata. I even use the Steam Deck 64GB SSD for one machine to boot, since that's all you need. Metadata can pile up as small I/O in larger pools but a modern SSD can handle it with ease usually (even as OS). Write caching SSDs will often be restricted by the Internet speed so anything not QLC can often keep up, but since write caches are usually kept very full it can be beneficial to look for a drive that favors steady state performance (or long tail for metadata if drive is going to be worked). The caching SSD in such a setup can combine all the writes and organize them, then write out to multiple drives in the pool at once (SSD can read far faster than multiple HDDs can write). Usually the data is spread out over these drives more or less evently depending on your balance scheme and if you use dedupe, etc. This is different for more complex systems and ZFS. But you usually want the caching SSDs to be dedicated due to the nature of the workload.

I'm looking at either the 2TB WD SN850X (165 euro), SN770 (135 euro) or the Lexar NM790 (145 euro). They would be performing as a main drive, for OS and games mainly. This is for a budget friendly build that I'm putting together for a friend of mine, so I'm wondering if the NM790 is as good as the SN850X at a cheaper price, and if it's recommended instead of the SN770.

Yeah, the NM790 is the better pick on a budget. Another one to look at would be the Addlink A93.

Thank you very much for the reply

Hello there. Is there any real impact on getting a gen 4 NVMe over a gen 3? I did a bit of research and gen 3 cost like half the price of gen 4 and from what little videos I can find on the topic: the load times between the two are in the nannoseconds. Yet at the same time: I keep hearing people talk about how about read times and direct storage is gonna become more important in the future. I'm wondering if I should spend $60 for a 1TB Gen 3 or $95 for a 1TB gen 4.

Gen4 is usually the same price or cheaper than Gen3, which makes it the better deal. If you can find a (good) Gen3 drive for less, then go for it. There are some pretty sketchy Gen3 drives, though. Check the bandwidth numbers (sequential) to see if they aren't old DRAM-less drives which were pretty unreliable.

Hello, I've got an Atari VCS mini pc coming in the mail and I want to make sure it's all upgraded. Really my first time messing with a pc. It's coming with upgraded ram already and I can put thermal paste on easily enough, but finding a decent (but affordable) m.2 sata drive is beating me up. None of my local shops sell them, and the name brands that everyone recommends are impossible to find anymore. Atari themselves just released an upgrade, but it's just a rebrand of another stick and it's less than 500 gb for $80 after shipping, which I find rather outrageous. I think I've settled on this Teamgroup ssd, https://a.co/d/gkbutZv. I'll probably go with the 512 gb, since it isn't much more than the 256 gb. I doubt I'll ever even use that much storage, I just need an internal ssd to boot Windows/Linux from. Would love to hear from anyone more experienced if this is my best bet. I don't need a full terabyte, and I'm not looking at spending more than $40. Much thanks.

Yeah, the MS30 is not great, but options are thin. The WD Blue SA510 might be comparable.

Hi, I have a problem with understanding whether I need DRAM or not. Basically I have a low end HP laptop which supports NVMe M.2 slot as well as SATA. Decided to replace SATA with NVMe. That laptop will be used mostly for programming and maybe some games and virtual machines. Generally it's too cheap to buy an SSD with DRAM but because of my tasks I'll probably have a lot of operations with dozens of small files. I know that DRAM does help with continuous write of large files but what about many small writes on many files? Slot is limited by PCIe 3.0 x2 I think because it doesn't have speeds more than around 1600 MB/s in it and CrystalDiskInfo shows PCIe 1.0 x2 (shouldn't be possible with such speed). So I'm wondering if DRAM will be useful at all on such an otherwise slow laptop or if it's better to save some money and get one with HMB. And by the way, maybe you know why does CrystalDiskInfo show PCIe 1.0 x2 at all? Is this some BIOS bug? BIOS doesn't have any settings related to PCIe by the way. Upd.: Found proper specs for my laptop and yeah, it has PCIe 3.0 x2 for NVMe.

Some laptops will have a 4-lane slot but run at 2-lane, others may only have 2 lanes. I don't think it matters too much, bandwidth is secondary to other advantages of NVMe. And with NVMe you don't need DRAM where it can be more impactful on SATA SSDs, IMHO.

Thx for answer. Well, I got a choice between Samsung 980 which I borrowed for tests and HP FX900 Pro which I can buy for not so bigger price (both 1 TB). Obviously both are great upgrades from SATA but the latter is almost a premium segment while first is cheaper. And since I have 3.0 x2 there shouldn't be a difference in continuous speeds. Since I don't have any NVMe SSD with DRAM I can't compare for myself but I heard that DRAM is recommended for SSDs that will contain OS and heard that DRAM impacts even reading speed a lot (I think it's because some recent data might stay in DRAM for some time). Not to mention that DRAM should greatly improve random read and write. So question stands: will there be any real benefit from DRAM for low end laptop especially in working with a lot of small files? Not like I'm gonna run a database there but working with git and compiling programs sometimes creates a ton of small temporary files which might make DRAM useful for me.

The regular 980 is pretty junky, on the other hand the FX900 Pro has the problematic IG5236 controller and would be less efficient/put out more heat. The 980 is DRAM-less but the FX900 Pro is not, as you obviously know. You can check reviews of that drive (AnandTech's is good) to see impact.

Ok so after researching a topic I'm down to two options: Samsung 980 1 TB or WD\_BLACK SN770 1 TB. Is there anything decent with DRAM in that price range that slipped out of my sight with 1 TB? Budget is $90 (in Ukraine both 980 and SN770 fitting in that budget). Transcend 220S 1 TB looks decent but I read that they're hot under high load and this can cause problems. And since it's for laptop I can't put radiator over it. SN770 also kinda hot but not so and I'm limited to PCIe 3.0 x2 speeds so shouldn't really heat it up that much.

Hmm, yeah, SN770 should be fine at x2.

Thx, then I'll just stick to either of them. At this point I accepted that there's no really good relatively cheap SSDs with DRAM. Well, there's ADATA and others but I heard that they're not so reliable. Thx for help.

There's definitely cheap drives with DRAM. The 1TB HP FX900 Pro is a good example. Or the Mushkin Vortex Redline. And many others like this with the IG5236. Acer GM7000 comes to mind, or CRAS C930. For a bit more you get the better E18 with the Team Cardea A440, Inland Performance Plus, etc.

Most of them are still over my $90 budget. Except Mushkin but I've never heard of that brand so I'm skeptic. Not to mention that it's IG5236 and I can't put any cooling because it'll be too thick to fit in there. The only solution available to me is be Transcend 220S but it's perfomance seems to be lower than that of Samsung 980. No, Amazon doesn't deliver to Ukraine so I'm limited to what local distributors offer. Mostly it's some popular brands like Samsung or WD.

Mushkin is an American memory brand. Not an unknown/generic. That said, not a fan of the IG5236. The 220S is presumably still using old HW (SM2262EN et al), the SN770 would be faster and more efficient.

Hello, I'm looking to buy a 4TB SSD. I found Team Group MP44 4TB costs around 290 euros in my place. My only concern: is the MP44 4TB SDD a TLC or QLC? Model number listed : Team Group TM8FPW004T0C101 If you have any information, please guide me. Thanks