How We Examination

Along with an array of flash drives, we've included the Western Digital 4TB 3.5" 7200RPM and Western Digital Velociraptor 1TB x,000RPM difficult drives for comparing'due south sake. Other SSDs tested have controllers from LSI, JMicron, Intel, Marvell, Toshiba and Samsung. Our testing suite consists of four constructed criterion programs along with our own file copying and load time tests.

Every bit yous likely know, while manufacturers merits impressive height I/O operation out of the box, this performance tin can diminish over time. Unlike a conventional hard bulldoze, whatever write functioning made to an SSD is a two-footstep process: a data block must be erased and then written to. Plainly if the drive is new and unused at that place will be null to erase and therefore the first pace can exist bypassed, but this but happens in one case unless the drive is trimmed.

Considering this, nosotros run the Hd Tach total criterion several times to fill the bulldoze before testing. This simulates heavy usage and clearly indicates how performance will be afflicted later normal long-term use.

Nigh drives support the TRIM role, which is meant to annul these negative furnishings.

Test System Specs

  • Intel Cadre i7-4770K (LGA1150)
  • x2 4GB DDR3-1600 G.Skill (CAS eight-8-8-20)
  • Asrock Z97 Extreme6 (Intel Z97)
  • Silverstone Strider Series (700w)
  • Western Digital Black 4TB
  • Western Digital Velociraptor 1TB
  • Plextor M6e 256GB
  • Plextor M6S 256GB
  • Plextor M6M 256GB
  • Samsung SSD 850 Pro 512GB
  • Samsung SSD 840 Pro 512GB
  • Samsung SSD 840 Evo 1TB
  • SanDisk Extreme Two 240GB
  • OCZ RevoDrive 350 480GB
  • OCZ Vector 150 240GB
  • OCZ Vector 512GB
  • OCZ Vertex 460 256GB
  • OCZ Vertex 450 256GB
  • OCZ Vertex 4 256GB
  • OCZ Agility 4 256GB
  • OCZ Octane 512GB
  • Crucial m4 256GB
  • Intel SSD 520 Series 240GB
  • Intel SSD 510 Series 120GB
  • Gainward GeForce GTX 780 (3072MB)

Software

  • Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate SP1 (64-bit)
  • Nvidia Forceware 331.65