Tópico geral dos SSD´s

[Jorge-Vieira]

SP/ Silicon Power Unveils the New Gaming-Grade Solid State Drives ─ Slim S85 & Velox V85

SP/ Silicon Power Unveils the New Gaming-Grade Solid State Drives ─ Slim S85 & Velox V85

Taipei, Taiwan – January 16th, 2015 – SP/ Silicon Power, the world's leading provider of memory storage solutions, today introduces the latest SATA III solid state drives - Slim S85 and Velox V85 with huge capacities up to 960GB. They have also proven to deliver amazing Read/ Write speeds during live tests which massively reduce boot time and enhance system responsiveness. In addition to increased work efficiency and gaming performance, the super slim 7mm height makes Slim S85 and Velox V85 easy to carry and use.
Complete Transformation for Performance, Capacity and Reliability
Engineered with a quality controller and the ultra-fast 6Gbps SATA III interface, Slim S85 and Velox V85 provide amazing Read/Write speeds of 560MB/540MB/sec for ATTO test and 530MB/510MB/sec for CDM (CrystalDiskMark) test*. With such an extraordinary performance, Slim S85 and Velox V85 offer reliable and ultra-fast transmission especially for high-resolution photos, video and multimedia files. This is a comprehensive system transformation for professionals and gaming enthusiasts - instant boot times, incredible data transfer speeds, enhanced multitasking capability, and pro-level reliability. On top of that, 960GB high storage space enables users to move all data from an existing hard drive to the newly installed SSD. You won't be haggling over more room to store games, music, films and applications. Compared to a hard drive, S85 and V85 realize higher stability to be shockproof and vibration-proof for there's no moving part contained. Built with S.M.A.R.T. monitoring system and ECC technology, they offer safe data transmission; meanwhile, Wear Leveling technique promises prolonged lifespan and improved durability.
Flexible Upgrade Solution for Desktops and Laptops
With 64g weight and 7mm height, the newly-launched Slim S85 and Velox V85 target users of ultrabooks and laptops to achieve high portability and usability. Besides, Velox V85 comes with a mounting kit for 3.5" drive bay so it can be installed in laptops, desktops and definitely ultrabooks for different upgrade solutions. Professionals and hardcore PC gamers can get more bang for their bucks! To provide more considerate service and support for customers, both S85 and V85 are backed by a 5-year warranty. These two SSDs are available in 240GB、480GB and 960GB to suit a range of budgets and storage needs. For more information, please visit Silicon Power official website: www.silicon-power.com.
*Note: Transfer rates may vary depending on system platform

Slim S85 & Velox V85 Solid State Drives
Features

• 7mm slim design for ultrabooks and ultra-slim notebooks
• SATA III 6Gbps backwards compatible with SATA II 3Gbps
• ATTO: 560MB/s max. Read speed ; 540MB/s max. Write speed
• CDM: 530MB/s max. Read speed; 510MB/s max. Write speed
• Support TRIM command, NCQ and RAID ready
• Equipped with Wear Leveling to extend endurance
• Implemented with ECC technology to guarantee reliable data transmission
• Built-in with SMART monitoring system
• Low power consumption
• Shockproof and anti-vibration
• No noise, no latency delay and no seek error
• 5-year warranty

Specifications

• Capacity: 240GB/ 480GB/ 960GB
• Dimensions: 100mm x 69.85mm x 7mm
• Weight: 64~77g (depending on model)
• Voltage: 5V
• Vibration Resistance Test: 20G
• Shock Resistance Test: 1500G Max
• Color: Black

Noticia:
http://www.hitechlegion.com/news-pre...-s85-velox-v85

[Jorge-Vieira]

SanDisk CloudSpeed Eco 960GB Enterprise SSD Review

Introduction

image: http://imagescdn.tweaktown.com/conte...ssd-review.jpg

SanDisk offers a complete range of storage offerings that span the entire range of flash products; from the highest capacity PCIe offerings on the market to the highest capacity 4TB SAS SSDs, SanDisk has the bases covered. SanDisk has also pioneered the fusion of flash storage and the low latency memory bus with their revolutionary ULLtraDIMM product, which is covered in our SanDisk ULLtraDIMM DDR3 400GB Enterprise SSD Review.

These high-end solutions provide bleeding edge performance through SAS, PCIe, and memory channels, but SanDisk also provides solutions for the ever-growing 6Gb/s SATA segment. SATA SSDs offer wide compatibility with existing infrastructure, and an economical price point. SanDisk's CloudSpeed SSDs address read-centric and mixed-use workloads with three different offerings. The CloudSpeed Ultra delivers three DWPD (Drive Write Per Day) for heavier workloads and a higher random write speed of 30,000 IOPS, and the CloudSpeed Ascend offers one DWPD with 14,000 IOPS of random write performance. Both of these upper-tier SATA SSDs utilize eMLC to deliver a five-year warranty period.

The CloudSpeed Eco we are evaluating today leverages standard consumer class MLC (cMLC) to deliver the lowest price point, and one DWPD of endurance for a three-year warranty period. The CloudSpeed Eco addresses web servers, web 2.0 content repositories, photo sharing, media streaming, and VOD applications.

The price-sensitive SATA SSD segment values endurance and reliability over raw performance, and the CloudSpeed Eco employs SanDisk's proprietary Guardian Technology Platform to provide power-loss protection, and end-to-end data path protection. The Eco also features a BER of one per 10^17, and a two-million hour MTBF. We take a closer look at the three components of Guardian Technology on the following page.

image: http://imagescdn.tweaktown.com/conte...ssd-review.png

The 6Gb/s SATA CloudSpeed Eco leverages SanDisk's 19nm MLC NAND, and comes in capacities of 240, 480, and 960GB. Random and sequential read performance are crucial in the value segment, and the Eco delivers up to 80,000 random read IOPS and 475 MB/s of sequential read speed. Random write speed weighs in at 14,000 IOPS, and sequential write speeds reach 450 MB/s.

The Eco leverages the Marvell 9189 controller running proprietary SanDisk firmware featuring the Guardian Technology Platform, and 1GB of DDR3-1600 DRAM to deliver a consistent performance profile that offers excellent performance in RAID arrays. The Eco SSDs feature thermal monitoring, which throttles performance if the SSD exceeds the rated thermal envelope.

The CloudSpeed family has progressed through previous CloudSpeed 500 and CloudSpeed 1000E products to the three new models that provide a low price point. Let's take a closer look at the CloudSpeed Eco.


PRICING: You can find the SanDisk CloudSpeed Eco 960GB SSD for sale below. The prices listed are valid at the time of writing, but can change at any time. Click the link to see the very latest pricing for the best deal.

United States: The CloudSpeed Eco 960GB SSD retails for $995.00 at Amazon.

Ver toda a review:
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/691...iew/index.html

[Jorge-Vieira]

Lite-On Introduced World’s First TLC NAND-Based SSD With Advanced LDPC Tech

During a press conference at CES, Lite-On Storage introduced its new CV2 family of solid-state drives packed with next-generation low-density parity-check (LDPC) technology that is said to extend the endurance by up to 33%. The new drives are powered by Marvell’s four-channel 88SS1074 controller with 256-bit AES encryption and DEVSLP and coupled with Toshiba’s A19 NAND.
The result is an SSD that is rated for 2,000 program-erase cycles, comes as 128GB, 256GB, and 512GB capacities, and is backed by a three-year warranty. Sequential read performance tops out at 500 MB/s over SATA 6Gb/s, while random 4KB throughput hits the 100,000 IOPS mark

“Advances in manufacturing technology are responsible for facilitating higher-capacity SSDs at lower prices. The challenge becomes keeping their ones and zeros straight as more bits are stored in each memory cell. Today’s BCH error-correcting codes do a fair job of maintaining reliability, even faced with modern TLC NAND. But LDPC is universally accepted as the future, and Lite-On is leading the charge forward with its CV2 SSD family. The CV2 is built on Marvell’s newest mainstream processor and outfitted with an advanced implementation of LDPC. So, even as you enjoy enthusiast-class responsiveness at value-oriented prices, you can be sure the most cutting-edge storage technology is keeping your data safe.”

No word on pricing or availability yet, but expect both to follow soon.

Noticia:
http://www.eteknix.com/lite-introduc...ced-ldpc-tech/

[Jorge-Vieira]

SSD prices drop as new tech beckons

Recent discussions with memory manufacturers, indicate that there will be more innovation in the Solid State Drive market place in the first half of 2015. None of us know exactly when those improvements will happen, but price drops are normally a good indicator – as older product is cleared from the channel ahead of the ‘cool new stuff’. KitGuru scans the reseller pages for clues.
When KitGuru reported on a strong price push from SSD manufacturers a couple of years ago, SanDisk and Kingston were among the earliest to push out special offers – on their older products.
We then hit an extended period of relative stability.
Indeed, the price of many SSDs actually jumped through the end of 2012 and through to mid-2014 – when a lot of improvements to the underlying technology were released.
Following the Black Friday/Cyber Monday/Boxing Day offers, we’re now seeing stores like eBuyer push through price drops in the order of 10% on 120GB Kingston SSDNow V300 drives (£42), 128GB SanDisk Pulse drives (£44) and 128GB SK hynix SH910A drives (£45).
Overclockers have some interesting pricing on 240/256GB drives, including SK hynix at £85 and Crucial MX100 at £87.
For those of you looking at big SSDs, then the 480GB OCZ Arc 100 is at £175 from OcUK and they are also carrying the Crucial M500 at £180.
Lastly, the chaps over at Dabs seem to have obtained a serious deal from Samsung, with its 1TB EVO 840 drive at just £299.
That’s quite a lot of bargains, so should we be expecting an evolution on the SSD production lines over the next 90 days or so? Time will tell.
Against this backdrop, it’s shocking that so many laptop still ship with scarily slow 5400rpm mechanical disks.
Roll on the next advances, that’s what we say.

Noticia:
http://www.kitguru.net/components/ss...-tech-beckons/

[Winjer]

Belos preços. Fui agora ver umas lojas e encontrei o MX100 de 512GB a 199 euros.

[Jorge-Vieira]

É tendencia é baixar este ano, foi dito na CES que o objectivo era aproximar-se dos preços dos discos mecanicos na relação preço/GB.

[Winjer]

O meu Intel de 180 gb Ainda vai dando para os gastos. Mas se calhar ainda este ano vou fazer o upgrade para uns 500 Gb.
Os 180Gb já começam a ser curtos para alguns jogos.

[Jorge-Vieira]

Review: Plextor M6e Black Edition 256GB PCIe SSD

Plextor M6e, Now Back in Black


Last year, we had the pleasure of checking out Plextor’s M6e SSD which was one of the first PCIe SSDs on the market using the M.2 form factor. At the time we were fairly impressed with the drive as it was a solid offering from Plextor with great performance and a solid warranty to match. Unfortunately, the drive is quite pricey and there’s only marginal performance gains for anyone who couldn’t take advantage of the lightning fast sequential performance offered by the drive.
However, Plextor sees the opportunity in being the first to market with a M.2 based PCIe SSD, so they recently unveiled the Plextor M6e Black Edition, which they claim is faster and more feature filled than the original.
Plextor M6e Black Edition Specifications

Manufacturer	Plextor	Plextor	Plextor
Model	M6e Black Edition	M6e Black Edition	M6e Black Edition
Model Number	PX-AG128M6e	PX-AG256M6e	PX-AG512M6e
Form Factor	HHHL (M.2 2280)	HHHL (M.2 2280)	HHHL (M.2 2280)
Capacity	128GB	256GB	512GB
Controller	Marvell 88SS9183-BNP2	Marvell 88SS9183-BNP2	Marvell 88SS9183-BNP2
NAND	Toshiba A19nm Toggle Mode MLC	Toshiba A19nm Toggle Mode MLC	Toshiba A19nm Toggle Mode MLC
DRAM Cache	256MB DDR3	512MB DDR3	1024MB DDR3
Sequential Reads	770 MB/s	770 MB/s	770 MB/s
Sequential Writes	335 MB/s	580 MB/s	625 MB/s
4K Random Read	96,000	105,000	105,000
4K Random Write	83,000	100,000	100,000
Interface	PCIe Gen 2 x2	PCIe Gen 2 x2	PCIe Gen 2 x2
Warranty	5 Years	5 Years	5 Years

As such, today we’ll be reviewing the Plextor M6e Black Edition. Like the original, the M6e Black Edition will be available in capacities of 128GB, 256GB, and 512GB. Surprisingly, rated performance between the original and the Black Edition are identical as well. However, unlike the original, the Plextor M6e Black Edition will only be available bundled with the HHHL adapter and the adapter is getting a huge “gamer-centric” redesign. There are no plans for a standalone, bare M.2 drive at this time. Plextor will also be including PlexTurbo 2.0 with the M6e Black Edition, which is something we’ll get into a bit later.
In terms of internal components, the Plextor M6e Black Edition is sticking to the same Marvell 9183/Toshiba A19nm Toggle Mode MLC used in the original M6e. This makes sense given that Marvell’s upcoming Altaplus controller will be used in the upcoming Plextor M7e, and Toshiba’s 15nm NAND is still nowhere to be seen.
Warranty on the Plextor M6e Black Edition is a solid 5 years and Plextor doesn’t seem to do any sort of endurance limitation on their drives either. Nice!

Ver toda a review:
http://www.custompcreview.com/review...-review/22806/

[Jorge-Vieira]

Kingston Predator SSD coming in February

M.2 or PCIe, 1500+ MB/s read

Kingston HyperX is a strong brand when it comes to a performance storage and memory components, and now the company has refreshed its SSD offering with the Predator line of SSDs.

The Predator is a quite innovative product with support for some of the latest standards including PCIe 4X and M.2 storage standard. Enthusiasts who have M.2 support on their motherboards will be able to use this standard and those with older boards without M.2 will be able to use PCIe 4x.
The drive comes in 120GB to 960GB capacities and will start shipping in February in 120GB, 240GB and 480GB sizes, while the 960GB variant is expected in Q2 2015. The Predator drive uses Marvell’s X4-lane PCIe SSD Controller 88SS9293 that will enable speeds over 1500MB/s read and around 1000MB/s write. These were the numbers we saw at Kingston's CES booth, but you can expect at least 1400MB/s read and 950MB/s write, which is still significantly faster than the average 2.5-inch SSD SATA 6Gbps drive.


This is faster than most drives on the market and an innovative design that enables both PCIe 4X based optional half-height, half-length (HHHL) card and M.2 connector is definitely a refreshing change in this segment.
There is also a Savage line of refreshed HyperX drives called Savage series that will also come to market in the second quarter of 2015. It is based on the Phison S10 controller and we saw it running in Intel's NUC with Intel Core i5 Processor and 2.5-Inch Drive Support (NUC5i5RYH). The Savage line will replace HyperX 3K drives.

Noticia:
http://www.fudzilla.com/news/memory/...ng-in-february

[LPC]

Boas!
Penso que o caminho que isto está a dar...

A coisa vai acabar assim...

Sata Express não vai ter qualquer expressão e será retirada... Será concerteza substituida mais para a frente pelo SATA IV que deverá duplicar os 6 para 12 gbit´s e tornar-se no mainstream...
No entanto vejo o m.2 ultra (32gbits) a tornar-se a alternativa para os power ssd´s que vão aparecer no mercado...

No fundo esses serão os caros e os outros no formato 2.5 serão o que os discos mecanicos são agora, apenas para os backups e afins dada a sua menor velocidade (e se virmos bem 12gbits é á volta de 1024mb´s por segundo...).

Cumprimentos,

LPC

[Jorge-Vieira]

Samsung T1 Portable SSD review - Introduction

Super small portable storage with scrorching performance

The lads at Samsung figured, hmm ... why just out SSDs for laptops, server and PC solutions ? Our latest tech is affordable, very fast and over USB 3.0 an excellent alternative for storage on the go. As such we review the Samsung T1 Portable SSD, the new portable storage unit allows you to connect it towards USB 3.0, combined with the DNA of an SSD it makes the T1 a VERY fast storage unit. In fact this product houses the very latest 3D Vertical NAND. Our sample has been equipped with a 500 GB NAND flash storage and if you are on the move, this great looking yet very small device might just be what the doctor ordered.
The Samsung T1 Portable SSD external storage drive is at 9mm probably the thinnest external HDD storage unit you have seen to date. And hey now, it is compatible with USB 3.0. USB 3.0 (also known as SuperSpeed USB) has a maximum bandwidth rate of 5 gbps (gigabits per second). That would be to 625 MBps (megabytes per second), ten times faster than USB 2.0 (aka Hi-Speed USB). And yeah at 71mm length it is among the smallest and he thinnest portable SSDs overall (71.0 x 9.2 x 53.2 mm). The first series of drives are available in three volume sizes, 250GB/500GB/1TB. The 250GB starts at roughly 175 EURO. As stated the Samsung T1 Portable SSD has 9.2mm thickness and comes with a nice carbon feel surface that has scratch resistance features. The drive also has a bright LED indicator for indicating power and data transfer status. The T1 uses 3D Vertical NAND (V-NAND) SSD technology that you know from the latest Evo 850 series.
Here's a schocking moment; the drive has sequential read/write speeds of up to 450 megabytes per second (MB/s) on that USB 3.0 super speed interface and random read/write speeds of up to 8,000 inputs/outputs per second (IOPS) and 21,000 IOPS respectively.

Interested already ?, well have a peek with the help of a photo first and then head onwards into the review.

Samsung T1 - 500GB - USB 3.0 - WARNING - photo is larger then the object really is

Toda a review:
http://www.guru3d.com/articles-pages...-review,1.html

[Jorge-Vieira]

Crucial MX100 512GB Review

Introduction:
Crucial is a division of Micron and as such are one of the few companies that are actually making NAND flash memory. This gives them some advantages when it comes to newer types of NAND, smaller manufacturing processes and availability. The MX100 drive we are looking at today will be replaced here in 2015 with their MX200 which will edge it out slightly in the performance department. They will also be releasing an entry-level drive line - the BX100 that will still have very good read speeds, but will be a bit slower in terms of writing performance. The unit we have on our bench is the standard 2.5-in SSD, but as we'll see in the coming months, a lot of companies (including Crucial) are investing a lot of effort and R&D into M.2 and mSATA drives as well.

First Look:
The MX100 is exclusively a 2.5-in SSD that comes in a nice slender form factor. This drive is 7mm in height and comes with a shim to make it standard 9.5mm tall drive. If you have a newer laptop or Ultrabook, you're going to need the 7mm height and this drive will easily slide in and give you half a Terabyte of storage. As you can see below, the bundle is pretty lean as the MX100 package consists of the drive, the aforementioned shim and a full version of Acronis True Image HD that will require you to register to get a full key. This software is worth $30 easily and it is a nice addition to the package.

Check Prices
Samsung 850 Pro 512GB Price: $359.00	Samsung SSD Price: $512.44
Crucial M550 512GB Price: $255.99	Samsung 512GB 2.5IN Price: $338.99

The drive is very plain and the only thing to really note is the label on the bottom that includes the model, serial and part numbers. The entire drive housing is metal and this gives in durability. You'll see in the bottom right corner the "Warranty Void" sticker - that will be removed shortly.

Before we jump into benchmarks and the like, we'll take a quick look inside the drive to find out exactly what Crucial has put together with the MX100 series of SSDs.

Toda a review:
http://bcchardware.com/index.php?opt...5048&Itemid=73

[Jorge-Vieira]

Western Digital readies inexpensive SSDs featuring JMicron controllers

Western Digital Corp. still has not introduced a lineup of its own-brand solid-state drives for consumers, even though the company owns a lot of various SSD-related intellectual property and offers SSDs to corporate users. Nonetheless, the things may change this year as the company is working on solid-state storage devices featuring inexpensive controllers from JMicron.
DigiTimes reports citing Taiwanese local press that JMicron will supply SSD controllers to Adata Technology, Transcend Information and Western Digital this year. While companies like Adata and Transcend use SSD controllers from JMicron for models that address the entry-level segment of the market, companies like Western Digital are not known for usage of such controllers.

Since JMicron’s controllers are used on low-cost solid-state drives, if WD plans to utilise them, then it indicates that the company is working on inexpensive SSDs, which are usually used by consumers. Theoretically, this may mean that the company wants to substantially boost sales of SSDs this year.
Adata, JMicron, Transcend and Western Digital did not comment on the news-story.

Noticia:
http://www.kitguru.net/components/ss...n-controllers/

[Jorge-Vieira]

Plextor M6e Black Edition M.2 PCIe SSD Review

Plextor M6e Black PCIe SSD Review

Plextor made headlines at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this month when they debuted the M6e Black Edition PCI Express Gen 2×2 SSD as well as the M7e PCI Express Gen 2×4 SSD. The Plextor M7e PCIe SSD looked amazing at the show and in CrystalDiskMark it was showing 1411MB/s Sequential Read and 1028MB/s Sequential Write speeds. Those are damn impressive performance numbers, but our sources are skeptical that the Plextor M7e will debut in Q2 2015 and believe that a 2H 2015 launch is most likely. So, if you don’t want to wait around 5 months for the Plextor M7e that means you are left with the Plextor M6e series. The Plextor M6e debuted at CES 2014 and was designed to the first PCIe SSD aimed at gamers with read/write speeds of 770/625MB/s and random read/write speeds of 105K/100K IOPS thanks to the PCIe Gen2 x 2 interface. The M6e 256GB PCIe SSD did okay in our performance review, but the add-in card featured a traditional green PCB and silver back panel bracket. Plextor has come up with the M6e Black Edition PCIe SSD series, which is basically a gamer themed makeover for what was originally a pretty bland card.
image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...es-645x540.jpg

As you can see from the image above the Plextor M6e Black Edition on the bottom certainly looks more gamer-centric than the original M6e on the top. The red heatsink that covers the M.2 SSD is functional and Plextor says that it helps lower the temperature of the SSD by an average of 10C in all three capacities. The only problem with the Plextor M6e Black Edition PCIe SSD is that the hardware specifications are exactly the same as the original. There no performance differences between the M6e and the M6e Black. Both feature server-grade multicore Marvell 88SS9183 controllers with native PCI 2.0 support and feature Toshiba A19 Toggle NAND flash. The Plextor M6e Black PCI Express Series SSD is available in 128GB, 256GB and 512GB capacities, which also remains unchanged.

Plextor M6e vs. M6e Black Performance on a 256GB SSD
Model Name	PX-AG256M6e	PX-256M6e-BK
Capacity	256 GB	256 GB
Buffer	512MB DDR3	512MB DDR3
Warranty	5-Years	5-Years
Read/Write Speed (Under Windows NTFS)
Sequential Read Speed (PCIe Gen II x 2)	Up to 770 MB/s	Up to 770 MB/s
Sequential Write Speed (PCIe Gen II x 2)	Up to 580 MB/s	Up to 580 MB/s
Random Read Speed (IOPS 4KB)	Up to 105,000	Up to 105,000
Random Write Speed (IOPS 4KB)	Up to 100,000	Up to 100,000

It is slightly disappointing that the M6e Black has the same exact speeds as the standard Plextor M6e PCI Express Series SSD is rated at and brings nothing really new to the table other than the PCB is mounted to and the new heatsink. While the performance numbers are exactly the same we have learned that the M6e Black Edition will include PlexTurbo 2.0, the latest generation of solid state memory cache solutions developed by Plextor. This newly developed caching solution will allow power users to increase system memory size by up to 4GB. Additionally, PlexTurbo 2.0 caching utility features data loss protection during sudden power interruptions or system crashes. Plextor believes that caching will improve performance and significantly reduce write usage on the SSD, which in turn improves the longevity of the Flash memory. Unfortunately as you’ll see later in this review the PlexTurbo 2.0 software works with the original M6e drives, so it isn’t a feature that is exclusive to the M6e Black.

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...box-140x82.jpg

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...cie-140x94.jpg

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...et-140x115.jpg

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...end-140x95.jpg

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...top-140x83.jpg

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...ack-140x91.jpg

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...es-140x117.jpg

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...ds-140x106.jpg

image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...ie-140x106.jpg

Our friends at Plextor sent over the M6e Black Edition 256GB PCI Express SSD to try out. Inside the retail packaging you get the drive itself, mounting screws, owners manual and a VIP sticker. The Plesxtor M6e Black Edition PCIe Card features a slick looking read and black color scheme that is sure to be a hit with both gamers and enthusiasts. Plextor did more than just change the color of the PCB though as they have added a standard SATA 15-pin external power header to the top and a 2-pin external LED header for SSD access lighting cues. We aren’t sure how many people will use either of these features, but they are present. Plextor also placed five LED lights (2 yellow and 3 blue) along the top edge of the card that show if the SSD is powered up and the blue lights flash when the drive is being accessed.
image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...-black-led.jpg


Please note that the SATA power connector is only needed when the motherboard PCIe slot is incapable of supplying enough power to the Plextor M6e Black Edition PCIe SSD. We doubt many will need to use this connector, but it is there if needed. The quick installation guide also shows that the external access light is to hook up the PCIe cards access light to the lights on a front panel of a computer.
image: http://www.legitreviews.com/wp-conte...er-645x255.jpg

Here are the internal Lite-On Power consumption numbers for those that are curious about the power differences between the Plextor M6e Black Edition 128GB, 256GB and 512GB PCIe SSDs. For the 256GB card we are looking at in today you can see there it uses 0.13W in sleep mode, 0.60W at idle and then tops out at 3.2W under full load.

To get the most from the Plextor M6e Black Edition drive you need to install Plextool software. A driver disc will come in the retail packaging or you can download the latest version from Plextor’s website. Plextool is basically Plextor’s SSD toolbox and allows you do a number of things with your SSD. The gallery above shows the installation procedure, which is painless and takes just seconds.

Once you get Plextool installed you’ll find the main menu (drive status) is a bit busy, but it shows you all the pertinent information. For example you have the overall capacity of the drive, free space, used space, drive health, interface type, temperature and whether or not TRIM is enabled. Along the bottom of the Plextool Utility there are seven tabs. The info screen basically tells you what drive status menu shows. You can also use Plextool to Secure Format and Firmware Update your SSD. You can also view all the S.M.A.R.T. information of the drive as well as run a diagnostic scan of your drive to check for any issues. Lastly, there is the PlexTurbo tab that you can use on the Plextor M6Pro and M6e series to use system RAM to accelerate read/write performance to reduce duplicate writes to the SSD.

Review:
http://www.legitreviews.com/plextor-...pT7TxaeO2CR.99

[Jorge-Vieira]

Patriot Blaze 120GB Low-Cost SSD Review

Introduction

image: http://imagescdn.tweaktown.com/conte...ssd-review.jpg

We've already published a trio of reviews covering Patriot's new low-cost SSDs from the Torch and Blaze product series. Today we're wrapping things up with a look at the Patriot Blaze 120GB SSD, a low-cost drive that uses a Phison S9 controller.

The Phison S9 was first launched over a year ago for use in cache SSD products. Patriot doesn't mention the cache aspect in the marketing material, and we've learned that several SSDs using the S9 ship in China, where low-cost SSDs outsell big name products daily.

Both the Torch and Blaze 240GB, and larger capacity models, use the Phison S8 controller designed for mainstream users. The S8 also uses a DRAM buffer to increase performance by caching table data, a map of sorts for the location of your data in relation to the flash cells. Because of this, the Torch and Blaze 240GB products perform significantly faster than the 120GB models.


Specifications, Pricing, and Availability

image: http://imagescdn.tweaktown.com/conte...ssd-review.png

The Patriot Blaze ships in four capacities. The 60GB and 120GB models both use Phison S9 controllers, a DRAM-less controller built for cache duty. The 480GB models and the 240GB we're testing today both use Phison S8 controllers with a DRAM buffer.

Patriot claims 545 MB/s sequential read performance for the Blaze 120GB we're testing today, and 430 MB/s sequential write speed. Random performance isn't stated, but we'll find that out in our testing today.

Unlike the Torch products we recently reviewed, the Blaze series ships in a full retail package. This does raise the overall cost slightly. We found the Blaze 120GB online for $69.99, and all capacities in the Blaze series include a three-year warranty.


PRICING: You can find the Patriot Blaze 120GB for sale below. The prices listed are valid at the time of writing, but can change at any time. Click the link to see the very latest pricing for the best deal.

United States: The Patriot Blaze 120GB retails for $83.05 at Amazon.

Canada: The Patriot Blaze 120GB retails for CDN$126.92 at Amazon Canada.


Read more at http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/692...iew/index.html

Toda a review:
http://www.tweaktown.com/reviews/692...iew/index.html