Although we see Ultrabooks (and other thin and light form factors) as the most likely beneficiaries of mSATA space savings, they don't make great benchmarking platforms for swapping drives in and out. So, we're using an mSATA-to-SATA adapter on our desktop test bed. There is no performance penalty associated with this configuration, since the adapter simply changes the physical interface, not the signaling. As a side benefit, this setup lets us compare mSATA-based drives to larger 2.5" SATA-based SSDs without introducing any other variables.

| Test Hardware | |
|---|---|
| Processor | Intel Core i5-2400 (Sandy Bridge), 32 nm, 3.1 GHz, LGA 1155, 6 MB Shared L3, Turbo Boost Enabled |
| Motherboard | Gigabyte G1.Sniper M3 |
| Memory | Kingston Hyper-X 8 GB (2 x 4 GB) DDR3-1333 @ DDR3-1333, 1.5 V |
| System Drive | OCZ Vertex 3 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s |
| Tested Drives | Adata XPG SX300 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - |
| Adata XPG SX300 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Adata XPG SX300 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Crucial m4 mSATA 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Crucial m4 mSATA 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Crucial m4 mSATA 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Mushkin Atlas m4 mSATA 60 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Mushkin Atlas m4 mSATA 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Mushkin Atlas m4 mSATA 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| OCZ Nocti 120 GB GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Intel SSD 310 80 GB SATA 3Gb/s, Firmware: - | |
| Intel SSD 320 300 GB SATA 3Gb/s, Firmware: 1.92 | |
| Intel SSD 320 80 GB SATA 3Gb/s, Firmware: 1.92 | |
| Intel SSD 330 180 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 300i | |
| Intel SSD 330 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 300i | |
| Samsung 830 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: CXMO | |
| Samsung 830 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: CXMO | |
| Crucial m4 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s Firmware: 0309 | |
| Crucial m4 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s Firmware: 0009 | |
| OCZ Vertex 3 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.15 | |
| OCZ Vertex 3 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.22 | |
| OCZ Vertex 3 60 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.15 | |
| OCZ Agility 3 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.22 | |
| OCZ Agility 3 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.22 | |
| OCZ Agility 3 60 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.22 | |
| OCZ Vertex 4 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 1.5 | |
| OCZ Agility 4 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 1.5 | |
| OCZ Agility 4 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 1.5 | |
| OCZ Vertex 4 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 1.5 | |
| Graphics | Palit GeForce GTX 460 1 GB |
| Power Supply | Seasonic 760 W, 80 PLUS Gold |
| System Software and Drivers | |
| Operating System | Windows 7 x64 Ultimate |
| DirectX | DirectX 11 |
| Driver | Graphics: Nvidia 270.61 RST: 10.6.0.1002 Virtu: 1.1.101 |
| Benchmarks | |
|---|---|
| Tom's Hardware Storage Bench v1.0 | Trace-Based |
| Iometer 1.1.0 | # Workers = 1, 4 KB Random: LBA=8 GB, varying QDs, 128 KB Sequential |
| PCMark 7 | Storage Suite |
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Also the award is something new. I guess the "Recommended" and "Approved" awards are gone for 2013?
Approved is still one of the awards we're using. Recommended Buy is replaced by Smart Buy to better-convey the emphasis on value, and Best Of is replaced by Elite to better convey the emphasis on "this is the best damn product in the segment that we can recommend." Elites will continue to be something you rarely ever see, except when we want to make a point to honor a piece of hardware.
Some discussion of trim, and the effects of using drives with a few days of use would have been good. The assumption is that the 'clean drive' performance tested is a good indicator of what people will see when they've used the drive for a month needs to be tested, the perforamnce order might change sharply. A 6 hour random write workload would go a long way to showing what to expect. Especially given the broken TRIM on SF 5 firmware and the slow speed of the fixes to existing SF drives.
BTW - $179.99 or $0.70/GB (Promo Code: EMCYTZT2757) NewEgg - http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148613 Just noticed the sale from a NewEgg email.
That's a bit crazy I know, but I had originally had it on the underside of an AZRock Z77E-ITX board until that board died.
as I recall it outperforms the M4 and all the drives here.
I love the m4 drives, but now its going to get too much attention.
Because they are pretty much EOL with the 840 series out.
I want to know when AMD laptops are going to start including msata slots... It is the budget laptop guys that would get the best benefit from msata with a standard HDD together...
Cause it's not available in retail.
Cheers,
Andrew Ku
Can anyone explain this please? Would be great if you could also test the Samsung 830 mSATA drive (it exists).
I think this comparison is flawed. The Mushkin SSD test is the Atlas model, which is slower and cheaper than the Mushkin DX-7 Deluxe. The DX-7 would be near or at the top of the list.
Pegger 3D
My bad, It is late and I did not see you were comparing mSSDs.
Pegger 3D
Any thoughts would be greatly appreciated.
I am contemplating buying mSATA drives 240GB-256GB range. It is really becoming confusing to purchase a drive considering so many different specs.
My options are
1) Crucial m4 mSATA 256GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820148613
2) Plextor M5M 256GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820249031
3) Intel SSD 525 240GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820167146
4) Mushkin Enhanced Atlas 240GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16820226321
I have not been able to get a head to head comparison of the drives anywhere. Most of the tech spec shootouts are of these drives against SSDs or older models.
Could you please advise which of these drives in your opinion would be the most eligible buy in a real world consumer scenario..
Cheers....