128 KB Sequential Write
This is where the analysis gets more complicated. When we tested SanDisk's Extreme II, our Iometer-based setup yielded specific, detrimental results. They weren't terrible, but we did notice that a larger-than-typical LBA range upset the drives. We suspect their behavior was attributable to SanDisk's nCache technology.
In the same way, the length of the testing at each queue depth means our results are stacked against the 840 EVO's maximum speed, penalizing the larger models due to their comparatively larger Turbo Write caches.
Take the 120 GB 840 EVO as an example. It should be hitting ~400 MB/s. But as I explained, it sets aside 9 GB of capacity to cache 3 GB of writes. Overflow is written to the remaining three-bit-per-cell memory at a slower rate. Samsung's 250 GB 840 EVO starts almost 100 MB/s faster. If we stopped this test after just a couple of seconds, though, you'd see throughput closer to 500 MB/s since the cache wouldn't be full yet.
The 500 GB and 1 TB versions can't quite hit the 500+ MB/s we'd expect because, again, we're exceeding the capacity of their respective caches. But more space set aside and additional parallelism facilitate results that come closer to Samsung's maximum specified Turbo numbers.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, the 120 GB 840 EVO butts up against the 250 GB 840. Samsung's older drive doesn't enjoy the faster controller frequency or on-drive caching. Those features help the 120 GB 840 EVO almost keep up with a vanilla 840 almost twice its size.
The 250 GB 840 EVO matches Intel's SSD 335 working on non-compressible data, and the two larger 840 EVOs nearly claim top positions through our test.

Samsung's Turbo Write technology propels the 120 GB 840 EVO into a spot between the 250 and 120 GB 840s. The 250 GB 840 EVO is sandwiched between a pair of Intel drives.
The 840 EVOs don't achieve their maximum numbers in our Iometer test, but 460 MB/s certainly isn't an outcome we'd dismiss.
- The Evolution Of Samsung As An SSD Giant
- The 840 EVO's Bag Of New Tricks
- Inside Samsung's 840 EVO
- Test Setup And Benchmarks
- Results: 128 KB Sequential Reads
- Results: 128 KB Sequential Writes
- Results: 4 KB Random Reads
- Results: 4 KB Random Writes
- Results: Tom's Hardware Storage Bench v1.0
- Results: Tom's Hardware Storage Bench, Continued
- Results: PCMark 7 And PCMark Vantage
- Results: Robocopy File Copy Performance
- Results: Power Consumption
- A Look At Samsung Magician's RAPID Feature
- Samsung's 840 Was Good; The 840 EVO Is Better

While the 1TB drive coming down to ~65c/GB is nice, seeing the 120 GB drives get near there would be nice. Especially since this is meant to be the value king.
I got them on a sale on Newegg for around $500 for both of them.
A 1TB would be cool if I find it on sale....
or maybe I should try out writing a letter to someone fat in some weird red costume...
Samsung: I need this drive with 2 SATA connectors so it makes possible to create a virtual RAID, and squeeze the drive performance.
Is clear that newer drivers are bottlenecked by the fastest SATA, so out of PCIE drives, virtual RAIDS are necessary.
Regards,
C. Ryan