Samsung 840 Pro SSD: More Speed, Less Power, And Toggle-Mode 2.0

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Samsung is taking the wraps off its new flagship 840 Pro SSD. It's promising better performance, lower power consumption, a five-year warranty, and aggressive pricing. Is such a compelling combination of benefits really possible in such a crowded market?

Test Setup And Benchmarks

We upgraded our storage platform's motherboard to Gigabyte's G1.Sniper M3, hoping to tinker around with HD Graphics 4000 for an image quality story. However, we still wanted to keep our SSD results as comparable to previous findings as possible. So, we're still using Intel's Core i5-2400 for testing.

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Test Hardware
ProcessorIntel Core i5-2400 (Sandy Bridge), 32 nm, 3.1 GHz, LGA 1155, 6 MB Shared L3, Turbo Boost Enabled
MotherboardGigabyte G1.Sniper M3
MemoryKingston Hyper-X 8 GB (2 x 4 GB) DDR3-1333 @ DDR3-1333, 1.5 V
System DriveOCZ Vertex 3 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s
Tested DrivesIntel SSD 320 300 GB SATA 3Gb/s, Firmware: 1.92
Row 5 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 320 80 GB SATA 3Gb/s, Firmware: 1.92
Row 6 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 330 180 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 300i
Row 7 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 330 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 300i
Row 8 - Cell 0 Samsung 830 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: CXMO
Row 9 - Cell 0 Samsung 830 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: CXMO
Row 10 - Cell 0 Crucial m4 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s Firmware: 0309
Row 11 - Cell 0 Crucial m4 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s Firmware: 0009
Row 12 - Cell 0 OCZ Vertex 3 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.15
Row 13 - Cell 0 OCZ Vertex 3 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.22
Row 14 - Cell 0 OCZ Vertex 3 60 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.15
Row 15 - Cell 0 OCZ Agility 3 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.22
Row 16 - Cell 0 OCZ Agility 3 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.22
Row 17 - Cell 0 OCZ Agility 3 60 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.22
Row 18 - Cell 0 OCZ Vertex 4 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 1.5
Row 19 - Cell 0 OCZ Agility 4 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 1.5
Row 20 - Cell 0 OCZ Agility 4 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 1.5
Row 21 - Cell 0 OCZ Vertex 4 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 1.5
Row 22 - Cell 0 Samsung 840 Pro 512 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: DMX02B0Q
Row 23 - Cell 0 Corsair Neutron GTX 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: M206
GraphicsPalit GeForce GTX 460 1 GB
Power SupplySeasonic 760 W, 80 PLUS Gold
System Software and Drivers
Operating SystemWindows 7 x64 Ultimate
DirectXDirectX 11
DriverGraphics: Nvidia 270.61 RST: 10.6.0.1002 Virtu: 1.1.101
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Benchmarks
Tom's Hardware Storage Bench v1.0Trace-Based
Iometer 1.1.0# Workers = 1, 4 KB Random: LBA=8 GB, varying QDs, 128 KB Sequential, 8 GB LBA Precondition
PCMark 7Storage Suite
Andrew Ku
44 Comments Comment from the forums
  • mayankleoboy1
    Kudos to Samsung for getting ahead of the competition yet again. And the complete SSD is designed and manufactured in house! And thay are sure of its reliability, hence the 5 year warranty.

    I dont see why it did not get a Toms approved award.... its faster, uses less power, and offers better warranty than the competition. And the firmware is also stable, unlike SF.
    Reply
  • mayankleoboy1
    Where are the TRIM efficiency tests ?
    Reply
  • mayankleoboy1
    Despite what the judges believe, Samsung is a great innovator. Unlike some fruity companies, that basically license other companies tech....
    Reply
  • willyroc
    Wow, Samsung was ahead of competitors with its 830 due to superior performance and low prices. Now I bet the 840 has, (or will) widened that lead.
    Reply
  • pocketdrummer
    mayankleoboy1Kudos to Samsung for getting ahead of the competition yet again. And the complete SSD is designed and manufactured in house! And thay are sure of its reliability, hence the 5 year warranty. I dont see why it did not get a Toms approved award.... its faster, uses less power, and offers better warranty than the competition. And the firmware is also stable, unlike SF.
    Probably because it still costs $600 for a pathetic 512gb of memory. Once you can get 512gb for under $200 and have a life span that gets close to a decent HDD, then you can expect an award.

    They keep increasing the speed, but they do nothing to reduce the COST. I would take an SSD half as fast as some that are out now if they cost me half as much and had a decent amount of storage. It's still pointless for someone like me who has over 1.5TB of space used. I can't load Windows and all of my critical programs on a 256GB SSD, and the 512GB wouldn't give me much wiggle room. Not to mention my sample libraries that would benefit from the speed... that are hundreds of GB each.
    Reply
  • So it's the Samsung 840Pro 256GB for C:, and it's the Seagate single-platter 1TB drive (ST1000DM003) for storage. Awesome awesome combo.
    Reply
  • sherlockwing
    Gah, 1 month after I get the 830 now comes the 840 Pro who gets another 120 mb/s in extra speed.
    Reply
  • mayankleoboy1
    sherlockwingGah, 1 month after I get the 830 now comes the 840 Pro who gets another 120 mb/s in extra speed.
    Thats technology growth for you :D
    Reply
  • aicom
    Well this makes my new SSD decision much easier.
    Reply
  • sherlockwing
    To those that complain about SSD life span, the truth is that in 3 years(typical warranty of an SSD) you won't be using the same SSD because the new SSD will be 40-50% faster. 3 year from now I'd be using the 860 Pro with anyway and when an SSD reach end life it just can't write anymore, you can still read all the files onto your new SSD unlike a hard drive that just breaks down.
    Reply