Netac NV7000 SSD Review: Merely Passable

The Netac NV7000 is a passable PCIe 4.0 SSD that could work in a desktop PC or especially a PlayStation 5, but unlike the drives on our list of best SSDs, its inconsistent results and current pricing leave much to be desired, meaning it will have to compete on the value front to make its mark.

The Netac brand is perhaps known better outside of the U.S., but it is expanding with many products on Amazon and may become a future player here. The NV7000 is one of its flagship drives that will be expanded in the future with the NV7000-t, a DRAM-less drive that can hit 7.3 GB/s in sequential workloads, reminiscent of the Acer Predator GM7.

We’re specifically looking at the 4TB model today, which would be a good fit for the PS5 if you want the maximum amount of internal storage. In fact, that’s where we feel this drive works best, but it has to be priced right to make sense. We caution that lower capacity models of this drive, particularly those found in other regions, could come with different hardware. This drive most commonly uses the InnoGrit IG5236 controller with either Micron’s TLC as on the HP FX900 Pro, SK hynix’s TLC as found on the SK hynix Gold P31, or YMTC flash, as we saw on the Predator GM7. The 4TB drive we have today instead uses the ubiquitous Phison E18 with Micron’s decent TLC.

This hardware combination is relatively safe, but the NV7000 demonstrated some performance inconsistencies. That means it’s probably not the ideal drive to buy if you regularly execute heavier workloads. Let's take a closer look. 

Specifications

The Netac NV7000 is available in the 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB flavors. It’s spec'd up to 7,200 / 6,850 MB/s for sequential reads and writes and 940,000 / 1,000,000 random read/write IOPS. Current pricing is $94.99, $109.97, and $333.99 on Amazon with coupons applied. This is on the high side even when accounting for the included heatsink, but the drive would work well in a desktop PC or the PS5. The drive is warrantied for five years and 640TB, 1280TB, and 3000TB of endurance (TBW) for the respective capacities.

Software and Accessories

Netac offers a download for an SSD toolbox on its website. This application is rough around the edges, but it works. It shows the general health of your SSDs, including SMART information, has a place for “migration,” which should clone a drive, allows for firmware updating, and also has the secure erase function. It also has a toggle for TRIM support. The utility is pretty basic, so we recommend using different software, if possible. 

A Closer Look

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The NV7000 comes with an aluminum heatsink that’s attached to both sides of the drive with thermal padding. It’s easy enough to remove, if necessary. The drive itself has an SSD controller on the top side, one DRAM package per side for a total of two, and four NAND packages per side for a total of four. A PMIC is located next to the controller.

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The Phison E18 SSD controller has proven to be a winner, although, at some point, it may be superseded by less expensive and more efficient designs. It’s backed by two 8Gb DDR4 chips for metadata, which is 2GB in total. This does not meet the best ratio of DRAM to NAND but is more than enough for this type of drive. The SSD also has eight 4Tb NAND packages, each with eight 64GB dies of Micron’s 176-Layer TLC (B47R). This is a lot of dies to address; something ameliorated with Micron’s denser 232-Layer TLC.

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