SanDisk X210 256 And 512 GB: Enthusiast Speed; OEM Reliability

Features
By
published

SanDisk's X210 SSD is both an OEM drive for major vendors and an aftermarket product for the enthusiast world. Having passed a gauntlet of validation tests, can it break into the consumer space as a true alternative to the quickest power user products?

Test Setup And Benchmarks

Our consumer storage test bench is based on Intel's Z77 Platform Controller Hub paired with an Intel Core i5-2400 CPU. Intel's 6- and 7-series chipsets are virtually identical from a storage perspective. We're standardizing on older RST 10.6.1002 drivers for the foreseeable future.

Changes in RST's driver packages occasionally result in subtle performance changes. They can also lead to some truly profound variance in scores and results as well, depending on the driver revision. Some versions flush writes more or less frequently. Others work better in RAID environments. In fact, builds 11.2 and newer even support the TRIM command in RAID. Regardless, results obtained with one revision may or may not be comparable to results obtained with another, so sticking with one build across all tests is mandatory.

Swipe to scroll horizontally
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
MemoryG.Skill Ripjaws 8 GB (2 x 4 GB) DDR3-1866 @ DDR3-1333, 1.5 V
System DriveKingston HyperX 3K 240 GB, Firmware 5.02
Drive(s) Under TestSanDisk X210 256 GB, Firmware X210400
Row 5 - Cell 0 SanDisk X210 512 GB, Firmware X210400
Comparison DrivesIntel SSD 530 180 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: DC12
Row 7 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 520 180 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 400i
Row 8 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 525 180 GB mSATA, Firmware: LLKi
Row 9 - Cell 0 SanDisk A110 256 GB M.2 PCIe x2, Firmware: A200100
Row 10 - Cell 0 Silicon Motion SM226EN 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: M0709A
Row 11 - Cell 0 Crucial M500 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: MU02
Row 12 - Cell 0 Crucial M500 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: MU02
Row 13 - Cell 0 Crucial M500 480 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: MU02
Row 14 - Cell 0 Crucial M500 960 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: MU02
Row 15 - Cell 0 Samsung 840 EVO 120 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: EXT0AB0Q
Row 16 - Cell 0 Samsung 840 EVO 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: EXT0AB0Q
Row 17 - Cell 0 Samsung 840 EVO 480 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: EXT0AB0Q
Row 18 - Cell 0 Samsung 840 EVO 1 TB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: EXT0AB0Q
Row 19 - Cell 0 SanDisk Ultra Plus 64 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: X211200
Row 20 - Cell 0 SanDisk Ultra Plus 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware X211200
Row 21 - Cell 0 SanDisk Ultra Plus 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware X211200
Row 22 - Cell 0 Samsung 840 Pro 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware DXM04B0Q
Row 23 - Cell 0 Samsung 840 Pro 128 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware DXM04B0Q
Row 24 - Cell 0 SanDisk Extreme II 120 GB, Firmware: R1311
Row 25 - Cell 0 SanDisk Extreme II 240 GB, Firmware: R1311
Row 26 - Cell 0 SanDisk Extreme II 480 GB, Firmware: R1311
Row 27 - Cell 0 Seagate 600 SSD 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: B660
Row 28 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 525 30 GB mSATA 6Gb/s, Firmware LLKi
Row 29 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 525 60 GB mSATA 6Gb/s, Firmware LLKi
Row 30 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 525 120 GB mSATA 6Gb/s, Firmware LLKi
Row 31 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 525 180 GB mSATA 6Gb/s, Firmware LLKi
Row 32 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 525 240 GB mSATA 6Gb/s, Firmware LLKi
Row 33 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 335 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 335s
Row 34 - Cell 0 Intel SSD 510 250 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: PWG2
Row 35 - Cell 0 OCZ Vertex 3.20 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.25
Row 36 - Cell 0 OCZ Vector 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: 2.0
Row 37 - Cell 0 Samsung 830 512 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: CXMO3B1Q
Row 38 - Cell 0 Crucial m4 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s Firmware: 000F
Row 39 - Cell 0 Plextor M5 Pro 256 GB SATA 6Gb/s Firmware: 1.02
Row 40 - Cell 0 Corsair Neutron GTX 240 GB SATA 6Gb/s, Firmware: M206
GraphicsMSI Cyclone GTX 460 1 GB
Power SupplySeasonic X-650, 650 W 80 PLUS Gold
ChassisLian Li Pitstop
RAIDLSI 9266-8i PCIe x8, FastPath and CacheCade AFK
System Software and Drivers
OperatingSystemWindows 7 x64 Ultimate
DirectXDirectX 11
DriversGraphics: Nvidia 314.07RST: 10.6.1002IMEI: 7.1.21.1124Generic AHCI: MSAHCI.SYS
Swipe to scroll horizontally
Benchmarks
Tom's Hardware Storage Bench v1.0Trace-Based
Iometer 1.1.0# Workers = 1, 4 KB Random: LBA=16 GB, varying QDs, 128 KB Sequential, 8 GB LBA Precondition, Exponential QD Scaling
PCMark 7Secondary Storage Suite
PCM VantageStorage Suite
Christopher Ryan
22 Comments Comment from the forums
  • vertexx
    I logged onto Tom's this morning totally expecting a Kaveri review. What's up?
    Reply
  • TeraMedia
    Is the warranty 5 years or 3? Last page says one thing, an early page says another.Decent review, decent drives. Has THG considered doing something similar to what the car mags do, where they take certain products and use them for a year? It would be great to capture that kind of longer-term info on certain types of products, especially the kind that wear out (ODDs, fans, cases, HDDs, SSDs, etc.).
    Reply
  • Quarkzquarkz
    What about Samsung SSD pro 512GB? I bought 2 of these and on that chart is only 128 and 256GB
    Reply
  • vmem
    @vertexxthere isn't anything particularly exciting about Kaveri going by Anand's review. I shall want for the A10 version with higher clocks
    Reply
  • smeezekitty
    MLC with 5k write endurance!And affordable and fast?We may very well have a new solid contender in the SSD world
    Reply
  • eklipz330
    anandtech has one? sweeeet, later tom's!
    Reply
  • RedJaron
    I agree with Chris. I don't need the fastest bench speeds in a SSD. Most models now are very fast and the user won't see the performance difference. I want reliability and longevity. Looks like this is a smart choice for any new builder.
    Reply
  • Phillip Wager
    sweet finally another company that can compete with intel's 5 year warrenty!
    Reply
  • jake_westmorley
    Can we PLEASE have some normal graphs for once? The graph on page 5 in stupid 3D is so bad it's comical. The "perspective" effect completely screws with the data. This has zero added value and is almost as bad as still using clipart.
    Reply
  • Duff165
    I find it hard to believe that the author has had "literally dozens of SSd's die" on him over the years. This would suggest that many systems have contributed to the demise of many of the SSD's being used, which seems somewhat outlandish. Just the cost factor involved in the purchase of so many SSD's and then having over a dozen of them fail, supposedly also from various companies, since if they were all from the same company it would not really be conducive to good sales. One, or maybe two I could live with, but dozens? No.
    Reply