The SSD Review The Worlds Dedicated SSD Education and Review Resource | 
POWER CONSUMPTION
For our power consumption testing, we have the drive connected to the system as a secondary drive. To record the wattage, we are now utilizing a Quarch Technology Programmable Power Module. It allows us to accurately measure power consumption over time and is flexible enough to allow us to test any SSD that comes our way.
When enterprise class storage is deployed, not only one or two drives are set out in a deployment, hundreds to thousands are, therefore, when booting a NAS or SAN it is important to ensure the power sources will be able to provide enough power to the systems. First we look at how much power the device needs during startup. Next we look at idle power consumption and workload averages at a QD of 256. This helps us gauge IOPS per Watt.
Our power analysis may change as time goes on, but for now we are looking at just a few metrics with the main goal of measuring our results against the manufacturer’s ratings.
Overall, we can see that power consumption is a bit more than the competition in our test pool, but still within the ratings we were given by Micron (7W-30W). Startup power consumption is less than the rest and its idle power consumption is just lower than the HGST and Techman SSDs, which share the same controller. 4K read is the highest, but 4K write is lower than both the HGST and Techman SSDs. 8K read and write consumption is higher than the rest as well as sequential read and write. Finally, during the server profiles we can see that it consumed more than the other drives as well.
Now, looking at the IOPS per Watt under workloads we can see a much better picture of its efficiency. Under 4K and 8K read the Micron 9100 MAX is close to that of the Techman XC100, but is beat out by the HGST and Intel. During 4K and 8K write on the other hand, it was one of, if not the most efficient drive of the pack. During sequential reads and writes it has slightly lower results than the majority, but during the server workloads it delivered better efficiency than the HGST and Techman SSDs for most of the profiles.
REPORT ANALYSIS AND FINAL THOUGHTS
Over the course of testing the Micron 9100 MAX, we were very impressed with its performance. It’s consistency profile was one of the best we have seen thus far. I was able to deliver 758K IOPS read and 311K IOPS write at 4K file size and over 387K IOPS read and 156K IOPS write at 8K. During sequential reads and writes it was able to deliver 3.2GB/s and 2.29GB/s respectively. Through the server profiles it took the lead by large margins, except for when the Intel DC P3608 took over thanks to its dual controller architecture and PCIe 3.0 x4 interface. Furthermore, reviewing the power consumption results, the Micron 9100 MAX 2.4TB showed some decent results. While it typically consumed more power than the rest of our test pool, it proved to be more efficient in the write heavy workloads.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Simply stated, the Micron 9100 MAX is one of the fastest NVMe SSDs currently available. When looking at the performance it delivers, it is one beast of a SSD, that is for sure, but when looking at it in terms of pricing, that is when it gets even more enticing. At just $1.35 per GB the Micron 9100 MAX is very alluring, but at just $1.10 per GB the Micron 9100 PRO looks to be an even better buy for read-centric tasks. The only thing we could ask for is an even larger capacity, but with their 3D NAND already coming into the market and this controller’s ability to utilize up to 8TB, we will just have to wait and see.
The Micron 9100 Series SSDs will let you process your data faster and help consolidate your infrastructure more than ever. With large capacities up to 3.2TB, both HHHL AIC and U.2 form factors, good endurance characteristics, and great performance with a tight QoS, the Micron 9100 Series is a tough competitor to beat. To top it off, it has a great enterprise feature set to ensure your data is safe and protected. Because of that, we award the Micron 9100 MAX our Editor’s Choice award! Be sure to check out these new SSDs if you haven’t already.
