The SSD Review The Worlds Dedicated SSD Education and Review Resource | 
TSSDR Z97 TEST BENCH
SSD Testing at TSSDR differs slightly depending on whether we are looking at consumer or enterprise SSDs. For consumer SSDs, our goal is to test in a system that has been optimized with our SSD Optimization Guide, and our system has been optimized by the adjusting of C States, if necessary. Benchmarks for consumer testing are also benchmarks with a fresh drive so, not only can we verify that manufacturer specifications are in line but also, so the consumer can replicate our tests to confirm that they have an SSD that is top-notch. We even provide links to most of the benchmarks used in the report.
This is a brand new test bench and, as such, we would love to thank those who jumped in specifically to help the cause. Key contributors to this build are our friends at ASRock, Corsair, Kingston with components from past contributors to include In-Win, EVGA, beQuiet, Plextor, Samsung, and QNIX. We have detailed all components in the table below and they are all linked should you wish to make a duplicate our system as so many seem to do, or check out the price of any soul component. As always, we appreciate your support in any purchase though our links!
SYSTEM COMPONENTS
This Test Bench build was the result of some great relationships and purchase; our appreciation goes to the below mentioned manufacturers for their support in our project. Our choice of components is very narrow, in that, we choose only what we believe to be among the best available and links are provided to each that will assist in hardware pricing and availability, should the reader be interested in purchase.
| PC CHASSIS: | InWin D-Frame Open Air Chassis |
| MOTHERBOARD: | ASRock Z97 Extreme6 Socket 1150 |
| CPU: | Intel Core i7-4790 |
| CPU COOLER: | Corsair Hydro Series H105 Extreme Water Cooled |
| POWER SUPPLY: | be quiet Dark Power Pro 10 1000W PSU |
| SYSTEM COOLING: | be quiet Silent Wings 2 PC Fans |
| GRAPHICS CARD: | EVGA GTX 770 Superclocked with ACX Cooler |
| MEMORY: | Kingston HyperX Beast |
| KEYBOARD: | Corsair Vengeance K95 Mechanical Gaming Keyboard |
| MOUSE: | Corsair Vengeance M95 MMO/RTS Laser Mouse |
| MONITOR: | QNIX 27? QX2710 2560×1440 |
| SYSTEM SSD | INTEL P3700 800GB NVME SSD |
.
BENCHMARK SOFTWARE
The software we will be using for today’s analysis is typical of many of our reviews and consists of ATTO Disk Benchmark, Crystal Disk Info, Crystal DiskMark, AS SSD, PCMark Vantage, along with Anvil Storage Utilities. In our reports, we prefer to test with easily accessible software that the consumer can obtain, and in many cases, we even provide links. Our selection of software allows each to build on the last and to provide validation to results already obtained.
Crystal Disk Info is a great tool for displaying the characteristics and health of storage devices. It displays everything from temperatures, to the number of hours the device has been powered, and even to the extent of informing you of the firmware of the device.
As we can see with Crystal DiskInfo, the common SMART attributes are present to monitor the drive and, most obviously, we took this shot when the drive was FOB (fresh-out of-box) fresh.
Go AMD! Good one Les! Looks like a very good SSD.
Cheers Les – I’ve been looking forward to this review for a while – also linked it at http://www.gamingtribe.com/status/13194139584347/?v=d155c8c3963c661791f1a3fca3e5105d for the gaming community at GT
Thanks for sharing Craig!
I’m willing to forget all my former bad experiences with them and try this drive or the Vector 150, the only thing that’s holding me back is their over-crowded pcb! not sure why OCZ/Toshiba pcb’s look like SAS/Data center drives!
And thats bad how ?
Smaller pcb means lower cost.
I’m not talking about the size, what worries me is the amount of capacitors/items that populate their drives.
Care to explain ?
The more items you have.. the more could go wrong.
Other manufacturers have far cleaner/less populated pcbs.
While i see your point, lots of SSDs have design like that and never caused trouble. Those are pretty dumb components and wont die easily. The controller is the main problem with ssds, when it comes to reliability.
You’re right my friend.. It’s just that I’m questioning the purpose of these components and nothing more.
I wonder the same. For all its worth, they could get away with a much smaller PCB and only 2-4 packages aswell (by using 8 dies per package). That would save cost, which could translate to lower MSRP.
Big guys are doing this for a while now (samsung and smi based drives to name a few).
I’m with you in this, a cleaner/smaller pcb would most likley lead to better cost saving.
sounds like you don’t understand PCBs. It doesn’t matter if the components are “visible” or not. In fact there’s going to be more heat if more of the components are inside an IC rather than on the outside. If you really don’t want to see the components, you basically have to remove them all together, e.g. downgrade the card.
Hello Eisa,
That still does not change the fact that all other bigger, more established manufacturers are making far more cleaner pcbs.
Sorry, but this is a really stupid complaint. If they were electrolytic capacitors then at least we could talk about it, because those had limited life-expectancy if they are highly loaded. But these are solid capacitors. You should complain if they do not put enough capacitors into a product. Yes, that is a usual cost reduction method. These are basically noise filtering capacitors. Without them the product is cheaper but less reliable.
PR article at best, does not stand out in any way, I’d still take sammy or crucial mx100 over this any day, bf controller is the best my ass.
I used to frequent this site for reviews, but if you can’t even take a honest critique of the artile (PR stuff otherwise), don’t even bother. And thank for deleting my previous post, looks like it was too much to handle, right?
I enjoyed your review but as of now, nearly two weeks later, they are not yet in stock with Amazon. “Order now and we’ll deliver when available.”
Do you have any updates on availability?
Jim
Stock is in and out sorry…no control over that but we appreciate you following our links!