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POWER CONSUMPTION
For our power consumption testing, we have the drive connected to the system as a secondary drive. To record the wattage, we use an Amprobe AM-270 multimeter connected in line with the 5v power on our SATA power cable to the drive. The multimeter records the min/max amperage draw from the drive over our testing period.
We also record the drive’s sequential and random read and write power draw using Iometer. We then take the values recorded and calculate the wattage of the drive. Some of the results may seem high compared to a standard notebook HDD because as these are peak values under load. When we see average power draw, SSDs are still more power efficient because they only hit max power for a short period of time.
Overall, we see that the 1TB is much lower in power consumption than the other two capacities in almost all areas beside sequential write. Also, it is apparent that the 500GB uses the most out of the three on most of the tests. Furthermore, there is a huge percentage leap in power consumption when comparing the three capacities when idling. The power used for idle for the 250GB is six times more than that of the 1TB and the power used for the 500GB is almost two and a half times that. So, if power consumption is a concern for you, you are best off going with the largest capacity model.
REPORT ANALYSIS AND FINAL THOUGHTS
One of the great things about being a SSD review site is that we get to assist companies in unbiased performance evaluations. This includes not only benchmarking the SSDs and verifying their listed performance specs, but we also get to aid companies in finding bugs in their products. If such a case is to arise, we gladly notify them and work to resolve the issue in a timely manner. During our initial testing with the SandForce variants of the Elukro Pro Performance SSDs we saw some lower than expect write speed results. In no time, they traced the issue to an issue between the SSD and Windows 8 operating system and they released a new firmware update to fix the issue. After receiving the new firmware performance was right where it should have been! So, if you currently have one of these SSDs and Windows 8 or 8.1, check out their website or contact them for a firmware update to get some faster speeds out of your SSD!
Having said that, let’s get on with the analysis. The Eluktro Pro Performance line of SSDs are a great first step in market for Eluktronics. They have capacities that suit the needs of almost anyone. All of the capacities under the 960GB are made with the proven SandForce SF-2281 controller while the 960GB and 1TB capacities utilize the newer and widely used Silicon Motion SM2246EN controller. The SandForce controller that was put into these SSDs is one of the old guard and lower performance when put through synthetic tests. This point, however, doesn’t affect how this performs in real world tests as a consumer product. This is why we like to benchmark with PCMark alongside the synthetic tests as it gives us a better perspective on relative real world performance. In the PCMark 8 tests we see how well the older controller stacks up, throughout all of the phases the latency is very low and the bandwidth is very high with little deviation. On the opposite side the Silicon Motion controller is more optimized for consumer workloads, edging out slightly there.
Also, during the synthetic tests we saw that the capacities with the SandForce had higher write speeds, maxing out at 534MB/s, while the 1TB Silicon Motion powered model had higher read speeds, maxing at 560MB/s. Finally, when looking at our power testing results we can come to one notable conclusion, going with the larger capacity model will yield slightly better power efficiency. So, if that is a concern for you, go big or go home!
With the ever increasing demand of SSDs, controller and NAND manufacturers are able to sell components and reference designs to third parties at cheaper and cheaper prices. This in turn helps increase competition in the SSD market as well as drive prices down for consumers. It was just a few years ago when SSDs were over $2/GB and even $3/GB! Now, we have SSDs in that are almost near $0.30/GB! Now more people can have high capacity, high performance storage that doesn’t really break the bank. Most of the time people can live off of a single 500GB SSD and they are set for years, and now you can get that for under $200. For those who need a bit more they have the option to go to 1TB or, if not, they can save some cash and buy a 250GB for just a Benjamin ($100)!
Eluktronics Eluktro Pro Performance line of SSDs deliver good performance and decent overall value. To be a new third party SSD producer that is able to price competitively while at the same time assembling their SSDs in the USA is impressive. Eluktronics has definitely made a smart choice going with the strongly proven controllers and reliable synchronous NAND in their Eluktro Pro Performance SSDs. Not only that, but they have some very good customer support based on what we have experienced by speaking with them and reading customer reviews online. If you are looking for another SSD option or if you weren’t sure about these SSDs until now, definitely add them to your comparison list, you won’t be disappointed.
Check out the Eluktronics Eluktro Pro Performance SSDs on Amazon!
Good review. I have been waiting for a new review on a sandforce drive with synchronous nand. It seems a lot of reviews of sandforce drives are with asynchronous nand, I don’t know why. You hear a lot about Samsung, crucial, and all the 100 million different controllers. But not much about sandforce/Seagate I guess because it is considered old, but it works and real
life and consistency seem to be just as fast as the new controllers all without a dram buffer. I can’t wait for Seagate and micron to pair the new sandforce controller with some premium micron nand then we will have a real ssd!