Kingston HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSDs in RAID 0 – You Thought One Was Fast?

PCMARK VANTAGE X64 HDD SUITE

The SSD Review uses benchmark software called PCMark Vantage x64 HDD Suite to create testing scenarios that might be used in the typical user experience. There are eight tests in all and the tests performed record the speed of data movement in MB/s to which they are then given a numerical score after all of the tests are complete. The simulations are as follows:

• Windows Defender In Use
• Streaming Data from storage in games such as Alan Wake which allows for massive worlds and riveting non-stop action
• Importing digital photos into Windows Photo Gallery
• Starting the Vista Operating System
• Home Video editing with Movie Maker which can be very time consuming
• Media Center which can handle video recording, time shifting and streaming from Windows media center to an extender such as Xbox
  
• Cataloging a music library
• Starting applications

PCMARK VANTAGE RESULTS

As a result of our HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD RAID 0 configuration the total PCMark Vantage score has increased, however not as much as you would think. Overall, it increased about 22K points to a total score of 159,030 points. Now, while the increase isn’t that much from a single SSD, this score absolutely demolishes any SATA based SSD out there. There were increases across the board, however, they were most notable in tests that favored sequential performance such as the “Windows Photo Gallery” bench where it reached 1.2GB/s and the “Windows Media Center” bench where it reached 1.5Gb/s. Therefore, these results reinforce why this SSD’s high performance is geared for the media professional and enthusiasts.

REPORT ANALYSIS AND FINAL THOUGHTS

Just when you thought that one of these bad boys were fast we brought you two in RAID 0! The Kingston HyperX M.2 PCIe SSDs provide you sequential speeds of up to 1.4GB/s and 1GB/s read and write. Pair two together and man do these HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSDs fly. In our RAID 0 testing they achieved a highest read and write speed of 2.6GB/s and 1.6GB/s respectively. On top of this, random 4K IOPS increased to over 244K IOPS read and 216K IOPS write.

After testing we decided to give this configuration a go in our X99 platform just as we had done previously with a single SSD and yet again we saw faster sequential reads, as proven with an ATTO screenshot above. We were able to achieve 2.8GB/s read and nearly 1.9GB/s write! So, there you have it, some very nice performance!

There is no doubt that SSDs in RAID 0 deliver massive sequential speeds, doing reports like this make us giddy as a school boy on his first date. We get to push the boundaries as to what most will normally see and be able to try with storage, however, as we seen in testing, RAID 0 doesn’t always reflect much improvement in most real world scenarios. Just as we stated in our review last week, the HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD is not for those who are going to use this SSD for light workloads under typical desktop usage. It is meant for those who can utilize high sequential speeds and whose workflow often enters into high queue depths, for example, media content creators or those who want to use it as a virtual machines storage volume. Our RAID 0 PCMark Vantage results point out that there wasn’t much improvement in a real world application based test in this type of configuration. Thus, a setup like this is really more for the grandeur than practicality.

Bottom line, if you want to get a fast M.2 PCIe SSD, this one is awesome. Its small size is great for small form factor and mobile device designs, Kingston even showed it off during CES 2015 in one of Intel’s NUCs. If you need faster speeds over one of these bad boys, you can see here that we were able to achieve some pretty impressive results in RAID 0, so as long as you have free PCIe lanes you should be good.  Now that we have satisfied our curiosity and hopefully yours, we will leave you to decide whether or not this SSD is right for you, be it in RAID 0 or not.

Check out the Kingston HyperX Predator on Amazon Today!