Mushkin Pilot-E M.2 NVMe SSD Review – The Pilot Climbs to 3.4GB/s

TSSDR TEST BENCH AND PROTOCOL

SSD testing at TSSDR differs slightly, depending on whether we are looking at consumer or enterprise storage media. For our Mushkin Pilot-E 1TB NVMe M.2 SSD testing today, our goal is to test in a system that has been optimized with our SSD Optimization Guide. To see the best performance possible, the CPU C states have been disabled, C1E support has been disabled, and Enhanced Intel SpeedStep Technology (EIST) has been disabled. Benchmarks for client testing are also benchmarks with a fresh drive so, not only can we verify that manufacturer specifications are in line but also, so those buying pre-built systems with the Pilot-E 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.

SYSTEM COMPONENTS

The components of this Test Bench are detailed below.  All hardware is linked for purchase and product sales may be reached by a simple click on the individual item. As well, the title is linked back to the individual build article where performance testing can be validated.

TSSDR ASROCK Z370 TAICHI TEST BENCH   (link)

PC CHASSIS:	Corsair Crystal Series 460X RGB
MOTHERBOARD:	ASRock Z370 Taichi
CPU:	Intel Coffee Lake Core i7-8770K
CPU COOLER:	Corsair Hydro Series H110i GTX V.2
POWER SUPPLY:	Corsair RM850x 80Plus
GRAPHICS:	PNY GTX 1080 XLR8 Gaming OC
MEMORY:	Corsair Dominator Pl 32GB 2800
STORAGE:	Intel Optane 900P 480GB SSD
KEYBOARD:	Corsair Strafe RGB Silent Gaming
MOUSE:	Corsair M65 Pro Gaming
OS	Microsoft Windows 10 Pro 64 Bit

BENCHMARK SOFTWARE

The software in use for today’s analysis is typical of many of our reviews and consists of Crystal Disk Info, ATTO Disk Benchmark, Crystal Disk Mark, AS SSD, Anvil’s Storage Utilities, AJA, PCMark Vantage, TxBench, PCMark 8, as well as true data testing. Our selection of software allows each to build on the last and to provide validation to results already obtained.

CRYSTAL DISK INFO VER. 7.5.0

Crystal Disk Info is a great tool for displaying the characteristics and health of storage devices. It displays everything from temperatures, the number of hours the device has been powered, and even to the extent of informing you of the firmware of the device.

This is what a ‘fresh out of the box’ SSD looks like on CDI, as we can see on the right side.  Much confirmed here to include capacity, that it is PCIe 3 x 4 and using NVMe 1,3 protocol.

ATTO DISK BENCHMARK VER. 3.05

ATTO Disk Benchmark is perhaps one of the oldest benchmarks going and is definitely the main staple for manufacturer performance specifications. ATTO uses RAW or compressible data and, for our benchmarks, we use a set length of 256mb and test both the read and write performance of various transfer sizes ranging from 0.5 to 8192kb. Manufacturers prefer this method of testing as it deals with raw (compressible) data rather than random (includes incompressible data) which, although more realistic, results in lower performance results.

Initial benchmarks are just a bit short of spec with highs of 3.3GB/s read and 2.5GB/s write, however the performance increase as data sample size increase is steady which we like to see.