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Price, performance and capacity. Time and time again the teller of all SSD success lies on these three factors…typically Well actually… rarely would you ever count a DRAM-less SSD in that grouping. There was a time in the industry where the word DRAM-less was a dirty word and the mere thought of recommending such would create response large enough to shut the internet down. Well maybe not quite but let’s just say, DRAM-less SSDs weren’t too highly thought of and that has changed in recent years, thanks in most part to tech advance. Today…. any thought of DRAM-less SSDs not being up there with the best gets put to rest. Today the Crucial P310 Gen4 NVMe SSD steps forward in a regular 2280 (80mm long) notebook and desktop form factor.
The Crucial P310 is a PCIe 4.0 (Gen 4 ) NVMe SSD that runs on 4-channels, vice the typical eight. Without question, the success of this SSD lies in the pairing of the Phison PS5027-E27 4-channel SSD controller with Micron 232-layer 3D QLC NAND running at 2400MT/s. Wait! Did we just say QLC NAND? Yes sir we did! And we are about to draw a picture of a DRAMless QLC SSD that is perhaps far to good to pass up.
The Crucial P310 is available in capacities of 500GB, 1TB and 2TB. It has a 5-year limited warranty and will come with a PS5 form-fitting heatsink soon enough. Its specs detail performance at 7100MB/s read and 6000MB/s write with up to 1 million IOPS read and 1.2 million IOPS write. Has that ever been done with a DRAM-less QLC SSD prior? No.
The Crucial P310 is a single sided SSD containing only a two chips, the Phison PS5027-E27T 4-channel NSME SSD controller and a 1TB capacity chip of Microns N58R 4-Bit QLC 3D NAND flash memory. Two chips. One sided PCB. Must be cooler right? Well yes and no… At ambient temperatures we the P310 stays around 43C but we can push it as high as 74C if we try real hard. The key here is the fact that you do not need that heatsink for typical PC use…
The P310 has active garbage collection, TRIM, ECC, TCG Pyrite and is rated at 220TBW (terabytes written) or double that for the 2TB Capacity. MSRP for the P310 is listed at $65 (500GB), $95(1TB) and $150 for the 2TB version which is really good pricing for such a high performing SSD. At the time of this report the 2TB version was going for $140. Check Amazon for today’s pricing and availability.