Silicon Motion SM2262EN Controller Preview

HDTUNE

HD Tune is a Hard Disk Utility with many functions from error checking, health testing (S.M.A.R.T.), and of course benchmarking. To build upon our real world write test we also looked to see where the write speeds leveled off to by using HD Tune Pro. If SLC caching is being utilized, this test will typically show it.

We can see that our samples SLC cache varies between 2.7GB/s and 1.3GB/s for the first 500GB. Beyond that, it has a native, direct to TLC write performance of just over 1GB/s.

REPORT ANALYSIS AND FINAL THOUGHTS

Today we got to take a close look at one of Silicon Motion’s latest developments, the SM2262EN SSD controller. With our sample bring packed with 2TB IMFT’s 64L 3D TLC, it delivered nearly 3.5/3.0GB/s sequential throughput and 360/340K random 4K IOPS performance in our testing. As well, it boasted some impressive efficiency, ranking higher than any SSD we have tested before.

There were some hiccups, however. In PCMark 8, it displays high latency results during the extended session, even more so than the SM2262EN powered HP EX920. Although, by the time it hit the recovery phases, it was able to catch back up and rank 3rd overall in performance. So, it goes to show that it is fairly well optimized for consumer tasks but could use more refinement for heavier workloads.

FINAL THOUGHTS

To conclude, we want to give a big thanks to Silicon Motion for sampling this controller to us. Overall, we are pleased to see another high-performance NVMe controller come to market, even if it is simply a refinement over its predecessor. With the preliminary results from today’s testing in mind and some great technology incorporated into it, the SM2262EN has the building blocks to become one of the best performing controllers out. We just have to wait and see what further firmware changes do for it when it’s released in retail products over the coming months.