Silicon Power Velox V70 240GB SSD Review

On our table today we have the Silicon Power Velox V70 SATA 3 SSD where SP is another to combine the power of the LSI SandForce SF-2281 Flash Storage Processor (FSP) with Intel synchronous MLC memory.

If NAND alone makes great partners, the V70 is in good hands as we have seen the same type and capacity in the OCZ Vertex 4, Kingston HyperX, ADATA XPG SX900, Comay Venus 3, as well as a few other top rated SSDs.

At the time of this report, the V70 reached e-tailer webspace, however, adequate stock had yet to show itself.  The Velox V70 is available in capacities of 120, 240 and 480GB and initial pricing at Amazon is showing at $111.54, $199.59 and $422.30.  This is very encouraging, especially for a new release, as the median price now seems to be below $100 for a 120GB SSD and $200 for a 240GB SSD and the V70 seems to be half way there.

Performance for the V70 is typical LSI SandForce Driven speeds with specifications of 557MB/s read and 507MB/s write with 86,000 IOPS at 4k aligned random write disk access.  We give full marks to SP for their exterior packaging as it not only promotes the Velox V70, but also, does a nice hard drive to SSD comparison which is a key element to consumer sales. The V70 comes with a desktop adapter and standard three year warranty.

V70 CASE AND COMPONENTS

The exterior casing of the V70 is brushed aluminum and it has a very attractive gold finish.  The casing is held together by four screws on the sides of the SSD which, once removed, allow access to the PCB.

There was something that I didn’t like about this SSD initially, and that was that there was a very prominent rattle within when the SSD was shaken.  On opening it, I determined that the PCB itself was only screwed down by two screws on one side, leaving the other free to move back and forth, contacting the exterior casing.  Initially, I thought that these screws were just missing as this was a pre-release sample, however, closer inspection revealed that there were no spots for screws to fasten to the casing on that side.

The face of the PCB displays the LSI SandForce SF-2281 FSP and eight modules of 16GB Intel synchronous 25nm MLC NAND flash memory.  A further eight modules are situated on the back of the PCB for a total of sixteen.

Total RAW memory capacity is 256GB (16 x 16), however, LSI SandForce firmware and over provisioning needs retain one module (16GB) and final formatting leaves the end user with 224GB of available storage space.