Angelbird SSD2Go USB 3.0 External 480GB SSD Review – Unbelievable Build & Performance + 10% Off

PC PERFORMANCE BENCHMARKS

As the Angelbird SSD2Go External SSD is fully compatible with both PC and Mac systems, we are going to benchmark in both environments.  In Windows 8, our benchmark programs will consist of ATTO Disk Benchmark Crystal DiskMark, AS SSD, Anvil Storage Utilities as well as PCMark Vantage.  Most of these benchmarks are free for download and appropriate links can be found by clicking on the name of each:

ATTO DISK BENCHMARK VER. 2.46

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.

Specifications for the SSD2Go are listed at 460MB/s read and write and initial ATTO testing confirms that this device is capable of these blazing USB 3.0 speeds.

CRYSTAL DISK BENCHMARK VER. 3.0 X64

Crystal Disk Benchmark is used to measure read and write performance through sampling of raw (0/1 Fill/compressible) or random data which is, for the most part, incompressible. In the AngelBird SSD2Go External SSD, a deviation is seen when testing with compressible data (left) and incompressible data (right):

Compressible data speaks to your OS and software while incompressible data speaks to music, video and photographs.  In the case of incompressible data, the transfer speed ONLY relates to the time it might take to transfer your media and not the play of it in any way.

AS SSD BENCHMARK VER 1.6

Up until recently, AS SSD was the only benchmark created specifically for SSD testing and it uses incompressible data. AS SSD, for the most part, gives us the ‘worst case scenario’ in SSD transfer speeds because of its use of incompressible data and many enthusiasts like to AS SSD for their needs. Transfer speeds are displayed on the left with IOPS results on the right.

With AS SSD, we get our first look at IOPS performance and can see that they are significantly below the listed 85,000.  Having tested the SSD alone, we can confirm that this is not the result of the SSD itself, but rather the USB 3.0 connection creating a small bottleneck with IOPS throughput.