Office hardware

Ultimate guide to SSDs (plus reviews of 7 new drives!)

Jon L. Jacobi

Jon L. JacobiJon Jacobi, PCWorld

Jon L. Jacobi has worked with computers since you flipped switches and punched cards to program them. He studied music at Julliard, and now he power mods his car for kicks.
More by Jon L. Jacobi

Corsair Neutron (240GB): The middle of the road

Photograph by Robert Cardin

Corsair's move to the Link A Media LM87800 controller has been a good thing. The Neutron GTX performs better thanks to its faster toggle-mode NAND, but the Neutron with its synchronous MLC NAND is still a very fast drive—fast enough to take the fifth spot among some very tough competition in our roundup.

Read our entire review.

Corsair Neutron GTX (240GB): A gamble pays off

Photograph by Robert Cardin

Corsair's move to the Link A Media LM87800 controller has paid dividends. Though not quite as fast as the Samsung 840 Pro or the OCZ Vector, the Neutron GTX beat out the OCZ Vertex 4 to take third place overall.

See our complete hands-on review.

Kingston HyperX 3K (240GB): An excellent buy

Photograph by Robert Cardin

Kingston's HyperX 3K was the best performer among the SandForce SF-2281 drives in our December 2012 roundup, by a fair margin: It took the sixth spot in overall performance. Kingston somehow managed to squeeze significantly better write performance out of this controller than the other vendors using the same part.

Read the rest of our review.

OCZ Vector (256GB): Bangin’ Barefoot

PHOTOGRAPH BY ROBERT CARDIN

OCZ's latest drive, the Vector, utilizes the company's new IndiLinx Barefoot 3 controller in conjunction with synchronous MLC NAND. Said NAND is rated for 550-MBps sequential writing and 530-MBps writing, as well as for 95,000/100,000, 4KB write/read operations per second. Whatever the numbers, the Vector is fast.

Find the entire review.

OCZ Vertex 4 (256GB): Hitting the sweet spot

Photograph by Robert Cardin

While it’s not quite as fast as its OCZ Vector sibling, OCZ’s Vertex 4 is a very speedy SSD. It uses the company's older IndiLinx Everest 2 controller, but contains the same synchronous MLC NAND used in the Vector. The combination proved fast enough for this drive to take fourth place in overall performance.

Read the entire review.

Samsung 840 Pro (256GB): A screaming-fast SSD

Photograph by Robert Cardin

It's always easy to write about the best—in this case, the Samsung 840 Pro with its proprietary MDX controller. Samsung also manufactures the toggle-mode MLC memory found in the 840 Pro, and judging from the results of our tests, the company knows what to do with it. The 840 Pro finished first in overall combined reading and writing. It also placed first in three of our four individual read and write tests.

Find all the details in our review.

SanDisk Extreme (240GB): Bang for the buck

Photograph by Robert Cardin

SanDisk's Extreme SSD is a study in extremes, at least pricewise. With the 240GB version carrying a $399 suggested retail price, you might dismiss it out of hand. That would be a mistake: We found the drive selling online for a mere $165 (as of December 18, 2012), which lowers the drive's price per gigabyte to just 69 cents—the lowest price in the entire roundup.

Read more about this drive in our review.

Bottom Line

Corsair's Neutron offers a very nice price-to-performance ratio. It's fast enough to give your system a kick in the pants without unduly straining your wallet.

*Price when rated

$190

Pros

  • A very good performer overall
  • Affordably priced

Cons

  • Not as fast as its cousin, the Neutron GTX

Bottom Line

If you're looking for top-flight performance on a budget, the Corsair Neutron GTX is currently the pick of the litter.

*Price when rated

$230

Pros

  • A fast performer overall
  • Budget priced considering its performance
  • Carries a five-year warranty

Cons

  • One of the slower drives when writing our large batch of files and folders
  • Link a Media is a lesser-known controller brand, at least in the consumer market

Bottom Line

If you're not insisting on absolute bleeding-edge performance, the HyperX 3K is easily one of the best deals going for an SSD.

*Price when rated

$184

Pros

  • A good overall performer
  • Includes cables and an external enclosure

Cons

  • Slow write performance
  • Only a three-year warranty

Bottom Line

If you're an enthusiast looking for top performance, this is a drive you should be thinking about.

*Price when rated

$270

Pros

  • Very fast
  • 7mm height suitable for thin-and-lights
  • 16GB more capacity than much of the competition

Cons

  • High price per gigabyte
  • Drive not discounted at time of review

Bottom Line

The OCZ Vertex 4 currently sits at the sweet spot for SSDs: It's very fast and relatively affordable, and it has 16GB more capacity than many of its competitors.

*Price when rated

$195

Pros

  • Fast
  • Strong price/performance ratio
  • 16GB more capacity than much of the competition

Cons

  • Slow when reading our collection of small files and folders
  • Only a three-year warranty

Bottom Line

The Samsung 840 Pro is currently the fastest consumer SSD on the market. You pay a bit more for it, but you always pay more for the best.

*Price when rated

$260

Pros

  • Fastest SSD in our December 2012 roundup
  • 7mm thickness makes it compatible with thin-and-light laptops
  • Five-year warranty

Cons

  • The most expensive SSD in our December 2012 roundup
  • Not dramatically faster than the second-place SSD in our December 2012 roundup

Bottom Line

Although it's only an average performer, the inexpensive SanDisk Extreme delivers tremendous bang for your SSD buck.

*Price when rated

$165

Pros

  • Very low price per gigabyte
  • Much faster than previous-generation SSDs

Cons

  • Mediocre write performance
  • Nothing extra in the box, not even mounting screws

Bottom Line

Intel's move to 20nm NAND flash renders higher-capacity SSDs more affordable.

*Price when rated

$184

Pros

  • Lower cost per gigabyte than Intel's previous-generation SSDs
  • Free Intel SSD Toolbox and data migration software

Cons

  • 9.5mm profile renders it too thick for ultraportables
  • SSDs remain considerably more expensive than mechanical hard drives

Bottom Line

If your PC doesn't have a SATA 6-gbps interface, this device adds it, caddies one drive, and let's you attach another via a cable.

*Price when rated

$95

Pros

  • Adds SATA 6-gbps capability to older desktop motherboards
  • Caddies a single SSD
  • Includes a second 6-gbps interface to host another drive

Cons

  • Expensive
  • Requires at least a x2 PCIe slot

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