Corsair Neutron GTX 240GB SSD review: Corsair's controller gamble pays off

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 in our December 2012 SSD roundup. The Neutron GTX uses Toshiba’s toggle-mode MLC NAND and is rated at 511/555 MBps for sequential writes/reads, as well at at 85,000/85,000 4KB IOPs (read/write operations per second).

In our tests, the Neutron GTX wrote our 10GB mix of smaller files and folders at a rate of 414 MBps, and it read them at 371.4 MBps. That second number was the drive's low point, good for only a tenth-place finish. The drive wrote our single 10GB file at a blazing 610.6 MBps, on the other hand, and read it at 440.2 MBps; those are very good numbers. The average write speed was 512.3 MBps, and the average read speed was 405.8 MBps.

The 240GB Neutron GTX carries an MSRP of $250, but we found it selling online for as little as $230, or 96 cents per gigabyte (as of December 18, 2012). That makes it easily the best deal in a top-performing SSD at the time of this writing. It’s only 7mm thick, which renders it suitable for use with thin-and-light laptops.

If you are looking for top-flight performance but have to stay on a budget, the Corsair Neutron GTX is currently the pick of the litter. And like the other top performers we saw, it carries a five-year warranty.

Note: This review is part of a roundup of seven SSDs. Be sure to read the introduction, where you'll also find a detailed explanation of how SSDs work, as well as links to our reviews of each of the other six drives.