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Seven... SSD sizzlers

Speed-boost upgrades for your laptop

Verdict

While this quick round-up doesn't go into great technical depth, the results suggest you needn't rush to purchase Sata 3 capable drives if your system doesn’t support this speed or you don’t plan to upgrade at any point in the near future. The higher price points that some makers command and somewhat questionable performance over Sata 2, would suggest that you buy something designed to max the interface it uses natively. There is, as always an exception, in this case it’s Crucial’s M4.

Out of these 128GB-ish drives, for use on a Sata 2 system, Samsung’s 470 Series really delivered. Despite the rather comical label on the box claiming speeds of 470MB/s (apparently derived from the sum of 250MB/s read and 220MB/s write), this drive is impressive in both quality and performance and gets the Editor's Choice award.

That said, if you’ve got the extra few quid lying around and think you’ll have a stab at this new-fangled Sata 3 stuff in the future, then pick yourself up one of Crucial’s M4 drives. The M4 tested was a larger capacity drive so its performance may differ slightly with the lower capacity models in this comparison. So to be fair, despite a great price, it gets the Reg Hardware Recommended award. But if you want a hassle-free upgrade for existing gear and use your old drive as external storage, then Kingston’s SSDNow V+ 100 drives would be worth paying a little extra for. ®

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