Benchmark Tests
Samsung quotes sequential Read/Write figures of 540MB/s and 450MB/s respectively for the 840 Pro, and following tests, these numbers seem pretty conservative. With ATTO benchmarking the 840 Pro notched up 561MB/s for the Reads and 528MB/s for the Writes – some of the fastest figures I have seen for a 256GB drive.
Indeed, the MDX controller doesn’t suffer from the Achilles heel that affects SandForce drives, namely, how it deals with compressible data. A quick comparison between the two CrystalDiskMark benchmark scores shows this up very nicely, with hardly any difference between the two sets of figures.
CrystalDiskMark 4K transfer rate
ATTO transfer rate
Samsung SSD 840
Unlike the 840 Pro, the 840 comes in two versions, either as a bare drive or for about £35 more, as a desktop/notebook upgrade kit. This range has a shorter warranty period than the Pro version at just 3 years. The 840 on test is the bare 250GB model, the two other capacities are the 120GB (bare drive £87) and the flagship 500GB (bare drive £343) models.
Looks familiar, the Samsung SSD 840 internals
Typically a desktop PC relies more on random read/writes than sequential read writes and so the firmware (DXT05B0Q) for the 840 series has been written to take this into account. Unlike the Pro model, it lacks the WWN (World Wide Name) and LED indicator support.
Samsung's sequential Read/Write figures for the 250GB drive are 540MB/s and 250MB/s respectively, and just like the 840 Pro, these figures seem a little cautious. Again when tested with the ATTO benchmark, more impressive Read/Write scores of 560MB/s and 263MB/s were achieved.
Verdict
The SSD 840 Pro carries on from where the 830 left off and is one of the fastest 2.5in SSDs around at the moment. It’s a little pricey compared to some of its competitors but if Samsung continues with the aggressive pricing it began with the 830, then it looks set to be the drive to buy. That said, the standard Samsung SSD 840 model appears very well-suited for consumer upgrades delivering an impressive performance and offering good value too, even at the asking price. ®
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Samsung SSD 840 Pro and 840
COMMENTS
Sorry, got to say it.
It's rectangular with rounded corners.
Again, sorry.
Re: Halve the price of the 512Gb model
I think you fundamentally misunderstand the point and need for SSD.
Video editing is a good example, seek times on HDD are of the order of 10ms half that if you go for a performance drive higher if you go for a green one. SSD are much faster, of the order of 0.1ms. But how would that affect your video editing? Can you think of any scenario in which those 10ms would be pertinent with video editing?
where ssd is useful is in launching apps, where 100s of different files need to be accessed at the same time.
128GB is enough for system files and most of your apps. after than you want a media drive. there is no benefit to storing your video on SSD except in pure I/O operations such as duplicating or remuxing, other than that the disk is never the rate determining step.
Re: Halve the price of the 512Gb model
SSD is just one layer in storage. there are a whole raft of storage types of varying speed and costs from L1 cache to tape drives.
SSD has it's place. If you need a terabyte then you're not using it properly. there is little to no performance advantage to storing say video files on it. it's just a waste of money.
An SSD cache drive would seem to fit with your needs more.
I don;t care so much how long they last
But I want to know properly how much lifetime is left...
If I have to replace my disk every 2-3 years then I'd do that for the performance, but proper stats are essential.
Re: Box
"Isn't overly and unnecessary packaging an environmental concern anymore? It's a computer part, not even for the average consumer consumer - they could well ship it in a recycled cardboard box."
I thought the OP was referring to the aluminiun shell of the SSD, not the packagaing... but if you're interested in saving the planet by going without packaging, and you're in the market for a tablet, do order yourself a Nexus 7. Some half wit has designed a box that is too small to protect the contents, although doing wonders to save the rain forest I'm sure (not). The device runs right to the very sides (so no protection for lateral loads), and sits at the very top of the box, so that there's only the thickness of the box lid before the tablet screen takes the loading. To make matters worse, the buffoons ship it in a nothing more than a very cheap and loose jiffy bag of the sort that you would expect to protect something with a value below £5, and TNT then deliver it looking as though it's done ten minutes in a cement mixer accompanied by a couple of bricks.
Bring back proper packagaging, and b0ll0x to the tree huggers.
