Samsung has simply launched its first Evo-branded price range SSD because the 970 Evo Plus got here out 5 years in the past, which you’d assume could be excellent news for budget-conscious PC builders. In spite of everything, the brand new Samsung 990 Evo has PCIe 5 compatibility listed in its specs, and it’s cheaper than the Samsung 990 Professional. Nevertheless, there are a few catches that mark this SSD as one to keep away from for desktop PC customers.
With loads of silicon experience at its disposal, Samsung has maintained a great repute within the land of SSDs. Two of its drives are listed in our greatest gaming SSD information, and the Samsung 990 Professional dominated benchmarks within the PCIe 4 period. Nevertheless, the brand new Samsung 990 Evo has a number of pink flags.
Let’s begin with that declare of PCIe 5 compatibility. “It’s designed to be suitable with each PCIe 5.0 and PCIe 4.0 interfaces,” says Samsung, “making certain it may be put in into all kinds of programs whereas sustaining optimum efficiency.”
Nevertheless, once you dig deeper it turns into obvious that it solely makes use of two lanes in PCIe 5 mode, giving it precisely the identical bandwidth as 4 PCIe 4 lanes. Which may technically be PCIe 5 compatibility, however the finish result’s no totally different from placing an ordinary 4x PCIe 4 SSD in a PCIe 5 M.2 connector – you continue to get a most throughput of 8GB/s.
All of which is educational anyway, as the highest sequential learn pace of the 990 Evo is simply 5,000MB/s anyway, with a prime sequential write pace of 4,200MB/s. That’s not solely considerably slower than the Samsung 990 Professional, which shares the identical mannequin quantity, but additionally method slower than the ageing Samsung 980 Professional. In my very own assessments, the Samsung 980 Professional learn pace tops out at 6,843MB/s in CrystalDiskMark, with a write pace of 4,984MB/s, with each figures a good method in entrance of the numbers Samsung claims for the 990 Evo.
And that brings us to the subsequent downside with Samsung’s new drive – its worth. The 990 Evo has launched at $124.99 for a 1TB drive, and $209.99 for a 2TB drive, and each these costs are larger than you’ll pay for the sooner Samsung 980 Professional in the mean time, which at the moment goes for $84.99 for a 1TB drive. Not solely that, however the 990 Evo costs are method larger than these of the WD Black SN850X proper now, which tops our greatest SSD information and reads at as much as 7,300MB/s, with costs additionally beginning at simply $84.99 for the 1TB mannequin.
On the plus facet, Samsung is making some good claims for the power and thermal effectivity of this drive, saying that it it improves “energy effectivity of as much as 70% when in comparison with the 970 Evo Plus.” That’s excellent news for laptops, the place energy and thermal envelopes are tight, nevertheless it’s largely irrelevant for desktops.
All of which is a disgrace, as there’s positively room for a keenly priced PCIe 4 SSD in the mean time, which might take over the reins from the Samsung 980 with its PCIe 3 interface. Within the meantime, be sure to learn our greatest SSD information in case you’re looking out for a brand new storage improve.