Samsung 850 EVO M.2 and mSATA SSD review

Memory (DDR4/DDR5) and Storage (SSD/NVMe) 367 Page 2 of 19 Published by

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Specifications & Features

Samsung SSD 850 EVO Specifications & Features

Samsung is to offer four versions of the 850 EVO M.2 / mSATA which includes 120 GB, 250 GB, 500 GB and 1 TB models. Their largest M.2 size is 500GB (otherwise the PCB would get too long). So the samples that have arrived in our secret test facility are the 120GB M.2 device and the 1TB mSATA version of the drive. The 850 EVO series will come with MLC NAND flash memory from Samsung's latest 3D V-NAND node.  

3D NAND

3D NAND is physical vertical NAND cell stacking not to be confused with chip stacking in a multi-chip package. In 3D NAND, NAND layers, not chips, are stacked in a single IC. The good news is continued cost reduction, smaller die sizes and more capacity per NAND chip. Also, installed NAND toolsets in the wafer fabs can, for the most part, be reused, thereby extending the useful life of fab equipment.

“By offering the 850 EVO in multiple form factors, Samsung is giving every PC user the opportunity to upgrade their device with the speed, reliability and endurance of 3D V-NAND,” said Unsoo Kim, Senior vice president of branded product marketing team, Samsung Electronics."

“There is growing demand for high-capacity SSDs and these new form factors will help drive further adoption of SSDs as well as expand Samsung’s leadership position in the consumer storage market.” In December, Samsung unveiled the 850 EVO featuring 3-bit 3D V-NAND technology, which greatly enhanced the everyday computing experience by overcoming the density limitations of conventional planar NAND architecture. 3D V-NAND stacks 32 cell layers vertically over one another, rather than decreasing cell dimensions to fit onto a fixed horizontal space, resulting in higher density and better performance with a smaller footprint. Now, with the M.2 and mSATA form factor SSDs, more consumers with desktops or ultra-thin PCs can benefit from best-in-class performance and reliability of the 850 EVO and V-NAND technology."

Samsung SSD 850 EVO mSATA/M.2 120GB 250GB 500GB 1TB (mSATA only)
Interface SATA 6Gbps
Formatted capacity 111.79GiB 232.88GiB 465.76GiB 931.51GiB
Controller Samsung MGX Samsung MEX
NAND Samsung 32-layer 3D V-NAND
DRAM Samsung LPDDR3 Samsung LPDDR2
DRAM config 1 x 512MB 1 x 1GB
Endurance 75 TBW (~40GB/day) 150TBW (~80GB/day)
Warranty

Five years

The Samsung 850 EVO mSATA comes in 1 terabyte (TB), 500 gigabyte (GB), 250GB and 120GB capacities and boasts the same top-notch read/write speeds as the 2.5-inch 850 EVO, with read speeds of up to 540 megabytes per second (MB/s) and write speeds of up to 520 MB/s. The 850 EVO M.2 will be available in 500GB, 250GB and 120GB capacities, offer read speeds of up to 540 MB/s and write speeds of up to 500MB/s.

Samsung SSD 850 EVO mSATA M.2
  120GB 250GB/500GB/1TB 120GB/250GB/500GB
Max Sequential Read 540MB/sec 540MB/sec 540MB/sec
Max Sequential Write 520MB/sec 520MB/sec 500MB/sec
Max Random Read (4K QD1) 10,000 IOPS 10,000 IOPS 10,000 IOPS
Max Random Write (4K QD1) 40,000 IOPS 40,000 IOPS 40,000 IOPS
Max Random Read (4K QD32) 95,000 IOPS 97,000 IOPS 97,000 IOPS
Max Random Write (4K QD32) 88,000 IOPS 88,000 IOPS 89,000 IOPS

Each drive manages large data transfers and complex multi-tasking operations using the Samsung TurboWrite technology. Featuring the TurboWrite technology, the 500GB and 1TB models offer random write speeds up to of 88K Input/Output Operations Per Second (IOPS), and random read speeds of up to 97K IOPS, meaning each drive is able to easily manage large data transfers and handle complex multi-tasking operations. Similar to the 2.5-inch 850 EVO, the M.2 and mSATA drives offer enhanced reliability with improved sustained performance, as well as AES 256-bit hardware-based encryption to ensure the safety and security of data. The Samsung M.2 and mSATA 850 EVO SSDs have a five-year limited warranty and an endurance rating of 150 total bytes written (TBW) for the 500GB and above capacities.

Pricing

I just pulled some numbers from some online etailers. Making your own SSD with your own controller, own PCB, own cache chips and own NAND flash memory does have advantages as Samsung is able to keep the prices very competitive as this product is made 99% in-house.

  • 120 GB costs 79 EUR
  • 250 GB costs 124 EUR
  • 500 GB costs 215 EUR
  • 1 TB costs 413 EUR
These are street prices incl VAT for both the M.2 and mSATA units. Not bad, especially when you consider that this is a mainstream class SSD that offers enthusiast class SSD performance (as you are about to find out from our benchmarks).

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The Samsung 850 EVO M.2 and mSATA SSDs

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