WD Blue SN550 1TB NVMe SSD review - Final Words & Conclusion

Final Words & Conclusion

We have little to complain about the new SN550, really. We think that this basically is an SN500 with new 96-layer TLC NAND. The big difference, however, is that the SN500 used an x2 lane configuration on PCIe whereas this SN550 brings that towards an x4 PCIe Gen3 link. Many of you will be looking at the results and say, this isn't a super-fast M.2. NVMe SSD. Correct, but it is a VERY fast SSD compared to SATA3 performance, and that's what this is all about. And keep in mind the value proposition WD offers, 119 USD for 1 TB is just a superb deal, heck you even get 5-years warranty. We see no reason to purchase a SATA3 SSD anymore, as this is as cheap as SATA3 while much faster.

Something to think about

The WD Blue SN550 is, in theory, a product that is priced at a value SATA3 SSD price level, at all times you need to keep this line, what I write here, in mind. Why am I saying this so specifically? Well, the 250GB version I do not find that interesting, however, the 500GB and 1GB versions are darn good value at 12 cents per GB. It's faster than QLC, it is TLC written NAND and you get a proper 5 -years warranty. That said, this is a TLC NAND writing product, and that does show in some areas (long sustained writes) but also the TBW values are a bit on the shy side with 600 Terabyte written for the 1TB model. The performance that Western Digital offers with the WD Blue SN550 is perfectly fine for NVMe and a good notch better than the SN500.

Performance

Technologies like TLC and QLC face some challenges writing more bits per cell of NAND, we noticed a dropoff in performance with mixed heavy workloads that exceed writing multiple gigabytes continuously. After you pass Gigabytes of writes (and I do mean continuous sustained/linear writes), then the SLC buffer is full and starts to write directly to TLC, and then perf can drop substantially. For the SN550 we measure that to be between 15 to 20 GB of writes, then performance drops towards ~850 MB/sec (for the 1 TB model). After a few minutes or even seconds the SLC cache will have written out and boom, performance is back full speed. This, in a nutshell, is what you need to be aware of with TLC and QLC SSDs. IOPS performance is good on this unit. Temps have not been an issue either. 

  

Concluding

Technologies like TLC and QLC face pose challenges writing more bits per NAND cell, we noticed a drop-off in performance with mixed heavy workloads that exceed writing we think roughly 18 gigabytes continuously. Then perf dropped to 850 MB/sec coming from 1.5~2GB/sec. If you deem that to be too slow, then it is what it is. In my experience on normal gaming or work PC, it simply never is as you'll need very complex workloads. The latest 96-layer Vertically stacked NAND works its miracles, and the add-in partners benefit from that. It's priced at a level of more high-end 1 TB SATA3 SSD but is many multitudes faster overall. Yes, Blue SN550 series will offer good performance at a very acceptable price level, 119 USD for 1 TB. WD will grant you a 5-year warranty to go along with that, and that in technology land is the proper warranty to have. That said and done, the WD Blue SN500 1TB is impressive overall, but not the fastest kid on the block. Regardless you will easily quadruple your read performance over a regular SATA3 SSD. It's quite funny to see where we are in the year 2020 with prices at these levels. A year or two ago we were above the 50 Cents per GB marker. The TBW value is 600 Terabyte written for this SSD, that's alongside a 5-year warranty. Pricing is good, period. And as such the WD Blue SN550 comes approved by Guru3D.com, as it is a proper performing product in relation to is price level. And you have the advantage of a big name behind your storage, with a 5-years warranty included.  

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