Samsung's 960 EVO line of solid-state drives is part of their second generation of retail M.2 form factor SSDs. These drives run at a full PCI-Express 3.0 x4 speed, which provides lots bandwidth and results in performance that is several times what a SATA III based SSD can provide. This 250GB model has sequential read speeds of up to 3.2GB/s with write speeds up to 1.5GB/s.
The limitation of these EVO series drives, however, is that not all of the memory on the drive is capable of those speeds. A portion is, but the rest of the drive has slower write speeds. That can show up in situations where a lot of data is being written at once: after a time, once the faster part of the drive is used up, the write speeds will drop substantially. This situation is not likely to arise in typical desktop usage, but can show up in some workstation loads.
Please note that some M.2 slots on motherboards only run at PCI-E x2 speed, rather than the x4 this SSD is capable of. In such cases, performance will be limited by the speed of the slot.
The limitation of these EVO series drives, however, is that not all of the memory on the drive is capable of those speeds. A portion is, but the rest of the drive has slower write speeds. That can show up in situations where a lot of data is being written at once: after a time, once the faster part of the drive is used up, the write speeds will drop substantially. This situation is not likely to arise in typical desktop usage, but can show up in some workstation loads.
Please note that some M.2 slots on motherboards only run at PCI-E x2 speed, rather than the x4 this SSD is capable of. In such cases, performance will be limited by the speed of the slot.
Gabe Martinez (Production Technician) Says:
Blazing fast storage in a cool, noiseless and compact form factor, the Samsung 960 Pro 250GB M.2 SSD is an easy first designation for your new PC. If you don't require a ton of storage space or are looking to run your OS on the M.2 specification, then this SSD will get the job done. If you want rock solid reliability and performance that will last for years to come, you can't go wrong here.
Blazing fast storage in a cool, noiseless and compact form factor, the Samsung 960 Pro 250GB M.2 SSD is an easy first designation for your new PC. If you don't require a ton of storage space or are looking to run your OS on the M.2 specification, then this SSD will get the job done. If you want rock solid reliability and performance that will last for years to come, you can't go wrong here.
Model: Samsung MZ-V6E250BW
Specifications
| Capacity | 250 GB |
| Interface | PCIe 3.0 x4 |
| Form Factor | M.2 2280 |
| Idle Noise | 0 dB |
| Seek Noise | 0 dB |
| Endurance (TBW) | 100 TBW |
| Peak Power Draw | 5.13 Watts |
Performance | |
| Sequential Read (Peak) | Up to 3,200 MB/s |
| Sequential Write (Peak) | Up to 1,500 MB/s |
| Random 4KB Read | Up to 330,000 IOPS |
| Random 4KB Write | Up to 300,000 IOPS |
