Plextor M6V 256GB SSD Review

Plextor M6V 256GB SSD Review

Cache. The single things that makes Plextor’s new SSD an edge above the rest. This “budget” solid state drive aims to perform further and seeing Plextor’s highfalutin terms that goes with the release of their PlexTurbo technology, it does have some high promises to keep.

Physical Features

As with the usual SSD, nothing is to be expected of the M6V’s packaging and contents. It includes the drive itself, accompanied with an instruction manual. That’s it. No additional cables and screws. You’re on your own after buying the SSD.

Performance

For our benchmarks, we used four popular programs that are widely known for checking write/read speeds.

Wait, wait! What do these numbers mean?

Well, from a consumer’s point of view, these numbers dictate how fast an SSD is given a number of trials in reading/writing data. Although data is not as concise or clean cut as projected by these tests, they are good indicators of how well the drives would perform under controlled scenarios. As SSDs and HDDs have one job (clue: it stores), manufacturers duke it out in terms of performance and implementation of their respective technologies and available hardware.

As always, the SSD is faster than an HDD. Given its design and means, an SSD trumps over the traditional disk-based storage by a large margin. Even when the said SSD is within the budget segment.

Crystal DiskMark

CrystalDiskMark is a disk benchmark software.It measure sequential reads/writes speed,measure random 512KB, 4KB, 4KB (Queue Depth=32) reads/writes speed,select test data (Random, 0Fill, 1Fill),provide theme support and Multi-Language support.

The numbers and the graph don’t lie that this the Plextor M6V is almost on par with Kingston’s high-end Savage. The caching technology is showing some fangs and claws but somehow gets the short end of the stick when it comes to writing.

HD Tune Pro

HD Tune Pro is a hard disk / SSD utility with many functions. It can be used to measure the drive’s performance, scan for errors, check the health status (S.M.A.R.T.), securely erase all data and much more.

Write
Read

ATTO Disk Benchmark

The ATTO Disk Benchmark performance measurement tool is compatible with Microsoft Windows. Measure your storage systems performance with various transfer sizes and test lengths for reads and writes.

Using the ATTO, utilizes the file formatting of the drive as opposed to the HDTune Pro.

Anvil Storage Utilities

Anvil’s Storage Utilities has been designed to be the most comprehensive benchmark tool for Solid State Drives on the market.

Plextool

Plextool is a program that allows the user to tweak the SSD’s caching mechanism. The above settings are enabled by default.

By enabling caching, we’re seeing tandem performance between the RAM and the SSD, producing whopping numbers shown by a rerun of the CrystalDiskMark trial:

Verdict

The Plextor M6V 256GB SSD is a monster. It’s a value friendly alternative to existing high-end SSDs and it won’t burn your wallet given that you have an ample amount of RAM to back it up. Caching is not a new technology and there are some programs that allow direct tapping of the RAM instead of having to go through the motions of a storage device. But the Plextor M6V floats in the middle of both shores, providing good speeds without breaking your wallet or your components.

The base performance is also surprisingly great. Even without caching, you’ll find a good money for speed ratio in this device.

The price of Plextor M6V 256GB SSD is somewhere between PhP 4,000 to PhP 5000.

Plextor M6V Review

Plextor M6V Review

Plextor M6V Review

Plextor M6V Review