Model: Plextor PX-256M5P 256GB Solid State Drive
Manufacturer: Plextor
Provided By: Plextor LLC

As one of the biggest names in the storage industry, Plextor doesn't need much of an introduction. For more than a decade, they've produced some of the best optical drives the industry has seen. Known the world over for their quality, performance, and features, these drives have become favorites among consumers and professionals alike. Today, Plextor continues to lead the way by bringing cutting edge storage technologies to market. Along with a vast assortment of high-performance DVD and Blu-ray drives, the company offers NAS devices, external hard drives and a growing number of solid state drives.

Like many other manufacturers, Plextor has set its sights on the growing solid-state drive (SSD) market. This fall, the company launched its  M5 Pro Series SSD. With its Marvell 88SS9187 "Monet" controller, Toshiba 19nm Toggle Mode NAND and enterprise-class features, the M5 Pro was an excellent alternative to the myriad of "SandForce Driven" SSDs on the market. Since then though, we've seen the launch of the Samsung SSD 840 Pro and OCZ Vector, which offer equal, if not superior, performance in a number of areas.

Instead of accepting defeat, Plextor asked their firmware team to push the M5 Pro’s performance even higher. The result was the recently released Xtreme firmware. This update transforms the current M5 Pro into the M5 Pro Xtreme, which Plextor claims is the first truly professional SSD capable of delivering up to 100,000 random read IOPS. The Xtreme firmware also increases the M5 Pro's maximum random write performance up to 88,000 IOPS and boosts its sequential write speed up to 470MB/s.

Plextor M5 Pro Specifications with Xtreme 1.02 Firmware
Model PX-128M5P PX-256M5P PX-512M5P
Capacity 128GB 256GB 512GB
Sequential Read 540MB/s 540MB/s 540MB/s
Sequential Write 340MB/s -> 330MB/s 450MB/s -> 460MB/s 450MB/s -> 470MB/s
4K Random Read 91K IOPS -> 92K IOPS 94K IOPS -> 100K IOPS 94K IOPS -> 100K IOPS
4KB Random Write 82K IOPS 86K IOPS 86K IOPS -> 88K IOPS

As you can see, the improvements offered by the Xtreme firmware don't apply equally to all models. The PX-512M5P gets the biggest increases in performance with the PX-256M5P seeing some, but not all, of those improvements. The PX-128M5P is the odd man out here as it sees a 10 MB/s reduction in its sequential write speed and gets an increase of only 1,000 random read IOPS in return. Not exactly a fair trade if you ask me.

To give you an idea of what to expect from Plextor's new Xtreme firmware, we updated one of our PX-256M5P's and ran it through a series of tests to see how well it performs. Is this update really "extreme" or is it just a bunch of hype? Read on to find out.


The test system used in this review was an HP 8200 Elite. The computer came equipped with an Intel Core i5-2400 CPU, 4GB of DDR3 1333MHz memory, Seagate Barracuda 7200.12 ST3250312AS 250GB SATA 6 Gb/s hard drive, NVIDIA Quadro FX580 512MB PCIe graphics card and an Intel 82579-LM gigabit network card. For the operating system, I installed a fresh copy of Windows 7 Enterprise.

To test the performance of the Plextor PX-256M5P with the new Xtreme firmware, I ran a series of benchmarks using CrystalDiskMark 3.0.1, ATTO Disk Benchmark 2.46, AS SSD, Anvil's Storage Utilities and Iometer.

CrystalDiskMark 3.0.1:

First, I ran a few quick tests using CrystalDiskMark. This benchmark tool measures the performance of a storage device by testing its sequential read and write speeds as well as its random read and write speeds using blocks 512K and 4K in size.


Plextor PX-256M5P Xtreme (1.02)

Plextor PX-256M5P (1.01)

According to Plextor, the PX-256M5P is capable of reading at 540 MB/s and writing at 460 MB/s with the new Xtreme firmware. While the drive came up a bit short of these numbers, you can see that there are some definite performance gains, especially in regards to its sequential write and random read speeds. 

ATTO Disk Benchmark 2.46:

I also used ATTO Disk Benchmark to test the PX-256M5P's sequential read and write speeds. The tests are run using blocks ranging in size from 0.5KB to 8192KB and the total length set to 256MB.


Plextor PX-256M5P Xtreme (1.02)

Plextor PX-256M5P (1.01)

The PX-256M5P was slightly faster when tested with the new Xtreme firmware. This time around, the drive's read speeds topped out at about 550 MB/s and its write speeds at 462 MB/s.

AS SSD:

AS SSD is a relatively new benchmark designed specifically for solid state drives. The application contains five synthetic tests used to determine the sequential and random read and write performance of a drive.


Plextor PX-256M5P Xtreme (1.02)

Plextor PX-256M5P (1.01)

The PX-256M5P did not perform as well in AS SSD's sequential read and write tests with the new Xtreme firmware. Nevertheless, its random read and write performance was better, especially when doing random reads at high queue depths.


Anvil's Storage Utilities:

Anvil's Storage Utilities is another new benchmark designed with SSDs in mind. The standard storage benchmark measures a drive's performance by testing its transfer speeds, access times and IOPS.


Plextor PX-256M5P Xtreme (1.02)


Plextor PX-256M5P (1.01)

Iometer:

Lastly, I ran a series of tests using Iometer. This tool can be configured to benchmark a number of things. In this case, I used it to measure the PX-256M5P's read and write speeds and the number of operations per second. The tests were run using random bytes and a queue depth of 3.

The PX-256M5P's sequential read and write speeds were slightly lower with the Xtreme firmware. In our tests, the drive was able to read at 521.58 MB/s and write at 438.87 MB/s.

At low queue depths, the Xtreme firmware had very little impact on the PX-256M5P's random and write speeds. It's not until you increase the queue depth that you see any real performance gains.

With the Xtreme firmware, the PX-256M5P is capable of 100,000 IOPS when reading and 86,000 IOPS when writing 4K blocks. In our tests, the drive reached 40,899 random read IOPS and 67,229 random write IOPS. As with the original firmware, the only way I came close to Plextor's numbers was to increase the queue depth. With the queue depth set to 32, the PX-235M5P reached 98,432 random read IOPS and 82,332 random write IOPS.

Final Thoughts:

The M5 Pro has been a big success for Plextor, and with the Xtreme firmware, the company is looking to continue this momentum into 2013. The big question is, does this free firmware update live up to the hype? Does it really take the M5 Pro's performance to the "extreme"? The answer is yes and no. Those with the 256GB and 512GB versions of the M5 Pro will definitely welcome the Xtreme's increased sequential write speeds. When we first looked at the M5 Pro, its 450 MB/s write speed put it at a disadvantage in some of our tests. The Xtreme firmware reduces the performance gap somewhat. However, Plextor still has a way to go before the M5 Pro's sequential write speeds are on par with the latest offerings from OCZ and Samsung.

And then you have the Xtreme's highly touted 100K random read IOPS. As impressive as this number is, the M5 Pro reaches it only at very high queue depths. This is great if you're going to use the drive in a database or web server but the average consumer isn't going to come close to this number during everyday use. It would have been better if Plextor had optimized the M5 Pro's random read and write performance at lower queue depths, but let's be honest here, the higher number looks more impressive and helps sell more drives.

Judging by comments made by Plextor on their Facebook page, the company is planning to sell an updated version of the M5 Pro as the M5 Pro Xtreme. The drive will ship in revised packaging and come with the 1.02 firmware. It will also be based on entirely new PCB (M6S-TSOP REV:01) which, going by the name, it will share with the M6 Series SSD. The M5 Pro Xtreme still uses Toshiba's 19nm Toggle Mode NAND. However, instead of it being Type A MLC in a BGA package, it will be Type C MLC in a TSOP package. How does this all affect performance? We really won't know until the M5 Pro Xtreme ships and we can run some tests to see how it stacks up against the original M5 Pro with the upgraded Xtreme firmware.

The M5 Pro is available now in 128GB, 256GB and 512GB capacities. Prices on Amazon currently range from $108 up to $440, with the PX-256M5P featured here going for about $200.