Model: Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB Solid State Drive
Manufacturer: Samsung Electronics
Provided By: Samsung America

Samsung Electronics has been a leader in the electronics industry for more than 30 years. Since the introduction of their first television in 1970, this Korean company has grown to become one of the world's leading electronics manufacturers, offering everything from tiny semiconductors to large home appliances. Samsung is no stranger to the storage industry either. Along with an assortment of DVD and Blu-ray Disc drives, the company offers both hard drive and flash based storage solutions for the portable and desktop computer markets.

 

Like many other manufacturers, Samsung has set its sights on the growing solid-state drive (SSD) market. Last fall, the company launched its first 3-bit 3D V-NAND based SSD, the 850 EVO. Optimized for everyday computing, the 850 EVO was powered by one of two different controllers. While the 1TB drive was equipped with the same MEX controller found in the 840 EVO and 850 PRO, lower capacity versions got Samsung's new MGX controller. To compensate for the slow write speeds typically associated with 3-bit (TLC) NAND, the 850 EVO used Samsung's TurboWrite write acceleration technology, which created a high-performance write buffer in the SSD. The result is an reasonably priced, consumer-oriented drive that delivers performance much like that of its higher-end sibling, the 850 PRO.

Samsung has now launched the 850 EVO M.2. Designed for Ultrabooks, ultra-thin computing devices and motherboards with built-in M.2 (NGFF) slots, this new addition to the 850 EVO family isn't much larger than a stick of chewing gum. The 850 EVO M.2 is powered by the same MGX controller found in the 850 EVO and is available with up to 500GB of Samsung's 3-bit 3D V-NAND flash memory. The drive also shares many of the same features as its full size counterpart. Along with Turbo Write, it supports Device Sleep (DEVSLP) for lower power consumption and self-encrypting drive (SED) technology that is TCG Opal 2.0 and IEEE-1667 compliant. Moreover, the 850 EVO M.2 supports Samsung's RAPID (Real-time Accelerated Processing of I/O Data) technology. By using free PC memory as a cache, RAPID can push the performance of the SSD beyond the limits of the current SATA specification.

The 850 EVO M.2 is available in 120GB, 250GB and 500GB capacities. For this review, Samsung sent us the 250GB version of the drive which comes equipped with 512MB of on-board cache and is capable of delivering up to 540 MB/s sequential read and 520 MB/s sequential write speeds as well as up to 95,000 random read and 89,000 random write IOPS.

   Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB Solid State Drive
General Specifications
Model Number MZ-N5E250BW
Capacity 250GB
Flash Type Samsung Samsung 32 layer 3D V-NAND 3-bit MLC
Controller Samsung MGX S4LN062X01-Y030
Cache 512MB LPDDR2 DRAM
Form Factor M.2 2280
Interface SATA III 6Gb/s

Performance
Sequential Read 540 MB/s Max
Sequential Write 520 MB/s Max
4K Random Read (QD1) 10,000 IOPS
4K Random Write (QD1) 40,000 IOPS
4K Random Read (QD32) 95,000 IOPS
4K Random Write (QD32) 89,000 IOPS

Reliability
MTBF 1.5 million hours
Endurance 75TBW

Power Consumption
Average 2.2 Watt
Maximum 3.3 Watt
Idle 50 mW
Device Sleep 2 mW

Environmental
Temperature (Operating) 0 ºC to 70 ºC
Temperature (Non-Operating) -40 ºC to 85 ºC
Humidity 5% to 95%, non-condensing
Shock 1500G & 0.5ms (Half sine)
Vibration (Non-operating) 20~2000Hz, 20G

Dimensions and Weight
Dimensions 80.15 x 22.15 x 2.38 mm
Weight 6.8 g

Other Features
Supports TurboWrite and RAPID technologies
AES 256-bit full disk encryption
TCG Opal and eDrive IEEE 1667 standards compliant
Supports TRIM, SMART and Garbage Collection
DEVSLP power mode
3 year warranty

Needless to say, this is only a taste of what the 850 EVO M.2 has to offer. To give you an idea of what to expect, we'll take a closer look at Samsung's new M.2 SSD and then see how well it performs. Does the 850 EVO M.2 have what it takes? Can it deliver the performance and features that we've come to expect from Samsung? Keep reading as we find out.


 

 

The 850 EVO mSATA comes in a small white box. While there aren't a lot of details on the front, the back of the box shows some of the drive's features including 3D V-NAND technology and a 3 year warranty. Inside, you'll find the SSD as well as a small guide with a warranty statement summary and user manual.

Physical Features:

The 850 EVO M.2 uses the 2280 form factor for M.2 (NGFF) SSDs. It measures 80.15 x 22.15 x 2.38 mm and tips the scales at a mere 7g. The drive also has a B+M edge connector which supports data transfer rates up to 6 Gb/s.

The 850 EVO M.2 uses Samsung's MGX (S4LN062X01-Y030) controller chip. There still isn't a lot of information available regarding this controller but from what we can gather, it is very similar to the MEX (S4LN045X01-8030) controller found in the 850 PRO and the 1TB version of the 850 EVO. The biggest difference is that instead of three cores, the MGX has only two.

For the 250GB version of the 850 EVO M.2, Samsung used their own 3-bit, 32-layer 3D V-NAND flash chips. Looking at the pictures above, you can see that there are two 128GB NAND flash packages on the top of the PCB. The drive also has a single 512GB LPDDR3 DRAM memory chip that is used for caching.


The Samsung Magician software is designed to help users easily manage the health and performance of their Samsung SSD. From the main screen, users can check the health of their drives and view information like the serial number, firmware, capacity and the total bytes written. This screen also shows whether or not AHCI mode has been activated as well as the speed of the SATA interface.

Magician also gives users the ability to benchmark their drives and optimize the performance by forcing TRIM and Garbage Collection to run. In addition to this, users can download and apply firmware updates using the software.

Most operating systems are optimized for traditional hard drives. The OS Optimization menu provides options that help you configure your OS to work best with your SSD. Additionally, the Over Provisioning menu gives you the ability to optimize the performance and lifespan of your drive by resizing the partitions.

The Secure Erase feature provides the option to delete all data on an SSD in a way that it can never be recovered, restoring the drive to its original performance. Magician gives you the option to do this from within Windows. Otherwise, if your SSD is in a frozen state, you can create a bootable USB drive, CD or DVD.

One of the advanced features in Samsung's Magician software is RAPID (Real-time Accelerated Processing of I/O Data) Mode. When enabled, RAPID mode is inserted as a filter driver in the Windows storage stack. The driver actively monitors all storage-related activity between and among the operating system, user applications and the SSD. The RAPID technology analyzes system traffic and leverages spare system resources (DRAM and CPU) to deliver read acceleration through intelligent caching of hot data and write optimization through tight coordination with the SSD.

The other advanced feature deals with Data Security. From here, users can check and see what security features their drive supports and view its current settings. Looking at the screenshot below you can see that like the 840 EVO and 850 PRO, the 850 EVO offers support for Class 0, TCG/Opal and Encrypted Drive.


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. I should also point out that our test system is not equipped with an mSATA port so we had to use an mSATA to SATA 6 Gb/s adapter card.

To test the performance of Samsung's 250GB 850 EVO M.2, I ran a series of benchmarks using CrystalDiskMark 3.0.1, HD Tach RW 3.0.4.0, ATTO Disk Benchmark 2.46, AS SSD, HD Tune Pro 5.00, Anvil's Storage Utilities and Iometer. For comparison, I've also included test results from the Samsung 850 EVO mSATA, AMD Radeon R7, Silicon Power Slim S80, Samsung SSD 850 EVO, OCZ ARC 100, SanDisk Ultra II, Crucial MX100, SanDisk Extreme Pro, Samsung SSD 850 PRO, Plextor PX-256M6S, Toshiba Q Series Pro, Plextor PX-256M6M, Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA, OCZ Vector 150, OCZ Vertex 450, Silicon Power Slim S55, Samsung SSD 840 EVO, Seagate 600 SSD, SanDisk Extreme II, Plextor PX-256M5M, OCZ Vector, Plextor PX-256M5Pro Xtreme, Samsung SSD 840 Pro and Samsung SSD 840.

As I mentioned earlier, the 850 EVO M.2 is based on Samsung's MGX (S4LN062X01-Y030) controller chip. Looking at the screenshot above, you can see that it performs equally well with both incompressible (0%) and compressible (100%) data.

CrystalDiskMark 3.0.3:

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.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB

Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode)

Samsung SSD 850 EVO 120GB

Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA 1TB

According to Samsung, the 250GB 850 EVO M.2 is capable of reading at 540 MB/s and writing at 500 MB/s. While the drive performed well, it came up a bit short of these numbers in CrystalDiskMark's sequential read and write speed tests. With RAPID mode enabled, these numbers increased considerably though. Looking at the screenshot above, you can see that the 850 EVO M.2 was able to read at 4,474 MB/s and write at 3,043 MB/s.

HD Tach RW 3.0.4.0:

Next, I used HD Tach to test the 850 EVO M.2's read, write and burst speeds as well as its seek times and CPU usage.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB

Looking at the screenshot above, you can see that the 850 EVO M.2 had average read and write speeds of 404.1 MB/s and 308.7 MB/s respectively, as well as a burst speed of 411.1 MB/s. The screenshot also shows the transition from TurboWrite to what Samsung calls "After TurboWrite" speeds. The 850 EVO M.2 starts writing at about 370 MB/s and then drops to about 300 MB/s when the consecutive write operation exceeds the size of the buffer.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode)

This time around, RAPID mode had very little effect on the 850 EVO M.2's performance. Most likely, this is due to the way HD Tach bypasses the file system when performing its read and write tests.

ATTO Disk Benchmark 2.46:

I also used ATTO Disk Benchmark to test the 850 EVO M.2'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.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB

Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode)

Samsung SSD 850 EVO 120GB

Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA 1TB

When tested with ATTO, the 850 EVO M.2's read speeds topped out at about 552 MB/s and its write speeds at 509 MB/s. With RAPID mode enabled, the read and write speeds were all over the place, but for the most part, it was a considerable improvement.


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.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB

Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode)

Samsung SSD 850 EVO 120GB

Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA 1TB

AS SSD also includes a copy benchmark. This test copies an ISO (two large files), program (many small files) and game (small and large files), returning the speed and duration of each.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB

Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode)

Samsung SSD 850 EVO 120GB

Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA 1TB

HD Tune Pro 5.00:

Next, I ran a series of tests using HD Tune Pro. This hard disk utility measures a drive's performance by testing its sequential read and write speeds as well as its access time, burst rate and CPU usage. For this review, I'm also going to use it to benchmark the 850 EVO M.2's random read and write speeds, random access times and the number of operations per second.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB - Read Benchmark

Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode) - Read Benchmark

Samsung SSD 850 EVO 120GB - Read Benchmark

Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA 1TB - Read Benchmark


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB - Write Benchmark

Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode) - Write Benchmark

Samsung SSD 850 EVO 120GB - Write Benchmark

Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA 1TB - Write Benchmark

The 850 EVO M.2 performed relatively well when benchmarked with HD Tune. The drive had average read and write speeds of 383.8 MB/s and 293.2 MB/s, respectively, and a burst rate of 224.5 MB/s when reading. Surprisingly, RAPID mode had very little impact on the drive's read speed. However, it was slightly faster when writing.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB - Random Access Read

Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode) - Random Access Read

Samsung SSD 850 EVO 120GB - Random Access Read

Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA 1TB - Random Access Read


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB - Random Access Write

Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode) - Random Access Write

Samsung SSD 850 EVO 120GB - Random Access Write

Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA 1TB - Random Access Writ

The 850 EVO M.2 didn't disappoint when doing random reads and writes. When reading 4KB blocks, it reached 17,660 IOPS and had an average speed of 68.985 MB/s. The drive was even faster when writing, reaching 23,191 IOPS with an average speed of 90.590 MB/s. As you can see, RAPID mode gave the 850 EVO M.2's random read and write performance a considerable boost. With it enabled, the drive reached 127,291 random read IOPS and 99,601 random write IOPS.


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.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 250GB (RAPID Mode)

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 850 EVO M.2'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 EVO 850 M.2's performance was hit and miss when tested with Iometer. While the drive was able to read at a respectable 526.45 MB/s, its sequential write speed averaged out at only 324.88 MB/s. With RAPID mode enabled, its read and write speeds jumped to 592.37 MB/s and 552.51 MB/s, respectively.

The 850 EVO M.2 performed very well when doing random reads and writes. In our tests, the drive was able to read at 164.49 MB/s and write at 295.3 MB/s. This by itself is impressive, but with RAPID mode enabled, its random write speed increased to 307.88 MB/s.

According to Samsung, the 250GB 850 EVO M.2 is capable of 95,000 IOPS when reading and 89,000 IOPS when writing 4K blocks. In our tests, the drive reached 42,111 random read IOPS and 75,597 random write IOPS. Increasing the queue depth had little impact on the 850 EVO M.2's random write performance. However, with the queue depth set to 32, the drive was able to reach 96,045 random read IOPS.


TRIM Performance:

While SSDs offer many benefits, there are some downsides to using flash memory. One of the biggest issues people run into is performance degradation. Over time, an SSD will run out of fresh blocks and will have to write over data the file system has marked as deleted. This procedure is very complicated and can slow an SSD's write speeds considerably.

To address this problem, most manufacturers have added TRIM support to their SSDs. The TRIM command allows an operating system, such as Windows 7, to tell an SSD which data blocks are no longer in use. Using this information, the drive pro-actively erases these blocks and adds them to the free block pool.

To test the 850 EVO M.2's TRIM and garbage collection functions, I first put the drive in a "dirty" state. I used Iometer to fill the entire drive and then ran a random write test for 30 minutes.  This had little impact on the 850 EVO M.2's read speed. However, its average writing speed dropped to a mere 23.9 MB/s.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 - Dirty

To see how well the 850 EVO M.2 could recover, I let the computer sit for about an hour and a half and then reran the test. Looking at the screenshot below, you can see that the drive's average writing speed jumped up to 295.0 MB/s.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 - After Trim

Lastly, I used Samsung's SSD Magician software to perform a secure erase of the 850 EVO M.2. With the drive wiped clean, it had average read and write speeds of 402.8 MB/s and 295.1 MB/s, respectively.


Samsung SSD 850 EVO M.2 - Secure Erase

Final Thoughts:

With the 850 EVO M.2, Samsung has proven once again that good things do come in small packages. Designed and built entirely in-house, this diminutive drive is powered by Samsung's energy-efficient MGX controller and is available with up to 500GB of the company's 3-bit 3D V-NAND flash. It also comes equipped with Samsung's innovative TurboWrite technology which uses a high speed buffer to maximize a user's everyday computing experience. Like its full size counterpart, the 850 EVO M.2 performed relatively well throughout most of our tests. In our sequential read and write tests, the 250GB version of the drive was able to read at speeds as high as 552 MB/s and write at speeds in excess of 471 MB/s. It also did very well in our random write tests, producing more than 75,000 IOPS at low queue depths.

Samsung's TurboWrite technology does have its limitations. It does a great job of maximizing performance under normal workloads, but, once a consecutive write operation exceeds the size of TurboWrite's buffer, the 850 EVO M.2's write speed drops to non-accelerated levels. If you use your computer primarily for web browsing, email or to play the occasional game, it's unlikely that you will ever run into this situation. However, if you have a heavier workload and are doing something like video editing, which writes large amounts of data, you may want to consider other options.

Of course, fast read and write speeds aren't the only things the 850 EVO M.2 has to offer. Along with support for technologies like RAPID and TurboWrite, the drive features AES 256-bit full disk encryption and is compatible with both the TCG Opal and IEEE 1667 specifications. The 850 EVO M.2 also supports the SATA Device Sleep (DEVSLP) standard which extends the battery life of a device by reducing the drive's power consumption when it's not in use.

The Samsung 850 EVO M.2 is available now in 120GB, 250GB and 500GB capacities. Prices on Amazon.com currently range from $80 up to $230, with the 250GB version reviewed here going for about $130.

Highs:

  • Small M.2 form factor
  • Equipped with 3-bit 3D V-NAND
  • Available in 120GB, 250GB and 500GB capacities
  • Features RAPID mode and TurboWrite technology
  • Excellent sequential read and write speeds under most conditions
  • Good random read and write performance
  • Performs equally well with compressible and incompressible data
  • SATA 6Gb/s interface
  • Large SDRAM cache
  • Supports TRIM, garbage collection and wear leveling
  • AES 256-bit full disk encryption
  • TCG Opal and IEEE 1667 compliant
  • Works with SSD Magician software
  • Reasonably priced
  • 3 year warranty

Lows:

  • Write speed drops when TurboWrite buffer is full
  • RAPID mode is Windows only