The Western Digital Black PCIe SSD (512GB) Review
by Billy Tallis on March 8, 2017 8:30 AM ESTRandom Read Performance
The random read test requests 4kB blocks and tests queue depths ranging from 1 to 32. The queue depth is doubled every three minutes, for a total test duration of 18 minutes. The test spans the entire drive, which is filled before the test starts. The primary score we report is an average of performances at queue depths 1, 2 and 4, as client usage typically consists mostly of low queue depth operations.
The WD Black just barely manages to deliver better random read performance than any SATA SSD, and among PCIe SSDs it also slightly beats the OCZ RD400 in addition to outperforming the Intel 600p as usual.
The WD Black's power consumption is the lowest among the non-Samsung PCIe SSDs, but its efficiency is still below average when SATA SSDs are considered, and it's only half as efficient as the Samsung 850 EVO.
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The WD Black has only a narrow random read performance advantage over SATA SSDs at low queue depths, but by QD16 it has scaled beyond the performance limits of the SATA interface. Power consumption starts out high but does not increase particularly steeply as the test progresses.
Random Write Performance
The random write test writes 4kB blocks and tests queue depths ranging from 1 to 32. The queue depth is doubled every three minutes, for a total test duration of 18 minutes. The test is limited to a 16GB portion of the drive, and the drive is empty save for the 16GB test file. The primary score we report is an average of performances at queue depths 1, 2 and 4, as client usage typically consists mostly of low queue depth operations.
The random write performance of the WD Black is nothing special: it's much faster than the SATA-based WD Blue, but still not as fast as the SATA drives using 3D NAND.
The power consumption of the WD Black is the second highest we've measured for this test and is close to 4W even at low queue depths. The efficiency is half that of the Samsung 850 EVO and barely a third that of the Crucial MX300.
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The WD Black is probably thermally limited in the second half of the test as power consumption drops back below 4W and performance ceases to increase with queue depth.
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BrokenCrayons - Thursday, March 9, 2017 - link
I hope they're not foolish enough to think that producing bottom feeder SSDs will slow the decline of their hard drive business. They're certainly aware of the fact that there are other companies that will land sales that shrink their hard drive business even if they never produce their own solid state storage solutions. It's genuinely perplexing why WD isn't pushing SanDisk to develop a more competitive product line. Maybe they are and this is just a stopgap measure, but I do wonder what's happening.timbotim - Thursday, March 9, 2017 - link
I simply don't get this SSD for desktops. If you're going to be in the slow SSD market don't you just need to be the cheapest? If you're not, what's the point? Do you hope there's sufficient clueless/confused users out there who will buy on availability?I'm pretty sure real user-facing usability is all about QD1 sequential R & W performance (and I'd guess R >> W), and then it's about price. So that's the 960 Pro on performance and the MX300 on price. Everything in between is the best QD1 sequential for the buck (probably why the best sellers are the 850EVOs and SSD PLUSs).
For laptops, replace MX300 with 600p I guess.
Jedi2155 - Thursday, March 9, 2017 - link
It would be nice if you could delineate the NVMe interfaced SSDs versus the SATA models. That way its easier to tell the performance between the two.Qostaarg - Saturday, March 11, 2017 - link
No samsung no party. performance like a potato.Gonemad - Tuesday, March 14, 2017 - link
For me it looks like a great alternative to my ageing rusty spinners for a boot drive on my 8 year old clunker.I won't even have to provision SATA or power cables for it, improving a little bit the cable clutter on my planned upgrade. Faster drives are on the too expensive side, cheaper drives are on the too slow side of the scale, so it becomes a good budget compromise by accident.
This guy has a weird place on the market, and I have a weird upgrade case to do from mechanical clatters, er, platters, so it fits.
Of course I will keep researching into options until the last minute.
jonathan1683 - Wednesday, March 15, 2017 - link
I feel bad when companies make bad decisions like this. I often wonder who made these decisions or if they tried as hard as they could and just fell short. I really like WD as a company, but I see their future may be grim. Hopefully they get it together.