MyDigitalSSD BP4 2.5" & mSATA (240GB) Review
by Kristian Vättö on April 3, 2013 11:13 AM ESTFinal Words
There's one thing that tells more about the BP4 than anything else: price. There's no SSD that can really challenge it in price if we look at all available capacities and I even tried to gather budget SSDs in the table below. Especially the 240GB BP4 at $160 is a brilliant deal as 240GB/256GB SSDs are commonly in the $200 range. Sure there are sales every now and then and I've seen the 250GB Samsung 840 hitting $150 but keep in mind that MyDigitalSSD's prices are not temporary—they are retail prices and are unlikely to change dramatically (at least not by going up).
| Price Comparison (4/3/2013) | |||
| Capacity | 120/128GB | 240/256GB | 480/512GB |
| MyDigitalSSD BP4 | $90 | $160 | $350 |
| MyDigitalSSD BP4 mSATA | $110 | $180 | N/A |
| MyDigitalSSD BP3 mSATA | $100 | $180 | N/A |
| Samsung SSD 840 | $100 | $210 | $350 |
| Corsair Neutron | $120 | $210 | N/A |
| OCZ Agility 4 | $115 | $200 | N/A |
| Mushkin Chronos | $110 | $180 | $360 |
| Intel SSD 525 | $170 | $290 | N/A |
| Crucial M4 mSATA | $130 | $210 | N/A |
| Mushkin Atlas | $115 | $190 | N/A |
Of course, you always have to trade off performance for price. The BP4 is not the fastest SSD we have tested and most of the other SATA 6Gbps SSDs are faster, but the BP4 is not terribly slow. Any SSD (well, almost) is still much faster than a traditional hard drive so simply having an SSD is far more important than the brand or performance of the SSD.
We have seen some pretty bad budget SSDs over the years, such as Crucial v4 and OCZ Agility 4, but the BP4 is miles ahead. Typically budget SSDs have one big Achilles' Heel (oftentimes write performance due to the use of lower quality NAND) but the BP4 has none. Random IO performance is average, IO consistency is good and power consumption is great. I literally can't find any weak points in the BP4. There are aspects that could be better, such as random read/write speeds, but after all we are dealing with a budget SSD and I don't think it's even reasonable to expect high-end SSD performance.
The only question is long-term reliability. When a relatively unknown player steps into the market, it always takes at least a generation or two before any sort of reliability can be determined. MyDigitalSSD is claiming that their reliability is on par with Intel but I would take manufacturers' words with a grain of salt. That said, I haven't seen enough MyDigitalSSD's drives around to draw any scientific conclusions of their reliability but on the other hand, I haven't had any issues with mine nor have I heard of anyone else having issues. Only time will tell how the reliability plays out but then again, we also need a sufficient sample size as reliability can't be determined unless people actually buy and use the product. While the unknown reliability is definitely a con, I don't think it should be taken too seriously. Any drive can fail so you should always have a backup regardless of what your primary drive is.
All in all, I have no reason not to recommend the BP4. For once the price/performance ratio is reasonable as most of the time budget SSDs fail due to the fact that the price isn't cheap enough to compensate for the lack of performance. I would still choose Samsung SSD 840 over the BP4 if the price is the same, mainly because the SSD 840 is slightly faster and its reliability is more proven, but I wouldn't consider the SSD 840 to be worth much more (maybe ~$10-20).
All MyDigitalSSD needs to do now is to get their name out in the public as I'm sure not many have heard of them before. Expanding their sales channel to more vendors would be a good start because in the end you will always be limited in visibility if you only rely on Amazon and your own online store (although I do see the the enticement of keeping the distribution channel as simple as possible and it definitely helps to keep the prices low). I'm sure MyDigitalSSD has considered many options and made their decisions based on what's best for the company, but there's no doubt that the BP4 could be a great vehicle for taking a bigger slice of the market.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
35 Comments
View All Comments
Kristian Vättö - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Intel 525 is mSATA only, so the scores there are for mSATA version ;)It really depends on the firmware and hardware you're using. For example, Intel 525 is actually slightly faster than the 520 or 335, which may be due to newer firmware or higher quality NAND, but Plextor M5M is a bit slower than its 2.5" counterpart. A lot depends on the controller/firmware design and how much that relies on parallelism. SandForce does have a minor advantage there because they write less to the NAND due to compression, so you can get away with less (or slower) NAND.
The overall problem with mSATA is that there really aren't that many drives available, especially in the retail market. Most drives are OEM only (like Samsung's) so getting them in for testing is harder.
jhoff80 - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Aaah, right, I got it confused with the 520. My mistake.DanNeely - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
"Most drives are OEM only (like Samsung's) so getting them in for testing is harder."Sounds like you just need to start voiding warranty stickers on review ultrabooks to stick the drives into the benchmark box after taking pictures of what's inside the shell.
Kristian Vättö - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Two problems with that:1. Manufacturers don't usually like laptop review samples to be taken into pieces. Having good connections with manufacturers is one of the most important things in this field, so we can't just do what we wish -- we also have to respect manufacturers' requests. Legally all review samples are property of the sender/manufacturer.
2. Laptop and SSD reviews aren't done in the same place; in fact I'm not even on the same continent as the others. Thus it's not possible (or worthwhile) to send the SSD to me for testing, especially as most laptops only have a few week review period. On the other hand, Jarred/Dustin/Vivek could test the drive, assuming they have a modern desktop, but I'm not sure if that's worth it because dealing with different setups always represents some potential issues when it comes to consistency and they already have tons of work to do.
Lets put this in another way: What mSATA SSDs would you like to see tested? I can always ask if the manufacturers can give us review samples, even though the drive may not be available for retail.
msahni - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Hi there,I am contemplating buying mSATA drives 240GB-256GB range. It is really becoming confusing to purchase a drive considering so many different specs.
My options are
1) Crucial m4 mSATA 256GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
2) Plextor M5M 256GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
3) Intel SSD 525 240GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
4) Mushkin Enhanced Atlas 240GB http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N8...
I have not been able to get a head to head comparison of the drives anywhere. Most of the tech spec shootouts are of these drives against SSDs or older models.
Could you please advise which of these drives in your opinion would be the most eligible buy in a real world consumer scenario..
Cheers....
MyDigitalSSD - Thursday, April 4, 2013 - link
Visit Amazon and search bp4 240gb mSATA there are a few still left in stock. Best deal on one right now.Kristian Vättö - Thursday, April 4, 2013 - link
I would pick either Crucial or Plextor. The Plextor one is a bit faster and Plextor also has very good reputation when it comes to reliability, although in this case the Crucial is "more proven" as it's been out longer. Both are good choices, so this is a matter of personal preference.LouisPR - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
Happy to see a review about the BP4. I own it since mid February if I'm not mistaken and it's awesome!Vepsa - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
I really like the price of $160 for the 240GB drive. Seriously considering getting one now and a second later for RAID0.jamyryals - Wednesday, April 3, 2013 - link
I got one of the 256GB Samsung 830 SSDs for $160. It was a great price for a drive on sale. I'm very happy to see retail starting at that price for a comparable drive. Time to wait and see what BP4's reliability will be like before I jump in on a nicely priced ~500GB.