Samsung SSD XP941 Review: The PCIe Era Is Here
by Kristian Vättö on May 15, 2014 12:00 PM ESTAnandTech Storage Bench 2013
Our Storage Bench 2013 focuses on worst-case multitasking and IO consistency. Similar to our earlier Storage Benches, the test is still application trace based—we record all IO requests made to a test system and play them back on the drive we're testing and run statistical analysis on the drive's responses. There are 49.8 million IO operations in total with 1583.0GB of reads and 875.6GB of writes. I'm not including the full description of the test for better readability, so make sure to read our Storage Bench 2013 introduction for the full details.
| AnandTech Storage Bench 2013 - The Destroyer | ||
| Workload | Description | Applications Used |
| Photo Sync/Editing | Import images, edit, export | Adobe Photoshop CS6, Adobe Lightroom 4, Dropbox |
| Gaming | Download/install games, play games | Steam, Deus Ex, Skyrim, Starcraft 2, BioShock Infinite |
| Virtualization | Run/manage VM, use general apps inside VM | VirtualBox |
| General Productivity | Browse the web, manage local email, copy files, encrypt/decrypt files, backup system, download content, virus/malware scan | Chrome, IE10, Outlook, Windows 8, AxCrypt, uTorrent, AdAware |
| Video Playback | Copy and watch movies | Windows 8 |
| Application Development | Compile projects, check out code, download code samples | Visual Studio 2012 |
We are reporting two primary metrics with the Destroyer: average data rate in MB/s and average service time in microseconds. The former gives you an idea of the throughput of the drive during the time that it was running the test workload. This can be a very good indication of overall performance. What average data rate doesn't do a good job of is taking into account response time of very bursty (read: high queue depth) IO. By reporting average service time we heavily weigh latency for queued IOs. You'll note that this is a metric we've been reporting in our enterprise benchmarks for a while now. With the client tests maturing, the time was right for a little convergence.
In our most demanding storage test, the XP941 is just amazing. It's about 40% faster than any SATA 6Gbps drive we have tested, which is huge. Obviously it's not the random performance that makes the XP941 shine but the large IO sequential performance where the PCIe interface can be used to its full extent. While most IOs in client workloads tend to be random, the sequential performance can certainly make a big difference and high queue depth random reads can also take advantage of the faster interface.
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nathanddrews - Thursday, May 15, 2014 - link
They weren't trying to squelch his speech or impugn his rights, rather give him advice as to where he could take those opinions so they would be better appreciated. "Free speech" isn't some magical phrase that suddenly allows you to say whatever you want whenever and wherever you want. Valuing free speech doesn't mean you have to value dumb comments on websites, even this comment that I just made! :-PBabar Javied - Thursday, May 15, 2014 - link
This site needs a "thumbs up" or "like" button because I'd like to "like" your comment good sir.Sabresiberian - Thursday, May 15, 2014 - link
Hmm yeah it's a matter of etiquette, not "free speech". Those topics tend to derail discussions, turn them into heated arguments which add nothing to a discussion unless they are pertinent. It is bad internet manners to bring them up in any form when the topic has nothing to do with them.As far as not reading the post - well. that would make sense in an ongoing discussion, where it could easily be seen that the comments were not going to be interesting to the reader before he had read them. This kind of post though - it is impossible to know the poster will go too far for you until he has. :)
yaedon - Thursday, May 15, 2014 - link
@critical: I would love to go on a long and well-thought-out diatribe on common misconceptions of the First Amendment in response to your comment, but the comment section of a tech blog is simply not the appropriate place for that and would continue to distract me, you, and everyone who reads the comment from our common interest in computer tech. I fail to understand how entreating someone to observe good manners so that all people can enjoy this fine tech blog is inflammatory.Travisryno - Thursday, October 18, 2018 - link
..has nothing to do with free speech-private citizens/private forum.This is about respect-specifically not bringing heated/emotional topics into a professional and/or h.obbyist's forum.
Hell I could say you are imposing on their right to tell people to leave that stuff at the door.. but i'd just be abusing it too
vFunct - Thursday, May 15, 2014 - link
lol he totally didn't know that businesses have fixed costs and not just variable costs.vgray35@hotmail.com - Friday, May 16, 2014 - link
Well I do not concur. Both the PCIe and SATA interfaces are not new by any means. And as for the SSD technology, well that too is not new. The development costs are much lower that one would think. Pretty much a new PCB with layout testing. That's it. It's just old tech on a new PCB, since SSD on PCIe has also been around quite a while now too.Opportunistic behavior dictates price first and foremost, and I do not believe the device is peppered with Samsung blessed gold which could justify such an expensive PCB.
nafhan - Thursday, May 15, 2014 - link
In general:Price = cost where they will sell the number of units that maximizes profits.
If they priced it lower, they'd be doing that out of greed, too.
MrSpadge - Thursday, May 15, 2014 - link
"If they priced it lower, they'd be doing that out of greed, too."Brilliant!
RobElk - Thursday, May 15, 2014 - link
This uses multiple controllers to reach that speed, so it is means more parts, not less.