Intel SSD Pro 2500 (240GB) Review
by Kristian Vättö on July 30, 2014 5:00 AM ESTFinal Words
I have to say I have never been a fan of business SSDs. They tend to be just consumer SSDs with a couple of software features to justify the higher price tag and this is the case with the Pro 2500. Fundamentally the Pro 2500 is just an SSD 530 with TCG Opal 2.0, IEEE-1667, and vPro support. There is nothing special about the Pro 2500 and if Intel wanted, they could enable the same set of features on the SSD 530 as well. As a result, the whole SSD Pro lineup feels a bit redundant, or at least it is a very obvious effort to increase the profit margin.
I certainly understand Intel's motivation behind the separate business lineup since Intel's goal is to generate profit for shareholders, but from a consumer's perspective the model is bad. The problem is that TCG Opal 2.0 and eDrive will never become consumer friendly features if manufacturers do not include them in their client drives, which is what happens if there is a separate business lineup. Ultimately Opal and eDrive are features that benefit consumers too, even though the gains are more obvious in the business space.
| NewEgg Price Comparison (7/29/2014) | ||||
| 120/128GB | 180GB | 240/256GB | ||
| Intel SSD Pro 2500 | $120 | $160 | $200 | |
| Intel SSD 530 | $94 | $140 | $165 | |
| SanDisk X300s | $125 | - | $196 | |
| Samsung SSD 850 Pro | $130 | - | $200 | |
| Samsung SSD 840 EVO | $90 | - | $140 | |
| Crucial MX100 | $75 | - | $115 | |
| Crucial M550 | $90 | - | $150 | |
The fact is that both Crucial and Samsung can provide the same TCG Opal 2.0 and eDrive encryption while being substantially cheaper. The 256GB MX100 comes in at almost half the price of 240GB Pro 2500, so I find it really hard to justify the extra cost. The only advantages that the Pro 2500 has are the administrator tool with PSID revert support and vPro support for remote management, although PSID revert can be done by a third party tool as well. Hence the only scenario where the Pro 2500 makes sense is a company that relies heavily on vPro for management because the Pro 2500 is the only SSD with vPro support (at least to my knowledge).
All in all, the days of Intel being an interesting player in the client SSD space seem to be over. For the past two years, Intel's focus has been in the higher profit enterprise market and that has happened at the cost of the client SSD business. Nowadays it feels like Intel is just riding on the brand they built several years ago with the X25-M series and the Pro 2500 is another example of Intel's lack of interest and innovation in the client space.
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Samus - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
Ian, you couldn't be more wrong. Although Sandisk makes solid products and is a large OEM partner, they can't come close to competing with crucial\micron manufacturing capacity which inevitably makes Sandisk more expensive. When you consider crucial\micron drives have more features and better reliability than everyone else, the writing is on the wall. Sandisk (and Samsung, Toshiba\OCZ, and perhaps Intel) will continue to be relevant form their product segments but crucial\micron will always be king of ssd volume and reliability.Everyone else will be irrelevant. Kingston, ADATA, PNY, OWC, and so on, will all fail in the consumer space because they are doing what Intel is doing with this very drive, relying on outsourced components. The problem for them is they can't charge what Intel can. They'll be lucky to even break even in the future.
hojnikb - Thursday, July 31, 2014 - link
I don't know where you're from, but here in EU MX100 is almost 110€ cheaper than X210 (YES, 110€ cheaper) for 512GB capacity. So you would have to be insane to fork that much more for only a marginally better performing drive.Burner.Tom - Monday, August 4, 2014 - link
In Slovakia is the price of Crucial MX100 512GB cca 183€ with tax compared to 235€ of SanDisk X210 512GB. For me is the X210 right choice because of better warranty (3y vs 5y) and much better performance.GammaLaser - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
"a study performed by the Ponemon Institute"At first I read that as Pokemon Institute :P
texasti89 - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
Why on earth would someone (client or business) choose this sub-bar product over Samsung new V-NAND drives given they are priced on the same range? This product doesn't even have an Intel chip inside!galfert - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
When I upgrade my client's computers they say, "Samsung? What happened with Intel?" And I tell them, "Oh those Intel SSD days are long over." I like Intel as a company, and they had the resources to keep up with the SSD innovation train. It isn't too late for them. The focus should move to M.2 PCIe with NVMe.Kristian Vättö - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
I wouldn't say Intel isn't innovative in the SSD space as the P3700 was one of the first NVMe drives to ship. It's just that Intel's focus is in the enterprise market and their efforts in that front don't translate to the client market.mmrezaie - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
You are talking about intel. They should be way more innovative with what resources they have, but I assume this is typical intel. They were never satisfying but just dominating.FunBunny2 - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
Intel doesn't have the experience that Texas Memory has, and is the reason IBM bought them rather than Intel. Intel has cpu design and fab expertise. Enterprise SSD? Not so much. It's not a mass production venue. Whether SSD gets to the point of HDD, where the only real difference is QA of parts, is the question. It's still more about design and execution of a very different part.gsvelto - Wednesday, July 30, 2014 - link
I'm really not sure what these drives are good for. Intel already has a line of drives which offer functionality above that of consumer offerings: that's the Pro 1500 series which is in spirit (and price) an excellent successor to the venerable 320 line. That line was relatively popular even among consumer builds and in workstations precisely because it offered extra features not commonly available in consumer drives (such as encryption and power-loss protection). These drives on the other hand have basically no advantages over competitive offerings and a lot of downsides including the high price.