The Toshiba TR200 3D NAND SSD Review: One Step Forward, One Step Back
by Billy Tallis on October 11, 2017 7:00 AM ESTMixed Random Performance
Our test of mixed random reads and writes covers mixes varying from pure reads to pure writes at 10% increments. Each mix is tested for up to 1 minute or 32GB of data transferred. The test is conducted with a queue depth of 4, and is limited to a 64GB span of the drive. In between each mix, the drive is given idle time of up to one minute so that the overall duty cycle is 50%.
The mixed random I/O performance of the Toshiba TR200 is much faster than the HP S700, but is slower than everything else, even the earlier Trion/TR series drives. Contemporary budget SSDs like the ADATA SU800 and Crucial MX300 are more than twice as fast.
The power efficiency of the TR200 during the mixed random I/O test is a marked improvement over the TR150 and is more than twice that of the HP S700, but that's not enough for the TR200 to rate much better than acceptable.
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The performance of the TR200 during the mixed random I/O test traces out a common bathtub curve shape, with performance dropping after the initial pure reads phase and climbing very slowly as the proportion of writes increases, before accelerating near the end of the test as the workload shifts to mostly writes. The TR200s don't show a large spike in performance at the very end of the test like the TR150 does, but at least they don't bottom out anywhere near as low as the HP S700.
Mixed Sequential Performance
Our test of mixed sequential reads and writes differs from the mixed random I/O test by performing 128kB sequential accesses rather than 4kB accesses at random locations, and the sequential test is conducted at queue depth 1. The range of mixes tested is the same, and the timing and limits on data transfers are also the same as above.
The larger two Toshiba TR200 models are marginally faster than their TR150 predecessors on the mixed sequential I/O test, but the 240GB has lost more than 12% of its overall performance. All of the TR/Trion series drives remain at the bottom of the chart, well below even the other DRAMless SSDs.
The TR200 climbs out of last place for power efficiency, and the 960GB model in particular is near the top of the chart along with the other DRAMless SSDs. The smaller two capacities have fairly average efficiency.
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All three of the TR200 models lose a lot of performance when writes are first added to the workload, but they regain a bit of performance through the first half of the test. The 960GB model gains a bit more performance in the second half of the test while the smaller models drop off again. The drives that do well on this test mostly either regain significant performance in the second half, or show steady increases across the entire test.
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theniller - Wednesday, October 11, 2017 - link
Why is this shit still a thing? The process node is there the stacking is there. Where is my 500 GB slc drive?lilmoe - Thursday, October 12, 2017 - link
IKRI already pay double for my drives work 50% over provisioning. SLC would cost me the same yet dramatically improve QD1 performance and endurance.
And they say there's no market for that. BS.
cekim - Wednesday, October 11, 2017 - link
Engineering you might expect from a company going out of business during the biggest supply shortage we've seen in PC parts in quite some time. Why god why?Billy Tallis - Thursday, October 12, 2017 - link
Toshiba's NAND division isn't going out of business; it's thriving. The nuclear power part of Toshiba is just failing so hard that Toshiba as a whole is deeply in the red.mapesdhs - Wednesday, October 11, 2017 - link
Way slower and more expensive than an 850 EVO was 2 years ago. *yawn* This race to the bottom re performance/endurance is annoying.I wish the charts would include a couple of older models so so we can really see whether this tech has actually moved on or not, eg. an 840 Pro (wonderful MLC), Vector, Vertex4, Neutron GTX - all of these were already being bottlenecked by the SATA3 limit when the 840 Pro was reviewed on AT 5 years ago. Are these Toshiba models any better than what Samsung/OCZ was back then? The last time I saw it included, the Vector inparticular still looked pretty good. As long as this lack of performance/endurance continues, I just keep hunting for lightly used 840 Pros, etc. Bagged another 256GB recently for 51 UKP.
I miss the days when the 850 EVO 250GB was 53 UKP, everything has become so expensive since then, and not just SSDs. Prices of most RAM types has doubled.
Billy Tallis - Wednesday, October 11, 2017 - link
I've tested almost all of the older SSDs that I have on hand. Some of the older ones have died, or been transferred to other AT editors for use as boot drives. There are a few old drives I have in active use on various systems that I can clone then run through the test suite (a SandForce drive, a Crucial MX100, a Samsung 840 Pro) when time permits. Fortunately, my testing backlog is almost gone, so I may be able to get some of those drives added to the Bench database later this month.mapesdhs - Friday, October 13, 2017 - link
That would be great Billy, thanks!! 8)Btw, have you seen the article on techreport where they tested a bunch of SSDs to death? The 840 Pro was the final one to go, after it had written an astonishing 2.4PB. IIRC I can't link to other sites directly here, so just search for, "The SSD Endurance Experiment: They're all dead", the piece is written by Geoff Gasior.
artifex - Thursday, October 19, 2017 - link
I know an anecdote is not data, but my Samsung 830, 128GB is still going after about 5 years. Magician says it's pushed 20TB. It's actually still my gaming OS drive, too.Question, though: how come I hear nothing about the 750s, now? Did that line get dropped quickly? I got one in a sale last year, and I hope they're not terrible.
yifu - Monday, November 20, 2017 - link
is this the most power efficient SSD in the market today? I have missed the BX100, Now I can not find it anymore.