Corsair Neutron GTX SSD Review (240GB): Link A Media Controller Tested
by Anand Lal Shimpi on August 20, 2012 6:00 AM EST- Posted in
- Storage
- SSDs
- Corsair
- Neutron
- Link a Media
The Neutron GTX
Corsair sent me a 240GB Neutron GTX. The non-GTX version uses ONFi NAND (Intel/Micron) while the GTX version uses Toggle NAND (Samsung/Toshiba). The controller supports capacities up to 1TB, however initial drives will be limited to 120, 240 and 480GB models when they're released later this month.
The Neutron GTX comes in a 7mm thick chassis with no outward facing screws. The PCB enclosure just snaps together.
Inside there's a smaller than normal PCB, held in place by three screws. There's a single 128MB DDR2-800 package on the back side of the PCB. Flipping it over reveals eight quad-die NAND packages, a second 128MB DDR2-800 DRAM device and the Link A Media LM87800 controller itself.
The Neutron
Brandishing a blue logo is the regular Neutron SSD, equipped with ONFi NAND:
Corsair sent along a 240GB drive, which uses 16 x 16GB Micron NAND packages and features the same 256MB of DDR2-800 as the GTX version. Spare area is identical to the GTX at 12.7% of total on-board NAND, the chassis and PCB layouts are the same as well. I tested the same 2.06 firmware on the regular Neutron as on the Neutron GTX. The only change here is the type of NAND used, everything else seems the same between these drives.
Pricing
Corsair sent us along pricing for the Neutron and Neutron GTX:
| Corsair Neutron/Neutron GTX Pricing | ||||
| 120GB | 240GB | |||
| Corsair Neutron | $119.99 | $209.99 | ||
| Corsair Neutron GTX | $139.99 | $249.99 | ||
Street pricing of SSDs can be highly volatile, but there's nothing too outrageous about these prices. The standard Neutron is priced where I'd like to see the GTX however.
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PommieB - Monday, August 20, 2012 - link
The Vertex 4 uses the 9145 controller, which as enterprise origins and was used by OCZ in there latest PCIe ssd drives, OCZ was obviously impressed with the controller to use it as there re-branded Everest controllers in the Vertex 4 and other ssd drives, so yes the Plextor M5 Pro is first ssd drive to have the 9187 Marvell controller.maximumGPU - Tuesday, August 21, 2012 - link
thanks :)DukeN - Monday, August 20, 2012 - link
For those of us hoping to put 3 or 4 of these in our systems..Please and thanks.
Zap - Monday, August 20, 2012 - link
Why does Corsair (and also Newegg) call it SATA 3?http://www.sata-io.org/developers/naming_guideline...
Proper terminology is to call it "SATA Revision 3.0" or "SATA 6Gb/s" and to NOT use "SATA III" or "SATA 3.0." This is because SATA II was often marketed as SATA 3Gb/s or SATA 300, so "3" is associated with the slower speed.
Beenthere - Monday, August 20, 2012 - link
Most consumers are interested in reliable, compatible, hassle-free PC hardware not the half-baked trick-of-the-week rushed out the door for huge profits. PC hardware review sites lose credibility when they hype half-baked products and gloss over obvious defects or down-play their significance.Many companies are quite successful selling quality, reliable products and providing excellent customer service - all at affordable prices. In fact that use to be the norm in the U.S. until some unscrupulous CEOs decided that they could reap more money in annual bonuses by shipping crap products and pretending there were no issues or defects.
Unfortunately for Corsair in recent years they have jumped on the growth-at-all-cost bandwagon by using contract suppliers. Corsair's numerous product lines are filled with documented defects be it SSDs, PSUs, H2O CPU coolers, etc. At one time I recommended Corsair RAM but even that seems to have dropped in reliability and compatibility recently so I no longer recommend any of their current products.
Shadowmaster625 - Monday, August 20, 2012 - link
Idle power consumption is stupidly bad. Samsung SSD830 is the reigning champion by far. It may not be the fastest, but it is competitive speed wise, and its low idle power just continues to own the competition. I wouldnt even consider any other drive for a notebook.Paapaa125 - Monday, August 20, 2012 - link
I have no clue why you keep on presenting the same data in two different charts: average data rate and disk busy time. Only one is enough. Showing the other serves no purpose at all so please pick one of them and start using it. Thanks!Mastadon - Monday, August 20, 2012 - link
What kind of TRIM does the Corsair controller use? Is it garbage collection after the fact, or on-the-fly?Mr Perfect - Wednesday, August 22, 2012 - link
I've always been under the impression that Garbage Collection, as defined by the drive makers, is not TRIM. Garbage Collection is done solely inside the drive by the controller with no regard for what the data in the flash is or what the OS is doing. TRIM is done through commands sent from the OS to the drive to tell it what flash is holding valid data, and what flash is no longer needed and can be erased. I think some drives even do both GC and TRIM. If he's saying TRIM, I'd take it to be the later case.phimac10 - Tuesday, August 21, 2012 - link
Thanks for a good insight in the SSD world.