Monday, December 26, 2011

Corsair Performance Pro SSD (256GB) Review

The Corsair Performance Pro SSD is powered by the Marvell 9174 processor, Toshiba 34nm Toggle MLC NAND and a SATA 6Gb/s interface. The Performance Pro adds to Corsair's already excellent line of SDD products that leverage perhaps the most robust set of combinations of NAND and SSD processors available with a SATA interface. In this case the Performance Pro replaces the Performance 3, Corsair's first Marvell 9174-based SSD which was announced about a year ago. A year goes a long way in the SSD world, the Performance Pro picks up a tremendous speed boost over the Performance 3, delivering read speeds of up to 515MB/s and an impressive 440MB/sec in sequential write performance, compared to 480MB/s reads and 320 MB/s writes in the first generation model. 
Corsair offers a simplified capacity lineup with the Performance Pro, it comes in just 128GB (CSSD-P128GBP-BK) and 256GB (CSSD-P256GBP-BK) capacities. Each is ready for notebook duty with the 2.5" form factor, but Corsair also includes a mounting bracket for 3.5" desktop drive bays. The Corsair Performance Pro is competitively priced with a street price of $219 for the 128GB version and $419 for the 256GB capacity.
When comparing similar SSDs, it turns out the Corsair Performance Pro shares a lot with the Plextor M3S; so much in fact that they share the same PCB. As you will see below, we found similar markings on both boards, although each had minor hardware differences (additional capacitors or regulators). Hardware is where the differences stop though as both are running different firmware which is evident in our performance comparison...full review at Storage Reviews

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