Samsung 990 PRO NVMe SSD Review - Versus 22 Other Drives

[@TechTesters]

It took a while, but I finally got an answer from Samsung about the (many) reports of 990 PRO SSDs losing (reported) health quickly. Still more to be done, but I've made a post on it here: kzbin.infoUgkxtMEfrMCkVOy0CsJZI-o7wax9BKOYoub0 Honestly not sure what to make of it yet. Definitely update your firmware, but imho Samsung has to show a little bit more than one simple statement. TBC!

[@KennyT187]

Would be interesting to see a short follow-up review with the fixed firmware, as in does it make the 990 Pro run slower and more in-line with other high-end Gen 4 SSDs. Maybe the original speed was too hot to handle for the hardware, hence the health degradation? I also read that some people are unable to update the firmware with the Magician software and are just going to send it back for RMA. Was thinking of getting the 990 Pro but all things considered I think I'm going to get Kingston Fury Renegade (upgraded KC3000) or Solidigm P44 Pro.

[@jonathan45732]

Was this specific reason I went with an SN850x over the 990 pro

[@airtightbox]

Do the performance numbers hold up after the latest firmware update?

[@carrickdubya4765]

Nice follow-up and you got my sub! Got my 2TB 990 yesterday, but it's going back and getting something else

[@matthouston8411]

Need an 850x 2TB drive tested

[@juno1597]

This seems to be the only place on KZbin that has consistent high quality SSD reviews, keep up the great work!

[@TechTesters]

Thank you :D

[@carrickdubya4765]

@@TechTesters Just subbed, can you recommend a 2TB M.2 ssd? I just put a return request for my 990 after seeing your video. Thanks

[@kingjon5818]

She should have put the 850x 2tb to compare since 1tb is generally slower

[@soulshinobi]

I love that you go in depth on SSDs, this channel is the best source for that and it makes it stand out.

[@TechTesters]

Glad you think so! :D

[@end0rphyn]

Grabbing my WD SN850X for $199 making me feel much better hearing the difference between the two 🤘🏼 great review by the way. Love the detail you went into to show all the differences between the top drives atm

[@TechTesters]

Thank you! And the SN850X is an excellent choice, especially at current prices. I'll have a video on that soon, hopefully tomorrow already.

[@stevetb7777]

Sweet, I also recently nabbed the 850x 4tb for $399. Will probably go back down there for Black Friday or Prime Day.

[@NINJA_INVESTORS]

Just get a 4 tb

[@vultureTX001]

@@TechTesters thanks again for that launch price vs. fall off expectation a couple of weeks later. now if only GPUs would do that.

[@TechTesters]

@@trollmeister69 should be tomorrow or the day after

[@littlebill1987]

Glad you're expanding your content but good to see you come back to your SSD review roots. Waiting for that SN850X review.

[@shreyasdharashivkar8027]

The Original Gangster of SSD testing is here. Awesome review as always.

[@kevinwingard6246]

I put 2 990 Pro 2T drives into a new 13th Gen I-9 on an Asus Z790 Maximus Hero and have never seen faster response time. One dedicated to game and OS on other. Was worth the wait and the dollars spent.....this review confirms everything I see real time. Excellent review!!!

[@patfre]

Watch out man there are reports they are dying very fast saw someone who had one that reported to be only at 68% health after just 2TB so check it and honestly you should probably contact Samsung for an RMA

[@isz]

@@patfre even tho there are firmware updates should i buy the 990 pro? or are WD SSDs better overal...

[@patfre]

@@isz you should still wait the firmware update isn’t out just yet. Only for the 980 Pro and even when it comes out it is best to wait to see if it is actually resolved

[@7moody771]

I watched a lot of SSD reviews but this is the first video I’ve seen that explains what these tests mean to the user (I usually just looked at which one has a higher number lmao)

[@Davethreshold]

THANK YOU SO MUCH! I was literally 2 minutes away from ordering my 2nd 980 Pro 2TB but I thought to look it up first. I did not know that this existed. ❤🧡💙🥂🍾🍹Pre-ordering right now!

[@justmejustme3042]

Why you don't have a million subscribers is a mystery to me! Great review as always!

[@TechTesters]

Maybe one day ☺ And thank you!

[@Rkcuddles]

It seriously is baffling to me too. I think it’s a timing thing, this channel would have blown up if they started a little sooner. I still think they will grow steadily as those of us who don’t enjoy the unprofessional bro culture end up looking for alternative sources of reviews and updates on tech.

[@Boemtie]

Simp

[@45eno]

@@Rkcuddleswhat’s bro culture? Is Hardware Unboxed bro culture?

[@GamePat96]

Nice test as always, can't wait to see your Gen 5 tests, hopefully they actually come out this year😁

[@TechTesters]

Me too! But no sign of any yet. I've heard from a couple of different vendors that their model is delayed.

[@GamePat96]

@@TechTesters Ah that's a shame, I wanted to Build an itx Build with the new AM5 Asus ITX Board you showed of at launch. Which only has 2 NVME slots as you probably know... The 4.0 Was for Windows and the 5.0 for games. Guess I have to keep my Sata SSDs a little longer than expected, and port them over to my new build😅 p.s. thanks for the heads up Nada and Im sure as soon as there some available you will have a review up. Can't wait for it😁

[@jackka82]

The SK Hynix P41 would be a good inclusion for the comparisons. For example, it tops the 3D Mark Game Loading test section. Also, I'd love to see the real world loading time differences. Whether it's 0.1 seconds, 1 second, a few seconds, the synthetic benchmarks leave us in the dark about how much faster it actually is in daily use. I think performance in the end comes down to the difference I can actually tell while actually using, so that would be something good to know even if the difference is negligible because then I know that the higher benchmark numbers don't mean anything to me.

[@TechTesters]

I hear it a lot, I'll try to find one :) As for gaming loading, storage is only a small factor, so you're usually talking fractions of seconds between the top gen4 nvme drives in most games. But it'll be a different story if you compare a 2022 PC (13900K, RTX 4090, 990 PRO) to a pc from a few years ago where every part is slower.

[@ericmafl2847]

@@TechTesters Agreed, please include the P41 SK Hynix 1TB and/or 2TB if you are able to. Thanks for the consideration.

[@till-tat5907]

First thing I notice too

[@robertanthonybermudez5545]

Ive seen this used in one of our newly assembled 3D mapping drones at work. The amount of data capture stream is just right for this.

[@emregocmen9562]

The performance increase is insane, will buy it for my new pc build

[@CalaisRider]

What a great review and presentation. Thank you for taking the time. I bought a 2TB 990 pro just 2 days ago, and it was the "exact same" price as the 2TB 980 pro at the same store - amazing. Queensland Australia.

[@KasaniGT]

i’m also in queensland and looking to buy one. may i ask where you got yours?

[@CalaisRider]

@@KasaniGT I got mine from UMart at Mansfield. They are quite helpful.

[@Rkcuddles]

Haha I liked the shot of the little fallout guy holding it… Thanks for such a detailed review and for talking through how these tests correspond to real world

[@TechTesters]

My pleasure!

[@abehaile2659]

Thank you so much. The most impressive standout from your data is the WD Black SN850X. Currently $450 for 4TB. Every Amazon review is CONSISTENTLY showing PS5 read speeds of just over 6,500 MB/s; highest I've seen registered for PS5 application

[@TheOnlyleroy]

I've watched a few of you're reviews and its always nice to see you replying to everyone's comments. I like you're energy don't ever change.

[@Unamatrix01]

Quite a concise and comprehensive review as always Nada.

[@TechTesters]

Glad you think so!

[@stickfijibugs]

Hi! Your presentations cut through all the confusion flack and give us a nice quick look at relative SSD performance in good sequence and context. One thing that would be helpful in FLIR and other temperature reports is to give us the ambient air temperature, say between 5 and 10 cm from the drive you are measuring. More, at 7:54 a temperature scale would be useful so we know what the blue is.

[@antoinecallens7637]

I've just discovered your channel. The tests you offer are incredibly precise, professional and clever. Thanks a lot for that, I now folllow you.

[@hawkeyes4768]

wow tbh ur the 1st to cover this ty they announced it a while ago and no one covered it anywhere

[@TechTesters]

Review embargo lifted today, but you're right, they announced it ages ago which is a bit weird.

[@Voivod74]

When it comes to NVMe SSD this is the best channel by far for reviews and comparison. On its way the KG FURY renegade!! Thank you so much. Keep Going

[@TechTesters]

Renegade requested! 👊

[@Voivod74]

@@TechTesters Boom. Right there! Cannot wait. Thank YOU so much.

[@thelegitimatenoob1]

I'm actually interested to see how direct storage 1.1 does with these drives and will gen 5 show any actual improvement over these. I think forspoken will give us an idea in q1 when it launches. Definitely would be a reason to wait for gen 5 if it does.

[@TechTesters]

Yeah, still waiting for those Direct Storage games though :(

[@glenwaldrop8166]

Given how Direct Storage works it should show gains on everything across the board. I'm looking forward to someone making a wrapper for older games. People have made mods that swap Fallout 4 to run on Vulkan and then added FSR to Vulkan, hoping for Direct Storage as well.

[@HeloisGevit]

@@glenwaldrop8166 I hadn't considered that, if it's possible would be sweet. Then again, older games like Fallout 4 don't really need the help, they load pretty much instantly as is on modern hardware.

[@glenwaldrop8166]

@@HeloisGevit I dunno, I've got modded as well as unmodded, they all take nearly a minute on an NVME, it's the decompression that slows it down, that's where Direct Storage really helps.

[@johndoh5182]

@@TechTesters Umm one comes out soon.

[@AdrianRusu95]

Great video as always! It would be interesting to see a comparison between the 990 Pro and the SK hynix Platinum P41.

[@TechTesters]

I'll see if i can find an SK Hynix SSD!

[@hoemey]

All the reviews I've seen have omitted the P41. Think it's quite obvious why. Samsung money really talks.

[@felixg3]

Unfortunately not available in Europe, at least not easily (all consumer SK Hynix SSDs, would’ve loved to get the P31 Gold

[@felixg3]

@@TechTesters and, ever seen one? :(

[@LivelysReport]

You do a great job in your presentation and offer information in a very nice way, concise and to the point.. Perfect!! I loved seeing the graphs you put up with the testings for the drives.. I did not know there was as much difference between the WD Black drives and that of SamSung 990 pro Drives..

[@denniscohle3786]

Thanks for the review. One of the best tech review channels on youtube, glad you're here!

[@Gthemaniac]

When I look up something for reviews if I see you have a video I always migrate to that one, very good fair reviews

[@lizardpeter]

I just found your channel as a major hardware enthusiast. Very impressive stuff! Subscribed!

[@javiej]

Great video, thanks. I'm only missing one thing, which is an endurance comparison (at least theoretical / warranty ). High end drives are expected to suffer heavy workloads, so it would be nice to know which ones last longer or have longer warranties

[@TechTesters]

I don't think I'll add theoretical durability as some people will take it literally no matter how clear we make it's "theoretical". It also just doesn't really change much for 99.9% of users. I might add a warranty graph though, will think about it!

[@Obi-Wan_Kenobi62]

For the vast majority of people, the write life of SSDs are mostly irrelevant; you can have an SSD be the boot drive to your computer for a hundred years and still not run the drive to zero.

[@javiej]

@@Obi-Wan_Kenobi62 It depends on what you call "vast majority". This video is about a high need NVMe model, so the vast majority of its owners will not be ocasional users.but people with more intensive requirements.Im one of those and I have burned low endurance SSDs pretty often, in just a couple of years or even less. Typically by doing thinks like letting the computer rendering during the nights, using them and as scratch disks with some applications , and also due to intensive swap when the computer didn't have enough RAM.

[@kingjon5818]

@@javiejdo some research, you’re not going to destroy these in a couple of years. You will never destroy it that way. Do research

[@javiej]

@@kingjon5818 I have indeed destroyed several of them by doing just that.. High end drives are supposed to be for intensive usage like I do, not for normal consumers like you seem to be. I do intensive rendering for previews (render, play, delete, then rewrite), also combined with serious NAS usage, 24h per day, 365 days per year. Pretty often I write several terabytes per day, that means writing the whole drive several times in one day. Only the best nvme drives support writing several terabytes per day during the warranty period, if you don't believe me just do the research that you claim for. Because obviously you didn't.

[@brianmiller1574]

Thank you for the review. I'm am Samsung guru since I can remember and I was waiting for this 990 Pro, but tbh. Firecuda 530 2TB and 4TB are more then double the endurance which is huge and virtually on par with speeds. I think this time around and for the endurance alone Firecuda 530 2TB takes the lead and my vote.

[@TechTesters]

I honestly don't know how to judge those endurance ratings. Technically if you manage to pass them within the warranty period and your drive breaks it's nice, but I doubt that'll happen and I'm really not sure if it really guarantees a better quality either.

[@kingjon5818]

I highly doubt you’ll surpass it. Ever

[@semvansambeek]

Bedankt voor de review, bizar dat de launch prijzen zo hoog waren, heb hem eergisteren besteld voor €130 😁

[@MartinOlminkhof]

It'll be interesting to see how hot SSDs get with the larger heatsinks on new motherboards

[@TechTesters]

Not really an issue in my experience. Any decent size heatsink with a little bit of air flowing by it and you'll be OK.

[@GSP-76]

Need airflow more than heatsink.

[@KazBlaze]

i love how you explain things

[@TechTesters]

Thank you!

[@KunalVaidya]

it would be interesting to know if motherboard heatsinks are actually as good as the SSD heat sink option , maybe they are more for decoration of board and don't work as great. might be an interesting point to add in the next motherboard showdown

[@TechTesters]

That would require a lot of motherboard swapping :P From my experience, as long as there is an OK amount of metal and you have a little bit of air passing by, you'll be fine even for a stress test.

[@c4nchi]

so, this drive is not recommended for laptops ? or there is a way to attach a heatsink in a laptop ?

[@ovistech]

@@c4nchi not these high end models. But you can try the lower tiered models from Silicon Power (P34A60, P34A80) or from Crucial (P2, P3).

[@Mason_bluegrass]

i did some test with and without the heatsink that was provided with the Gigabyte Aorus Z390 and The SDD was like 15 degre cooler with the Heatsink so Yeah lol all heatsink will make a huge diference because those drive seem to run hotter then older ssd sata so it realy need a heatsink.. i use the samsung 970 pro gen3

[@-opus]

Board heatsinks tend to be larger, so should be able to transfer/hold/disperse more heat

[@tuomaskoivu8905]

Thank you for another great consistent review. It really helped me make my mind. I purchased the 2 TB version and a hefty Axagon CLR-M2XL cooler.

[@TechTesters]

Glad I could help!

[@puffnstuff12]

Here in the states right now April 2023 there's only $20 difference between the 990 and 980 pro so I went ahead and bought one of each. The 990 pro as a boot drive is super fast on Z790 with 13900k.

[@TMacGamer]

Damn, I just bought a 980 pro for my latest build. I wish I knew this was coming out. Oh well, the 980 Pro is STILL a fantastic NVMe SSD drive.

[@TechTesters]

Absolutely!

[@Chigasaurus]

I’m in the same boat, just built mine a few weeks ago!

[@jasperlorenzo3102]

Same here, 1tb for OS 980 pro and 2tb 980 pro for steam library...

[@califorupha1574]

It's probably the reason why it's on sale now as it the 990 pro comes out on Nov 14 which is tomorrow for me

[@stevetech1949]

Very nice review. Thanks! It looks like the MSRP today would be justified for hard-core content creators that are constantly accessing their drive. Looking at the Gen4 limitations you mentioned, I wonder if it would be better for them to build or buy a system w/ Gen5 support w/ speeds more than 2x-4x what we are limited to here.

[@TechTesters]

Thanks! And yeah, MSRP isn't unreasonable for a true pro user I guess.

[@charlestilley2576]

@@TechTesters No, just what you're getting for the money is the issue. A non-gamer would be better off with the Samsung 970 PRO (Gen 3) model. Because it's their last true MLC SSD & has true DRAM NAND on the drive. In time, just as Intel regretted going away from solder to cheap thermal paste on CPU's, Samsung will regret doing away with true MLC Flash on their PRO line of drives, be it NVME or 2.5" models. Glad I purchased two 1GB 970 PRO's when Amazon had a 24 hour sale, $109.99 each with next day shipping. Had to buy two at the price!

[@charlestilley2576]

@notfiveo Great brand there, Hynix has been making OEM RAM for a long, long time. Glad to see it now in use for PC RAM, only regret it's not MLC type. But buyers says it's fast as any they've bought. It's also been in many GPU's for a very long tome as well.

[@davereen5103]

Great work as usual :) But... Where is the promised SN850X review? :)

[@TechTesters]

Today! Almost done 😅😉

[@davereen5103]

@@TechTesters Awesome thanks! :)

[@vaeloreonari7516]

I have the 980 Pro 2TB and a WD Black SN 750 1TB, I had my first 980 brick on me trying to correct a bad sector, and after jumping through 50 hoops, Samsung kept their end of the warranty up and sent me a new one, and it has been rocking for over a year. I think next time I will go back to all WD Black, I have never had one cost me so much lost data and time.

[@teemuvesala9575]

It's fool's errand to think WD would not have defective drives. Oh believe me, there are plenty of WD drives (SN850s for instance) that have bricked. Every manufacturer will have defective drives, its down to how each manufacturer handles the warranty that matters. And Samsung once again is the most reliable on that front.

[@TechTesters]

It's just luck tbh, everything can break, and when SSDs break it's usually a total failure. So you'll need to make good backups either way. We have had 100s of SSDs here in total, I don't think we can say one brand has done consistently better or worse. Only very very old SATA drives have consistently broken (OCZ Vertex 2, and our last Crucial M4 died iirc :P)

[@teemuvesala9575]

@@TechTesters I had Crucial M4 128GB that died, but the 64GB M4 still works (was used as boot drive in Windows 7 era). Not that I use it anymore. The change from HDD to SATA SSD as a boot drive was still much more noticeable than any improvement going from even SATA to PCIE 4.0 SSDs.

[@noname-yb5jt]

Have had good luck with Crucial products. 1tb MX500 in my laptop is around 3 years old as well as the 16gb of Crucial ram added. I use a Crucial P5 Plus 2tb in my PS5 and a 2tb mx500 for external PS5.

[@teemuvesala9575]

I think you should be using SN850X 2TB model cause it is rated to have better IOPS than SN850X 1TB. Would give better insights to how it compares to 990 Pro 2TB.

[@TechTesters]

I'll get back to the story of capacity soon, but generally speaking there are tiny differences (also between the SN850 1TB and 2TB for example), nothing that changes the narrative. The consistency benchmark is the only exception usually, but even there the 1TB 990 PRO (that's going through the tests now) is also way, way ahead of the SN850(x)

[@teemuvesala9575]

@@TechTesters Well I'm not surprised considering how hot the WD Black drives run. Think even 980 Pro beat SN850X in consistency benchmarks. The reason why 990 Pro did so well in consistency benchmarks most likely has lot to do with their new controller, which is said to be 55% more efficient compared to Elpis controller found on the 980 Pro. Slightly off topic, but I'm just wondering is the SN850X controller really made in China? Cause from what I've seen on pictures, SN850X's SanDisk controller really has "made in China" label on it. I just remember SN850 (non X) controller having "made in Taiwan" label on it if I'm not mistaken... So if SN850X controller is made in China, it could be that it is not made by TSMC, but by Chinese SMIC instead... And for me that's a big red flag for multiple reasons, not just the fact CCP is involved in SMIC.

[@danarcher6249]

I like how you put components in or near bushes.

[@ledooni]

Hi Nada, I‘m coming back to this video as reports are coming out of quick degradation of the 990 Pro. Are you using it as a personal drive and if so, does your experience match? Additionally, I‘d really like to know which drive gets how hot if you‘re using the same heatsink on all of them, so kind of an efficiency test and if you get the chance to test that that would be awesome because that should give us a better indication of how these would perform with a standard motherboard heatsink for example. Thanks for the great work!

[@AmonStrix]

I love your voice and the way you explain, great channel and great information keep working congratulation for such a great channel!

[@TechTesters]

Thank you so much!

[@AmonStrix]

@@TechTesters You got a new follower thanks for your work!

[@ambientnaturally]

I've been waiting for these to come come out. I do my artwork on two 970Evo 2TB's striped together... it's really good and I can use it to store clips and do my art. But now I'd like to see about two of these 990Pro 4TB drives striped to replace my 970's. So maybe next year when they're available and that initial higher prices have gone down some. And a 2TB for my main drive for the OS to replace the 980Pro would be good. It sounds like the performance is so amazing that it cannot be denied. Great video as always.

[@TechTesters]

Thank you! :)

[@JynxedKoma]

You're the best. Love all your videos and you definitely sold me on buying this tomorrow! Thank you.

[@TechTesters]

My pleasure! And thank you! ☺

[@MarcMBX]

It would be interesting to always do the tests with products that are similar to each other, because we should never compare a 1TB nvme with a 2TB nvme, because that is a huge mistake, 2TB nvme in 90% of the times has a much better performance than one of 1TB, the interesting thing would be to keep them all in the 1TB or 2TB chart, but never mix it up, a practical example is when the Samsung 990 PRO 2TB beats the WD 850X 1TB and the difference is little, as for example in the PC Mark 10, where the 990 PRO scores 700 against 642 for the WD 850X, even the 980 PRO had a result that could have been very different, certainly the 980 PRO 2TB would have better results in the tests and would have reduced the difference in scores, in short, comparing an nvme 1TB or another 2TB nvme ends up making the wrong choice for those watching, I understand that this is something that was not thought of by you and that was overlooked, in many cases the difference is not that big, but anyway this difference from 1TB to 2TB are there and they exist, that is, the results would be even better in any 1TB nvme in the table if they had used 2TB models instead, it would be interesting to acquire 2TB models of these same 1TB nvme and do tests and add in the tables and maybe an update on the video, anyway, 99% perfect and well done video, just this detail that I mentioned really should be revised, but I really enjoyed watching it, see you later. (Sorry if my pronunciation was weird at times, I'm using Google Translate)

[@TechTesters]

I have a seperate video on the impact of SSD capacity 😉

[@smishdws]

Damn, such a thorough and useful review on an SSD. Thanks!

[@Exodus-sh5mq]

Been watching for a while so I just subbed.

[@BaconBearOfficial]

Nice to see the crucial p5 plus up there. Just got it during cyber Monday. Very nice deal for its price to performance ratio

[@simonb.8868]

how much?

[@BaconBearOfficial]

got it for like 100$ or so

[@robertcochran7103]

Thank you for an excellent review of this drive. I have two of them and got hit with the flawed firmware issue in both. I have updated the firmware versions and I hope the drives will stay healthy now. For a different desktop system, I have opted for the Western Digital SN850X.

[@swizzler8053]

Still rocking the 980 pro with the heatsink. This one looks very interesting. Keep up the great work you guys and stay safe. Groetjes uit Nederland.

[@TechTesters]

Dank je wel! :)

[@chesshooligan1282]

"Stay safe"? Haha, is she volunteering for the Ukraine war or something? As far as I know, she's a normal person who makes KZbin videos of PC products. How on Earth did we become such safety-obsessed wussies?

[@johnnywoolen1453]

Beautifully done Nada!

[@TechTesters]

Thank you! ☺🍻

[@Demonwicked]

im still using the 512GB 950 Pro from 2015, works great!

[@TechTesters]

It should! This should also be way, way faster :P

[@SGTBizarro]

I'm looking at this one, and also KC3000 for $90 less for same storage and very close performance in gaming and overall averages, think I'll try the KC3000. Thanks so much for your review

[@TechTesters]

For 90 dollars less? Unless it's a high-end production system the KC3000 will make more sense at that price.

[@johnpaulbacon8320]

Wonderfully done. Thanks for this comparison video.

[@TechTesters]

Glad you liked it!

[@horacinis]

Great video!! Thank you! Liked and subscribed 😊

[@tobfon2416]

I ordered the sn770 2 TB for 163 Euro on sale by Amazon. It will arrive 2nd November. Im pretty impressed by the performance in these benchmarks. I did not expect this when i ordered it. Lol. XD

[@clausbohm9807]

Thanks for the update, love these products.

[@TechTesters]

My pleasure!

[@Dane3412]

you have top of the line high warranty pc components adds, cheers.

[@DizConnected]

In a couple weeks or months, we will be seeing Gen 5 drives that will thrash these drives. Of course, you need a platform that supports it, like the AM5, and even then, it will make these prices seem like a bargain.

[@Octet]

In theoretical sequential speed, yes, the PCIE 5.0 SSDs will be much faster. In IOPS, barely, and IOPS matters more for loading games and feeling fast. Current PCIE gen 5 SSD on the market has 1.5M IOPS and the 990 pro is 1.4M, quite similar.

[@def6420]

@@Octet so what is best price ssd for games regural sata even will do?

[@christopherjackson2157]

I wonder how fast gen 5 drives will actually perform. Its a rare gen 4 drive that is constrained by the bandwidth of the connection (8 GB/s). If I remember correctly, pcie gen 4 drives had been on the market for quite a while before they exceeded gen 3 speeds. Even in the charts presented here I suspect the bottleneck is the phison controller used by most of the fast gen 4 drives and the related thermal and power limits of the nvme spec rather than the speed of the connection.

[@AethryPixel]

@@def6420 get a 970 evo or 980 pro if u have a good enough mobo that won't suffer from sharing lanes and you'll be good to go. No need for anything faster at current gen

[@maxstr]

@@jasonhayman9521 What you mean it doesn't matter for games?? It matters a lot for games. Patching Unreal Engine games requires writing the entire 50 gigs or whatever which can take like an hour on an HDD, half that in an SSD, and seconds on nvme. Also, faster drives means less popping in graphics, loading times, etc

[@LambLiquidations]

My 990 Pro 2TB died recently as it's no longer recognized by any system. I think it was a controller that died with less than 15 TBW in the 8 months I've had it. I even had a heatsink on it. The defective firmware didn't come with my 990 Pro out of the box and I updated it as soon as I got it. Just wanted to share my experience.

[@Everything_Comes_And_Goes]

Thank you (along with other poor customers online) for sharing this. I had early indications that Samsung are now to be avoided. The firmware issues were a sign, but there's more bs - see my long comment just posted.

[@JeremFNATIC]

Thanks for the test 👌

[@ericshutter5305]

that's funny ... was looking for a new/bigger SSD like the 980 2TB ... and then I see there is a new 990 with way more performance 👍😍

[@TechTesters]

Hope it was helpful!

[@imlucaswhitecastle]

Great review, as always. I love your work!

[@TechTesters]

Thank you!

[@abnerfigueroa7071]

I am a casual gamer and was wondering if the performance difference between the 990 vs 980 is worth the extra $70 for the 2TB 990 Pro. Will I really notice the difference for the extra money? Great informative videos by the way.

[@TechTesters]

For a bit of casual gaming only? Get whichever is cheapest, or even save some more money by looking at other brands.

[@TheUKWin]

I think if Samsung released it in MLC, then it would have a unique selling point

[@yulz_khepter]

Not sure which is nicer you or the presentation. Insta sub here.

[@DavidFregoli]

great time to grab a 980Pro or SN850, I've seen crazy deals

[@TechTesters]

Yeah they're very often a great deal imho.

[@DaviSiqueiraSilva]

Nice! You should also test the SK Hynix Platinum P41, which is much cheaper and may offer quite similar features!

[@TechTesters]

I'll try to find one :)

[@teemuvesala9575]

Only cheaper in markets it actually sells at. SK Hynix doesn't sell their SSDs in Europe.

[@RANDOMNATION907]

You have the best storage reviews.

[@TechTesters]

Glad you think so, thank you!

[@bubmario]

Hmm! Thanks for doing this. I was considering the 990 Pro, but may go with the sn850x based on the gaming performance. If this is the same for PS5 and not just for normal PC, then it may be the one to go with.

[@funhobbiesunlimited]

Thanks for your videos. It is a pleasure to follow you.

[@TechTesters]

Happy to hear that, thank you!

[@robertvanzant2653]

When will gen 5 be coming out ? Congratulations on Verstappens title ! A gifted young man .

[@TechTesters]

All manufacturers I've asked have said "not soon" or "delayed", so we'll see. And thanks I guess? :P

[@garynagle3093]

Great review and comparisons

[@cish1653]

Gen5 should be using it in professional industries. Normally, pc user unable to feel big difference between gen4 & 5. Gen4 is big enough our need. Using Gigabyte A. 7000s perm 2tb & Seagate firecuda 530 2tb heatsink.

[@de_stroyed]

I love your review but I'm a tad disappointed that you didn't include any SK Hynix Platinum P41. I was considering getting either this or the P41 but I don't see your benchmark on it.

[@TechTesters]

Trying to get one but they’re nowhere in the EU :/

[@theconsummatenerd]

Sincerely hope the SN850X review includes the 4TB version. That drive is insanely FAST!

[@TechTesters]

I wish :P

[@theconsummatenerd]

@@TechTesters Yeah, 494$ is odd pricing. You can buy 2 of the 2TB for 460 USD.

[@GeorgeAguilar]

​@@theconsummatenerd There was an Amazon lightning deal where I was able to snag the 4TB version for around $399. It's been more than a couple of days though and it still hasn't shipped, but when I get it I plan to make it my main boot drive.

[@theconsummatenerd]

@@GeorgeAguilar That's exactly what I want to pick one up for! Save some PCIE lanes, but still have tons of storage. If I decide to proceed to ridiculous speed, I may get two and put them in a raid 0 array 🤣.

[@imthemetalguy1]

Going from HDD to SSD early on in my PC building days, it's like night and day. I was thinking about getting abother NVMe drive. Honestly the read and write is not even going to matter when G5 comes out.

[@TechTesters]

First SSDs were amazing. Shame they all died :P

[@imthemetalguy1]

@@TechTesters I know! I found out about SSD's back in 2015. A year later my buddy tells me about M.2 NVMe drives. A year after that I built my first rig with up to date parts. Only to learn I'm still behind the curve XD

[@outlet6989]

I'm going to wait for the 4TM model. I checked the 4TM version sold by AMAZON. I saw they will be available in March of 2023. Got my pre-order placed. I'm a fanatic PC gamer with a ton of game storage hogs. The 4TM version is just made for me. For some gamers, the price is secondary. For me, it's go big or go home.

[@hardcorehardware361]

Regular SSD's are cheaper than ever but PCIE4.0 NVME are still quite expensive, yes they have came down in price $100 for a 980 Pro 2tb in my country but $388 is still pretty high. I'm using a 980 Pro 500gb as boot in my new system but I did hold out on the 2tb 980 Pro for my games , I'll probs grab a 990 Pro 2tb.

[@jassonavila144]

Would you recommend it for a laptop with the basic copper plate and thermal pads or it's too risky? Awesome reviews!!

[@FirstNameLastName-tx6td]

No way

[@azomiss]

Nice review, you can also use more then one software to benchmark an SSD. (Crystal Disk Mark as an example). P.S. Still rocking with my 2TB Seagate FireCuda 530 😁

[@TechTesters]

Thanks! For the record, SSDs get tested in several other applications, but the data gets complicated and for my video's I'd like to keep them accessible :P Maybe that's something to add to Patreon or something in the future, but right now, unless it really changes the narrative (like it did with a Transcend and ADATA SSD in my roundup) I don't include them. Hope that helps!

[@Crossfire2003]

Great video. I am curious what NAND type is being used on these 990 PRO SSDs. Is it 2-bit MLC, or 3-bit TLC? If they are using TLC, then the 970 PRO (MLC) drives might be slightly faster in random reads/writes, and when copying huge files that exceed the cache size of the drive, and they are also more durable.

[@TechTesters]

Thanks! the 990 PRO is 3-bit MLC/TLC, but it's faster in every test, including a lot of them that I don't cover in the video because it'll become too long. Durability, maybe, but I doubt it'll make much of an actual difference.

[@Crossfire2003]

@@TechTesters Thanks for the reply. Have you tested copying huge chunks of files, for instance 100-200GB of data? (This is where TLC NAND shows its weakness).

[@-Batman-]

Yo, glad that I found someone who is also interested in this. Yes, as she said it's TLC, so 3 bit Cells. It's just that Samsung's marketing geniuses apparently thought they might get away with using the term MLC, since it's technically correct, it is technically Multi Layer, but they are an outlier. Nobody else in the industry uses MLC to describe TLC... Anyway I was surprised that the long-term consistency workload didn't show it here, especially seeing the last MLC drive 970 Pro very low on the chart 🤔 I guess that one being 1 TB and the 990 pro being 2 TB helps with the "SLC Cache"? But yeah I think if one did a test as you said it'd show.

[@the-patient-987]

Your videos are always so professional that I really wish it would be possible to make some sort of collab with Gamers Nexus. I think whatever topic you may want to take it would be an awesome video. Plus they don't have a Vault Boy so they could learn something from you.

[@TechTesters]

Who knows, maybe one day! 😀

[@MrEggyman99]

I would like to see a game loading comparison with the 990 Pro vs an 870 QVO, because every video I've seen so far online shows gen 4 making no gains over SATA SSD's in gaming specific tasks

[@kingjon5818]

Wow, just buy and see. And do better research

[@andrew-kt1bm]

Great review .Thanking you . May you please add the Kingston Renegade Fury nvme ssd in 2TB in your testing list comparions ? and possibly do an individual review of the drive please ?

[@TyranosExHelvetia]

Perfect timing. Thank you!

[@TechTesters]

My pleasure!

[@Methodical2]

The 990 Pro is 2TB while the WD and some of the others are 1TB. Does the size of the drive make a difference? Also, why didn't you use 2TB for all the cards?

[@brentonfender2081]

I would love to see if the top tier SSDs impact 4k FPS on a RTX 4090 system.

[@chii2054]

What about endurance? The 990 Pro still seems to use TLC Flash. Has Flash quality improved since the 980 Pro? I really wish there were MLC SSDs again, even if they are more expensive. Talking ablout Flash types, TLC devices only are fast because of the SLC cache. What's the size of SLC cache on the 990 Pro? What's the throughput during high load scenarios that exceed the SLC cache's capacity? The 990 Pro may be better than the 980 Pro, but for some scenarios I would still recommend the expensive 970 Pro, which uses MLC Flash that can handle many more write cycles and safely hold data for a longer time without being powered. It would be nice if we could get an updated MLC SSD sometime.

[@ryanjofre]

Hey, I’ve been building and tweaking systems for over 20 years. Alas, I haven’t built a new system for myself in years and haven’t used m.2 drives or m.2 nvme @ home. I just got my first M.2 drive to play with😊A used Samsung 960 pro 512gig & a pci-e x 16 adapter. I want to use it for my boot drive. My daily driver Asus ROG mobo is a 2014 and it obviously has no built in m.2. Since my favorite SSD company OCZ Technology went out of business years ago Samsung has been my go-to brand for SSD drives. Ime Samsung SSD drives are world class with outstanding software & firmware but they’re overpriced. I love speed like everyone but reliability is of paramount importance. All the “pro” Samsung SSD drives I’ve used for myself and customers are very reliable as long as you don’t fill them over 80%(common sense). I’m building my 70 year old father a Dream Machine this year and I’ll use at least one 990 pro 1tb. The prices will go down soon. Happy New Year. 👍& sub’d.

[@DW-xt6nt]

it's a 980 pro MKII (or plus) in my eyes, MKI was obviously rushed out with poor design, will the Gen 5 "1000" follow this path? Of course still a great M.2 that's amazing for home user level. Great review as always.

[@TechTesters]

Thank you!

[@dackel4253]

I guess the P5 Plus has the best price / performance followed by the SN850X, considering that SSD's only make real world differences when being directly compared to each other or using them as a professional (which most people don't)

[@nelsoncontreras2615]

you always do a great job.

[@prowler1567]

Good info, thanks for the review.

[@TechTesters]

My pleasure! :)

[@NarekAvetisyan]

Another great review. Q: Are you testing these SSD's with or without heatsinks?

[@TechTesters]

Thanks! All testing is done with a heatsink :)

[@zengrath]

My mobo has a heat sink for SSD and luckily I ordered the right one without the heat sink. Although I supposed if i did accidently order the heat sink version I could just remove and not use the mobo heatsink so I'd still likely be ok. Only issue may have been if I didn't have a heatsink on my mobo and ordered the non heat sink SSD which in that case I would likely have had to get a 3rd party heat sink after the fact unless I wanted to delay my build by exchanging it. I actually was going to order the 980, but it was sold out at time I ordered and found the 990 pro available instead and now i'm happy that 980 pro was sold out, haha. All parts for my PC coming in next week so just continuing to review videos about various parts I ordered while I'm waiting just in case i missed anything.

[@SidTheGeek]

I came here to watch the Cool background decorations !