WD SN850x Revisited in 2024 - Still a good pick or go for Gen 5 NVMe?

[@Tyler-sl6vg]

I just installed these in my PC 1TB for OS and 4TB for game storage so I am just watching for the fun of it. I gotta say tho this was a really solid review. A deep analysis and I do not think I have ever seen something so unbiased before. You really force the audience to draw their own conclusion which comes across refreshingly honest.

[@xvnbm]

I already have 980 pro 1TB and I am planning to use it as my OS drive and I am probably going to buy SN850x 4TB as my game/movie/picture drive. Too bad I didn't buy 990 pro 4TB when it was on sale, now it costs 80€ more.

[@cheekster777]

Have been waiting g for this review. Thank you my friend.

[@WireHedd]

I've used the WD Black drives a few times but lately I've moved to the Crucial T500 NVMe drives for my creator PCs. Great video, thanks Lauri.

[@nishchaypallav]

Any reason in particular for moving to T500? I am confused b/w both the drives.

[@TheWorstGamerr]

Why?

[@afti03]

@@nishchaypallav i cannot recomend the t500 which i own, and could not install Windows on. There are absolutely no firmwares, software to install..nothing. it's a weird product.

[@OscarTorres-sn4cw]

Thanks for doing all the research I'd like to see a video with the original factory ssd data vs all these brands and gen 4 ssds

[@IamShopping]

It'd be really interesting to watch a review of WD black 8TB SSD - now, when it's sold at a very steep discount. In general, a separate 8TB SSDs on the market comparison would be really interesting. Laptops having usually only 2 M.2 slots make it really crucial to use the highest capacity SSDs not to waste the slots for a small capacity memory.

[@ryshask]

picking a 2tb for my 9800x3d build... love black friday.

[@puffpurp]

Same for 78x3d

[@fabiangomez357]

I just need a drive to put into an m.2 enclosure and use it as a flash drive and for google photos backup. so far SN850X and 990 EVO Plus are same price $85 for 1TB, and $149/$139 for 2TB respectively. Which would be the better buy you think? The SN850X has been magical as an O/S drive in every system I have for years and I'm sure I can live with 1TB for now and upgrade to 2TB later if prices come down maybe?

[@marcush7688]

have a wd black 1tb 850x for the os drive and a 1tb cardea z440 for the secondary. I have had them for over a year now but good to see that all my time reviewing parts online back then wasn't completely wrong lol

[@JaneChomiek]

Xfd

[@JaneChomiek]

F

[@asknight]

SShhhh! Don't share this video too far and wide or my discount source in the US(walmart) will have supplies drying up. This is by far the best performing nvme I can get off the store shelf in my area for under $100 per TB.

[@mahmaneiti]

i think SSD reviews should change and people should look other specs not just the speed since it doesn't matter anymore, you wouldn't feel any difference between a gen 3 and gen 4 if we're talking about general use or gaming, all these benchmarks for the best scores are just worthless, for me the most important specs are TBW, dram and the memory module technology, these specs are all hidden in marketing, they just push the speed which is so misleading, but also the price and what size you get for that price, that's more of a choice according to what is it that you need it for, personally i got the lexar NM800 pro for the OS, which is so similar to the sn850x and 990 pro but with a better TBW and a cheaper price, also no one was talking about this drive for some reason!!?? and i got the Crucial P3 plus as a secondary drive, also a very cheap ssd that does what i need for a secondary drive to do

[@SupraSav]

If I'm not mistaken that NVME has a controller that is notorious for bricking the drive.

[@mahmaneiti]

@@SupraSav i don't understand what do you mean, which nvme? where did you hear this? i've done a lot of research, i'm pretty sure it would've popped up somewhere if it was commun or even a thing, both those drives have great reviews from users in every website that sells them

[@talha0139]

​@@mahmaneiti search for 'innogrit ig5236 issues' Lexar nm800 pro is using that controller. And it is known for it's failure rates.

[@goodandcoolstudioid]

why there is no MSI spatium M480 pro???

[@CarlosDaMora]

At the same price for 2TB, would you recommend as a laptop main drive this sn850x or the Samsung 990 EVO? I know the Samsung doesn't have DRAM but it is well positioned on your charts.

[@JamieR]

SN850x is better for gaming performance. Depends on your use case. Techtesters did a good video too. I recommend checking that one.

[@PradeepKumar-tq4ev]

​@@JamieRHi, pls say, Is this SSD for content creators or for video editing as the name on the product is about game drive.

[@CaptianKapoo]

Great review! Hope to see the Crucial T500 in your mix at some point. Curious to see how it compares with the other Gen 4 drives.

[@nabinp]

could you plz review crucial t500 with updated firmware?

[@quintrapnell3605]

Sn850x is the best gen4 gaming NVMe but the firecuda 530 is good too if the price is better

[@deadselect]

KC3000 / Fury Renegade top for price, imho

[@GoldPunch]

Still using KC3000 4 TB and 2 TB version of it and happy so far.

[@User-12947I]

How long u been using kc3000 ?

[@kkmcgamer]

would you recommend this drive if it is only used for installing games? I currently have a Kingston kc 3000 as my boot drive/games and I want to get another drive to take load off my boot drive.

[@darrensayo3071]

recommendation gen 4 1tb ssd for 3D rendering?

[@tonyupham354]

can you do the same sort of review for some of the AliExpress vendors? I recently bought the Fanxiang 2tb and as far am I'm aware, seems very good in the PS5 and decent speed

[@tj4000aj]

I have Samsung 990 Pro on a Hyperdrive Thunderbolt 4 enclosure and getting 2.7-2.9gb/s writes when I backup data to it. I use the 990 also for editing Final Cut 11 4k video but always wanted at least 8k SSD. Do you think this drive will be as reliable as 990 Pro? Never used WD SSD so don't want to take any chances.

[@ADOS_DSGB]

Just bought the 4TB one for $250! That's over a 50% discount!

[@nishkarsharya2153]

Wait where is sk hynix platinum p41?

[@jonathanpilmore7140]

Absolute mad question, but do you need to download and drivers / firmware / software for this specific SSD to work properly? I have 1 in my system which I think is under-performing.

[@jonathanpilmore7140]

Also, I have 1 of these (4TB version), that I installed my OS onto and also download all of my games onto etc, I am seeing stuttering in games, should I have 2 drives. 1 for OS, and 1 for Games?

[@JamieR]

WD has firmware updates you want to update. You use the software they have. It'll give you lots of good info in one interface.

[@JamieR]

​@@jonathanpilmore7140 I'd personally always use a small drive for purely Os and a big one for data. If something happens with Os then there is less chance of data loss. And preferably backups.

[@TheWorstGamerr]

@@JamieR A $100 SSD really doesn't allow you to install Windows and games at the same time? Even a hard drive would allow that.

[@PradeepKumar-tq4ev]

Hi tech notice, is this ssd 850x useful for editing aslo or only is it for gaming needs.

[@theTechNotice]

Yes, very good for editing!

[@PradeepKumar-tq4ev]

@@theTechNotice are u sure sir, this SSD for content creators too. Thanks fr reply 😃

[@taomahNEGEV]

For running games?

[@n6dl321]

Yes I have PC Mark 10 but I don't see any drive test results after running the benchmark.. where are they?

[@ovistech]

On the expensive version/license.

[@PradeepKumar-tq4ev]

Hi PLS SAY, i want to take ryzen 9 7900 cpu which supports maximum 5200Mt/sec, should I choose 5200mhz ram maximum or can i go with 5600 or 6000mhz. Is there any use of taking extra MHz. Pls say this final doubt. Thanks a ton.

[@christian_dionisio]

do you need intel arc control on igpu uhd770 paired with nvidia graphics card?

[@MaxRiley]

Any chance to review the Fikwot FN970?

[@corneliodamianperezmedrano1136]

Are Gen 5 affordable already?

[@donnydarko7624]

No, you can get a 4tb gen 4 with 7000/6000mb/s for less than a 2 tb gen 5. like fifty dollars less.

[@JayzBeerz]

Are you gonna test Ryzen 9000 series?

[@theTechNotice]

sure am! :)

[@JayzBeerz]

@@theTechNotice cool I'll be waiting.

[@yxon1ph]

it looks cool i will get it

[@Rohitrps]

Hi,I have a question i just purchase wd sn850x, and i have inserted this nvme in pcie gen 4 slot in the motherboard, my motherboard is gigabyte auros pro B550M, on cristal diskmark software i am getting 7300 read 6300 write speed, but when i actully coping any file in this nvme i am getting 530 to 550mbps why?

[@TheWorstGamerr]

I have the same question

[@jokok2333]

mobo problem. i usually avoid any gigabyte product

[@the1kuwait]

i love my crucial T705 ITS BEAST!!!

[@haroldz123]

Just bought this from Amazon, free shipping to Malaysia. Still cheaper option compare to adata 980 legend, crucial t500

[@wickedninja1989]

thank you.

[@chionyenkwu2253]

2TB is single sided; I have a few ....

[@theTechNotice]

Good to know!

[@absolut6959]

What about 4TB? On their homepage it has the same dimension as 1TB and 2TB, so isn't 4TB a single-sided too?

[@kaneandy1836]

@@absolut6959 double sides

[@mrvincentpogi]

@@absolut6959double sided

[@Vj-mi7fi]

A6000 gpu have 48 gb vram In what case the 4090 24gb will bottleneck so that buying 48gb card is reasonable ?

[@bnawr4336]

If I needed the VRAM, certainly I'd just go for the A6000, performance of the 4090 is very good. You may know you can do more tasks or heavier ones with more VRAM.

[@nadtz]

If you really want to test disks you should be using something a lot more granular like fio. It would also be nice to see an enterprise drive for comparison, none of the workstations I've built for really data intensive work have used M.2 for anything but OS drive, at the least we'd use Intel D7-P5510 drives, there is no comparison for latency and iops and TBW under sustained workloads. Not to discount M.2 for the typical creator system, I own WD, Seagate and Solidigm M.2's that I picked up at various times when they were on sale and for my PC needs they have been fine.

[@Scouser89Liverpool22]

Really good NVMe, but i very surprised that WD Black dont have a Gen 5 SSD out considering all their competitors have one out there

[@rallyscoot]

maybe they are working on it.

[@Scouser89Liverpool22]

@@rallyscoot maybe yep, but im surprised as when look at the WD Black, they did a WD Black 850 and then later on brought out a 850X, thought they would of done the same 950 and then 950X, bit like Corsair brought out a 700 then a Pro 700 and then a Pro 700 SE all Gen 5 SSD’s

[@siam_g.d.s]

For what its worth, its good. Other comparable m.2 ssds are more higher in price

[@AWEG-qu8bz]

After your Reyiew some Weeks ago i buy a Sabrent Rocket 1 and 4 TB. And also 64 GB Sabrent RAM because of maybe a Good/better compatibility when i built a new system at my new minisforum UM790 Pro. Now after this Review i get the Feeling that i made a complete wrong decision.

[@The_Martinator_T-81]

2025 PC: SSD #1: Samsung 990 PRO 2TB use case: Windows 11, some Tools, Benchmarks, Programs SSD #2: Samsung 990 PRO 4TB use case: installing & playing games, unzipping huge files with WinRaR, copying big files to other drives SSD #3: use case: exactly like SSD #2 I'll either go for another Samsung 990 PRO 4TB or for that WD_BLACK SN850X 4TB.

[@Whitepinoy]

I got the kingston 1TB reengage

[@GuestGuest-k5y]

i just got my WD_BLACK SN850X For £75 on sale. Original price was £153

[@bobaudette79]

Well i did see them as the TOP 4tb drive..

[@kaneandy1836]

2TB is single side,i have one

[@absolut6959]

4TB has the same dimension, so what about 4TB? Does WD have a mistake on their website?

[@kaneandy1836]

@ 4tb is double sides,i bought one last week

[@rallyscoot]

The very high-end speedy NVM-e 4.0 4x are very limited. Most of these drives performance as average.. Which isnt great. I dont hope this will happen every new pci-e generation drive. I really miss those SATA ssd days, where almost every sata drive performance like the max what sata 600 could do.. So there was actually more choice to pick from. PCi-e 3.0 x4 wasnt a great generation too. Nowdays harder or hard to find when you still have a motherboard with pci-e 3.0 x4 lanes on that board.

[@nadtz]

The problem is manufacturers have to 'cheat' with faster NVME consumer drives. They are fine so long as you don't totally fill cache but once you do performance drops a lot and sustained workloads are also not as good as enterprise NVME. Gen 3-4 were/are great if you work with enterprise drives though.

[@radeononi758]

if you do not put a heatsink on this drive or the 990 they will not get past 7200

[@ZeekMX]

It becomes worth it when it's sub $100.00 per TB - which it is. It's as low as $86.00 on Amazon right now. I made every mistake with these M.2 at first on my Corsair Asus Rog Strix X570 Hero IIIV Wifi These SN850x will punish you for so much as overheat or an unsafe shut down. The trick is to keep them at 35c to 40c idle and no hotter than 50c to 60c under load.

[@deadselect]

It is a pity that radiators cannot be removed from top-end drives. In most cases, they are worse than radiators for $10. And until the warranty ends, you will have to endure high temperatures or put a fan next to it 😢

[@ZeekMX]

@@deadselect - Today I install NewHail brand M.2 Coolers on both of my M.2 SN850x NVMe SSDs The fans won't matter because they have 3 heat pipes and fins large enough to work in my large volume TT900 chassis with full complement of 2000RPM Noctua and TT fans. I've got a good performing set of M.2 at the moment. They've logged about 15 unsafe shutdowns. Yet no overheats logged. That was because of some PrimoCache 4.3 testing. Everything is ok now after proper cooling. They're spitting out 2250+ read and 33000+ write using PrimoCache 4.3

[@deadselect]

@@ZeekMX Hm... Would you like to try ZFS?

[@JbVest]

309 now, so roughly 77 bucks a terabyte 👌

[@andrewphoto4750]

Got 3, 2tb. One for game, one for blender

[@andrewphoto4750]

Recently got the sk Hynix p41 2tb and it’s nice

[@PradeepKumar-tq4ev]

Hi, pls say Is this SSD for content creators or for video editing as the name on the product is about game drive.

[@Roboto420]

Too bad the sn850 and sn850x have problems being recognized on x670 chipset especially. My msi x670e does not like these drives at all.

[@FranCuri7]

I would like to see a performance comparison between the MacBook PRO m3 Pro 14' 18gb vs Asus ProArt px13 I love your content, (～￣▽￣)～♥❤❤💙💙💚💚💛💛💜💜❣❣💖💖💗💗

[@donnydarko7624]

I feel like the macbook would be better for davinci, and adobe, but everything else the asus would probably win.

[@FranCuri7]

@@donnydarko7624 jm jm, thanks bro, I am looking for a portable workstation and I would mainly like to work fluently with Premiere and After Effects. That the PC does not make noise, and can work unplugged for at least 5 hours. They still need to launch the ProArt performance tests, we will have to wait

[@dounin8876]

White backgrounds look so bad.

[@Wxltzy5陰火牛]

Me with my samsung 990 pro🗿

[@Games-Ah46]

How is it so far? Have you used it for your Ps5 and does it cause any heat? Would you recommend it?

[@deadselect]

​@@Games-Ah46 My friend has been using this SSD on a gaming computer for almost 2 years now. If you use it on a PC, make sure you have a good 3.3V mains voltage. I recommend purchasing the version without a heatsink.

[@yttean98]

The Lexar NM790 1TB is cheaper than WD 850X 1TB at the lace where I come from, also the Lexar is faster, refer to table above. You pick viewers. End of comment.

[@toseltreps1101]

except you are completely wrong

[@yttean98]

@@toseltreps1101 why, I did my research?

[@Airwolf2030]

I do know the NM790 is DRAM-less which can't handle heavy writing but for everyday use will do just fine

[@toseltreps1101]

Comparing SSDs by sequential write is completely idiotic.

[@creed5248]

The Seagate 530s are better than those WDs with a better TBW as well ...

[@cpufrost]

Except they are prone to sudden death syndrome.

[@pegcity4eva]

After having 3 Seagate hard drives failing and 0 WD drives i would never get any Seagate products.

[@elodiie5430]

The 530s are quite famous for dying around 2 years, which is unfortunately a very short lifespan (despite a high tbw), the sn850x don't have that reputation yet