However, it's essential to note that the SN850 runs hot under load, so a heatsink is advised (which can increase its price), but it's a great option for PS5 owners and PC gamers alike. The SK hynix Gold P31 is still the gold standard for laptop SSDs, especially as it has DRAM, but it’s limited to PCIe 3.0 bandwidth, isn’t always available, and is limited to 2TB of capacity. The MP44 can get twice the bandwidth, but even in a 3.0 slot, it is inexpensive for 4TB and even has an 8TB option. Other alternatives, like the Crucial P3 Plus or Corsair MP600 Core XT, are slower and use QLC. The heatsink found on the Addlink A93 and other SSDs preclude them from laptop use and can add a little cost. Otherwise, the MP44 will have some competition at lower capacities, but it is worth a look if you can find it at the right price. We also make sure to measure the SSD's heat and controller-reported data on how much data has been written to the drive and how much life the drive has left before failing to determine whether the manufacturer's claimed endurance measures up to the time the drive itself estimates it has left.

The era of PCIe 5.0 SSDs is upon us, propelling us to new heights of stratospheric SSD performance. Blazing-fast PCIe 5.0 M.2 SSDs, which offer up to twice the sequential speeds of the older PCIe 4.0 standard, are now supported with Intel and AMD's current platforms, the Zen 4 Ryzen 7000 and 13th-Gen Raptor Lake. The PNY XLR8 CS3140 M.2 SSD is one of the best SSDs around, both for gamers and PC enthusiasts alike. Available in three capacities—1TB, 2TB, and 4TB—this SSD is a great swan song for the PCIe 4.0 era as PCIe 5.0 SSDs start to roll out. That's not a bad thing. Especially in the case of laptops, an older machine might supportonlyM.2 SATA-bus SSDs, and that will be the boundary of your upgrade path...end of story. As a result, the only reasons you'd upgrade the drive, in that situation, would be to get more capacity, or if the old one failed. Though it can't quite match the gaming prowess of some of the latest generation of PCIe 4.0 speedsters, the 990 Pro with Heatsink still offers respectable gaming performance while being a thoroughbred workhorse for creative tasks. It's an appealing choice and a worthy upgrade from the 980 Pro. Finally, we use the drive as our primary SSD in our workstation PC (and video game console, if appropriate) to assess the real world use of the drive.Get the ultimate gaming edge over your competition with insane speeds up to 7,300 MB/s(1) for top-level performance and radically short load times.

This SSD is designed for use in desktop and notebook computer workloads and is not intended for Server environments. However, from an engineering point of view, SSDs didn't needto be that big. The enclosure an SSD comes in has a lot of dead space inside. It's designed in that 2.5-inch size and shape to make the drive fit into those existing bays. So when mobile-device designers, challenged with slimming down laptops and tablets, reassessed this issue, the consensus was clear: The bulky 2.5-inch form factor, eventually, would have to go.We actually like these because often, you often get a robust heat sink on the M.2 drive. Some PCI Express-bus M.2 SSDs can run hot under sustained read/write tasks and throttle their speed. That said, unless you're running a server or something similar, where a drive is constantly getting hammered with reads and writes, that's usually not something you have to worry about. That's because many of these drives are so fast, they get their transfer duties done before they have a chance to get all that hot.

If the drive is compatible with a video game console, we will also measure the SSD's speed both with the console's own benchmarks but also through file copy operations to and from the main console storage drive. Of all the M.2 SSD's on this list, the Samsung EVO Plus is the most expensive, in some cases (against XPG SX8200, for example) by a good margin. If you have the money to spend and you want the fastest SSD your PCIe 3.0 board can handle, then you can't go wrong with the Samsung EVO Plus. The Solidigm P41 Plus is the best budget DRAM-less M.2 NVMe SSD on the market. It’s particularly good at 2TB, rivaling the 670p, which is older but comparable. This is no surprise as Intel’s NAND and SSD division migrated to Solidigm after a sale of the company to SK hynix, so the P41 Plus is reminiscent of that excellent budget drive. We would give the edge to the P41 Plus if you can make full use of the drive, which includes total Synergy 2.0 SSD driversupport. We’d also give the P41 Plus the edge over the P3 and P3 Plus if you’re shopping for your primary drive, as it has more consistent performance, even if maximum bandwidth is lower. The combination of the Phison E18 controller and 176-layer TLC flash from Micron is a match made in heaven: unrivaled peak performance and, with the right cache design as on the Gaming model, strong sustained performance. That is ideal for workstation tasks, and Inland’s drives are cheaper than competitor offerings while maintaining a decent warranty. This is a barebones drive but will get the job done.

So, What Is an M.2 SSD?

A range of capacities from 1TB to 4TB(2) means you get to keep more of today’s games that can take up 200GB(2) or more of storage.