Plextor M6S & M6M (256GB) Review
by Kristian Vättö on April 10, 2014 6:00 AM ESTPerformance Consistency
Performance consistency tells us a lot about the architecture of these SSDs and how they handle internal defragmentation. The reason we don’t have consistent IO latency with SSD is because inevitably all controllers have to do some amount of defragmentation or garbage collection in order to continue operating at high speeds. When and how an SSD decides to run its defrag or cleanup routines directly impacts the user experience as inconsistent performance results in application slowdowns.
To test IO consistency, we fill a secure erased SSD with sequential data to ensure that all user accessible LBAs have data associated with them. Next we kick off a 4KB random write workload across all LBAs at a queue depth of 32 using incompressible data. The test is run for just over half an hour and we record instantaneous IOPS every second.
We are also testing drives with added over-provisioning by limiting the LBA range. This gives us a look into the drive’s behavior with varying levels of empty space, which is frankly a more realistic approach for client workloads.
Each of the three graphs has its own purpose. The first one is of the whole duration of the test in log scale. The second and third one zoom into the beginning of steady-state operation (t=1400s) but on different scales: the second one uses log scale for easy comparison whereas the third one uses linear scale for better visualization of differences between drives. Click the buttons below each graph to switch the source data.
For more detailed description of the test and why performance consistency matters, read our original Intel SSD DC S3700 article.
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| Plextor M6S | Plextor M5M | Crucial M550 | SanDisk Extreme II | Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA | |||||
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| 25% Spare Area | |||||||||
Ouch, this doesn't look too good. The IOPS is constantly dropping below 1000, which is something I'm not expecting to see anymore. Even the M550 can keep the IOPS at ~4000 minimum, so the M6S certainly doesn't do well here. With added over-provisioning (OP) the performance does look a lot better and the minimum IOPS jumps to ~10K but it's still a downgrade from the M5M. Given the change to a lighter controller this is perhaps expected, but I'm still worried about the consistency without additional OP. I would make sure to leave ~10-15% of empty space with the M6S and M6M to avoid running into inconsistent performance.
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| Plextor M6S | Plextor M5M | Crucial M550 | SanDisk Extreme II | Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA | |||||
| Default | |||||||||
| 25% Spare Area | |||||||||
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| Plextor M6S | Plextor M5M | Crucial M550 | SanDisk Extreme II | Samsung SSD 840 EVO mSATA | |||||
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| 25% Spare Area | |||||||||
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nick2crete - Thursday, April 10, 2014 - link
Christian ,the Crucial M550 has the Marvell 9189 controller ,so what are the differences from 9187,9188 and 9189
Kristian Vättö - Friday, April 11, 2014 - link
9189 is an updated version of the 9187 with full DevSleep and LPDDR support.9188 is a light version of the 9187 with four channels instead of eight.
nick2crete - Friday, April 11, 2014 - link
Thank you !maybe you should correct it in the review ,because as it is written is meant that the M550 has the 9187 or you meant the M500 probably ..
HisDivineOrder - Thursday, April 10, 2014 - link
The main reason to release a derivative product is because "the other guys" are releasing new products and you don't want to seem behind.AKA AMD re-releasing the 7xxx series as R9 parts with new branding and new "newness." nVidia, Intel, they all do it. In fact, Intel's about to do it again.
payton2037 - Sunday, April 13, 2014 - link
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watersb - Monday, April 14, 2014 - link
Fantastic overview of NAND drive internals. Bundle this up as an Amazon Single for $1.99 and take my money.AbRASiON - Wednesday, April 16, 2014 - link
Would I be right in assuming when the author writes "manufacturers are preparing for the PCI-e era" regarding SSD storage, we're looking at that NGFF or whatever it is, next gen mSATA port? I mean surely they don't expect us to blow a PCI-e port on storage? (I would if it was worth it, most wouldn't)Antronman - Monday, April 21, 2014 - link
PCIe storage already exists at the consumer level...Extremely expensive, 1.4TB Read 700MB Write PCIe SSDs.
420GB, 1500USD.
Ultraspark - Thursday, April 24, 2014 - link
On Amazon Plextor m5p 128gb cost about 117$, and not 200$. I wonder how did you found such price. Or on newegg prices are updated once per 2 year, or this is an cheap review "paid" by someone to put Plextor in a bad light. It is well known that the controller+memory tandem is a half job. The firmware do the other half of job. You'll never feel in real life few tens of Mbps or few thousands of IOPS. The main goal of plextor is reliability! Just remember the Sandforce devices with shitty firmware who die like no one else. The MxS series is a preparation for MxP series. Remember the new revision of M5S. It is almost M5P with very small difference, without a chance to feel that difference in real life. Just different firmware and case. So, let's be honest dear reviwer: a good car is just a half job. If you want to win you need a good driver. The same is with plextor. This is 1st firmware. It is just to work. The future firmwares will do the magic, like on M5 Series. And When you search for price, be honest to search for lowest, not for highest. Please correct from 200$ to 117$Ultraspark - Thursday, April 24, 2014 - link
Or change the supplier. I never buy from newegg.