SAMSUNG 980 PRO 1TB

amazon SAMSUNG 980 PRO 1TB reviews

One of the most powerful SSDs available today, the 980 Pro model redefines Samsung’s entire SSD lineup. With the combination of the latest PCIe 4.0 protocol and a new generation controller and memory chip, Samsung 980 Pro delivers dizzying performance on tasks, surpassing older generation SSDs with PCIe 3.0 protocol.

PCIe 4.0, the fourth generation of the protocol for connecting peripherals to the motherboard, has gradually appeared and become more popular with replacing the existing PCIe 3.0 standard. With a nearly doubled bandwidth speed, the PCIe 4.0 standard supports 16 GT/s, (approximately 2GB/s per lane or 64GB/s total) compared to 8GT/s bitrate for PCIe 3.0 (total 32GB/s). PCIe 4.0 will also be backward compatible with older protocols, the PCIe 3.0 protocol will work on motherboards that support PCIe 4.0, and the PCIe 4.0 protocol will also work on PCIe 3.0 motherboards. Still, they are limited to the performance of the PCIe 3.0 protocol.

980 Pro is the first SSD product from Samsung to support the PCIe 4.0 protocol standard. With a maximum random read, read/write speed of 1,000,000 IOPS, Samsung 980 Pro promises to “stand” all the user’s heaviest tasks.

Design overview

The specifications of Samsung’s product boxes have long become an “immutable” formula, with the “Pro” brand line using mysterious black tones. This way distinguishes them from the lower-end lines that have brighter colors. The parameters are also quite simple, including the product name, white print capacity, and the highlights will be brilliant red. A color scheme to emphasize the focus without having to use too many flashy colors.

It should be noted, to exploit the full power of PCIe 4.0 SSDs like the Samsung 980 Pro, we will need a configuration that fully supports this protocol standard. Currently, they include AMD Ryzen 3000 CPUs, 5000 series combined with motherboard X570, B550; Intel 11 Gen Rocket Lake CPU with B560, Z590 motherboards.

Overall, the Samsung 980 Pro is like a “beautiful, better” version of the 970 EVO Plus model. The 980 Pro is still designed according to the M.2 2280 form-factor, with a black and gold board – the usual color of flagship products.

With the 980 Pro, this is the first time a flagship SSD model from Samsung does not use 2-bit MLC flash memory chips. Instead, it uses Samsung’s latest 3-bit TLC flash memory chip to save costs. But with the Samsung Elpis controller and support for the PCIe 4.0 protocol, the 980 Pro still ensures a super high level of performance along with 256-bit AES encryption for both gamers and users.

Compact size but possessing high speed, Samsung 980 Pro will generate a lot of heat. To keep the drive cool and at the same time avoid deceleration due to overheating, Samsung continues to use a copper heat sink at the rear of the 980 Pro. Besides, the Elpis controller is also covered with a layer of nickel plating, which according to Samsung, helps to dissipate about 7% better heat effectively.

In terms of features, the Samsung 980 Pro is integrated with Intelligent TurboWrite 2.0 technology that increases burst speed and enables high-speed recording for longer periods. However, like on other SLC cache mechanisms, the 980 Pro’s write speed will gradually decrease as the cache gets close to full.

In addition to the enhanced post-TurboWrite performance, Samsung has also significantly increased the TurboWrite cache capacity compared to the previous generation. The original value remains at 6GB (4GB for the 250 and 500GB models). Still, Samsung has tweaked the amount of dynamic cache for a 5x increase in capacity compared to the original cache.

With 3-bit TLC memory chips, Samsung announced the endurance of the 980 Pro as 600 TBW (Terabyte Written). That is probably a calculated move from Samsung when according to its statistics on 661,000 NVMe SSDs, 99% of users only write to 156TB in 5 years – also the warranty period of the 980 Pro, and 99.7 % of users write less than 600 TB.

Benchmark performance and actual usage

Testing the performance of Samsung 980 Pro, BiaReview used the system with the following configuration:

CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 5900x

Motherboard: Asus ROG x570 F-Gaming

RAM: Corsair Dominator 32GB

Graphics Card: Inno3D RTX 3080 iChill X3

Source: Corsair RM850 Gold

The first test is the actual data copy task. BiaReview uses a data directory consisting of a 4K video file with a capacity of 20GB, the Cyberpunk 2077 game installer, and the Valorant game installer, with a total size of about 100GB. Samsung 980 Pro maintains a speed of about 2.3 GB / s; near the end, it drops to 150 MB / s, then increases to 1.7 GB / s until the copying process.

Next is Crystal Disk Mark, the most popular and intuitive hard drive benchmark tool today. That is also the application used by most hard drive manufacturers to announce their products’ read/write speed.

The results show that the Samsung 980 Pro achieves an actual sequential read/write speed of 6544.7/5156 MB/s, which is slightly lower than Samsung’s announced. The 4K Q1T1 random access speed is high, 89.09 MB/s and 208.9 MB/s, respectively.

Next is the AS SSD benchmark software. Using a different algorithm than Crystal Disk Mark, the speed of the drive on AS SSD tends to be lower, and due to less frequent updates, AS SSD is limited to a sequential read and write speed of about 6000 MB/s. The overall score of the Samsung 980 Pro is 7690, with sequential read/write speeds of 4951.54/3937.34 MB/s.

AS SSD also has another tool, Compression Benchmark, which measures the hard drive data compression speed with compression levels from 0% to 100%. In theory, the ideal result is two green and red lines corresponding to the read and write speeds of data as straight and as high as possible, indicating the controller’s stability. With the Samsung 980 Pro, both read and write lines are relatively stable, without too many fluctuations throughout the benchmark process.

The Samsung 980 Pro is superior to the PCIe 3.0 SSDs that BiaReview has evaluated in terms of gaming performance. Measured by the benchmark of the game FF XIV: Shadowbringers, the Samsung 980 Pro loads all five levels in just 8.9 seconds, while the PCIe 3.0 SSD usually takes about 12-13 seconds.

The operating temperature of the Samsung 980 Pro is around 45-46 degrees Celsius when benchmarking in room temperature conditions of 22 degrees; this is because the writer used the NVMe heatsink available on the motherboard. If possible, the writer will update the actual temperature of the SSD when not using the heatsink.

Summary

The Samsung 980 Pro is worth choosing if you are looking to jump into the PCIe 4.0 technology race. Not only fast data retrieval but Samsung 980 Pro also significantly improves game loading speed, so you are suitable for any user. However, there is a big barrier that computer hardware that fully supports PCIe 4.0 is still small. When computer components are expensive due to a global shortage of chips, it is clear that upgrading computers is not an easy challenge to overcome.

where can you get a SAMSUNG 980 PRO 1TB online

SAMSUNG 980 PRO 1TB PCIe NVMe Gen4 Internal Gaming SSD M.2 (MZ-V8P1T0B): Buy it now

Samsung 980 PRO 1TB PCIe SSD – 7,000 MB/s 4.0 x 4 M.2 NVMe Gen4 Internal Gaming Solid State Drive with V-NAND Technology for Laptops Desktops and Crypto Chia Mining: Buy it now

Samsung 980 PRO 1TB PCIe 4.0 NVME M.2 SSD (MZ-V8P1T0BW): Buy it now