When choosing SSD to improve the performance of our PC, the type of memory used by the SSD will determine from the maximum available capacity to the price and performance of the SSD we buy. The Sandisk Ultra 3D are the new consumption models of the company that have 3D NAND and nCache 2.0 technologies, and which we have already tested …
The Sandisk Ultra 3D SSD
Although when you consider changing the hard drive of a PC, either desktop or laptop, for an SSD to improve performance, the price is one of the main factors in the purchase decision. In the most affordable models, the latest memory technologies are usually left aside and tend to be models with less capacity.
Of the memory technologies of the SSD, the 3D NAND is what has allowed to vary this trend and since not long ago it has fully entered the consumer models offering more capacity and better reliability of the chips without the price soaring. Sandisk has in its Ultra 3D models an interesting option if you want more capacity, up to 2 TB, with a price that does not shoot with respect to the solutions that do not use 3D NAND technology although they are still more expensive models than direct competition, such as Recent Crucial MX500.
| SANDISK ULTRA 3D SSD | |
|---|---|
| Capacity | 1 TB (also 2 TB, 250 GB and 500 GB) |
| Technology | Sandisk 3D TLC 64 layers |
| Formats | Only in 2.5-inch unit |
| Sequential reading | 560 MB / s |
| Sequential writing | 530 MB / s |
| Random reading (IOPS) | 95K |
| Random writing (IOPS) | 84K |
| TBW (TB) | 400 |
| Controller | Marvell 88SS1074 |
| Price | 337 dollars |
At the level of theoretical features, the Sandisk Ultra 3D we have tested, with capacity of 1 TB, fits the expected: 560/530 MB / s in sequential read / write performance, more than 90k in random reading and SATA to 6 GB / s. This type of SSD units are not currently available in M.2 format and the warranty offered in this product Sandisk does not exceed 3 years, which gives us data over 500 GB / day in durability if we stick to the guarantee period.
Test equipment
For the performance tests of this Sandisk Ultra 3D 1 TB we used a test equipment consisting of the combination of the Ryzen 7 1800X processor on the motherboard Gigabyte GA-AX370-Gaming 5, accompanied by 32 GB of DDR4 RAM at 2400 Mhz and the Nvidia GTX 1050 graphics card.
On this occasion, for the comparison of performance we have the results of SSD 850 EVO units of Samsung, the MX300 of Crucial, the OCZ TR150 and finally, the WD Blue SSD, all of them of 1 TB and with similar price except offers special In all cases, the SSD drives have been connected to the motherboard directly and updated with the latest firmware available at the time of testing.
Read also: Sandisk Connect, a pendrive that you can connect by WiFi from the mobile
Performance of the 1 TB Ultra Sandisk 3D
The measurement of the performance of the Sandisk SSD that we are testing is carried out by means of the battery of tests with the specific reference software for this type of measurements: ATTO Disk Benchmark, CrystalDiskMark, PC Mark 8 and AS SSD.
We start the comparison with ATTO Disk Benchmark, where we can verify that the SSD disk of Sandisk even surpasses the theoretical frames that the manufacturer provides, being ahead of the rest of SATA units tested. Here is important the comparison with the Samsung EVO unit, currently the reference of the consumer sector in this capacity, with the price closest to the SSD of Sandisk despite having its seniority in the market, and the unit to be overcome by any SSD not NVMe consumption.
The next test that we launched on our PC was the CrystalDiskMark test, where the new Sandisk SSD confirms the read and write figures in sequential mode, again being ahead of the Samsung EVO unit.
If we look according to CrystalDiskMark performance when it comes to writing and reading random data (Random 4K QD32), this SSD yields 265 and 234 MB / s for reading and writing respectively.
The next test that we pass to the test unit is AS SSD, where in reading the Sandisk Ultra 3D maintains the leadership but suffers in front of all its rivals when it comes to writing speed. In any case, both when it takes advantage as in this last test, the differences for the consumer market are almost anecdotal.
Finally, we have the performance test with PCMark 7, assessing both the overall score and the bandwidth of the unit during the test.
With a price still high due to the novelty of its launch, the Sandisk Ultra 3D meets what one expects when buying a SSD unit based on 3D Nand. It also does it without blushing before “the king” Samsung and his EVO that has marked the way these years when we refer to capacity and performance without losing the head with the price.
The factor in favor of the Sandisk model is its most current technology, which allows it to compete better than others at the consumer level, something key when we talk about units that we can assemble in laptops. What is clear after this review of Sandisk 3D SSD is that we are already at the limit of performance within the consumer market for this type of units, so, who aspire to much more, will not have for now any choice but to pay more and move to the very fast NVMe.
Sandisk DashBoard: Information and easy maintenance of the SSD
One of the contributions of Sandisk to this SSD can be found in your console or Dashboard software. It is a program for Windows that we can download for free and that, in a very simple way, allows us to manage and know basic information about the SSD that we have installed.
Although this software supports the safe formatting of the unit, as well as performance graphics in real time, the most interesting is how easy it is to clone drives when we want to renew SSD, as well as firmware updates (with notifications even by email) and for me, the information about the use and health of the SSD, something critical if you have something more than your operating system in the Sandisk SSD.
