Samsung Portable SSD X5
Undeniably fast, Samsung’s new X5 SSD replaces the company’s trusty T5 as the king of portable drives
SCORE PRICE 1TB, £525 (£630 inc VAT) from samsung.com/uk
You only need to look at this month’s group test of laptops ( see p76) to appreciate the rise of USB-C. To complicate matters, it comes in two varieties: USB 3.1 and Thunderbolt 3. Of the two, Thunderbolt is preferable for all sorts of reasons, with one being speed – it can reach 40Mbits/sec while USB 3.1 is capped at 10Mbits/sec. And such speeds, as this Samsung SSD amply demonstrates, are particularly useful for external SSD drives.
Samsung has history here, with its SSD T5 reigning supreme as the USB 3.1 speed king. With the SSD X5, it adds a Thunderbolt 3-enabled SSD to the mix, in your choice of 500GB, 1TB or 2TB. Samsung quotes sequential read/write speed of up to 2,800MB/ sec and 2,300MB/sec, which is around four to five times faster than the T5. 2,800MB/sec translates into 22.4Mbits/sec, so that’s taking full advantage of the Thunderbolt bus too.
But theory is theory: we care about real-world performance, and here the X5 truly shines. I first conducted my tests on a 2017 5K iMac, and the results spoke for themselves. The drive managed read/write speeds of 2,352MB/sec and 1,682MB/sec. That’s a huge improvement over the 480/500MB/sec speeds I saw on the T5, and noticeably faster than the iMac’s built-in SSD, which manages still-respectable speeds of 1,058MB/sec and 756MB/sec.
I then plugged the drive into the Dell XPS 15 ( see p62) and yielded sequential speeds of 2,057MB/sec and 1,531MB/sec – yet, that wasn’t the thing that impressed me the most. Instead, it was the insane read/write speeds of 318MB/sec and 280MB/sec for non-sequential, smaller files. In comparison, the nonThunderbolt 3 ADATA SE730 and Samsung T5 SSDs managed only around 110-180MB/sec.
Design wise, this drive is available in one colour combo: a glossy silver front and a red enclosure around the back. It isn’t much bigger than a modern-day smartphone; at 119 x 62 x 19.7mm, it’s only twice the thickness. Even so, at 150g, you can easily pocket the drive. There’s a single Thunderbolt 3 port with an LED to illuminate when it’s in use, and Samsung bundles a Thunderbolt 3 cable, but there’s no carrying case. Unfortunately, there’s still no waterproofing either. It’s a feature I love having on the ADATA SE730, but with no IP-rating, the Samsung X5 may not survive any accidental spills or puddle drops.
The other thing to note is that you can’t plug the drive into a nonThunderbolt 3 port. Even if you have the latest computer that has USB-C 3.1 (or Type-A) ports, the drive simply won’t power on. That’s because NVMe drives require a connection to the computer’s PCIe bus – and that can’t happen through the regular USB interface. So, if you were looking to share your files, movies, or lifetime’s worth of pictures with your friends and family, you’ll need to ensure they
“Samsung’s handy Portable SSD Software allows you to check for firmware updates and protect the drive with a password”
have access to a device with a Thunderbolt 3 port.
Then we come to the price. As you can imagine, it’s not going to be cheap. Prices start at £360 for the 500GB model, while the 1TB model on review costs £630. If you need more space, Samsung offers the 2TB X5, which costs a whopping £1,250.
Such prices are a sign of two things: first, the newness of the technology. And second, that Samsung effectively has a monopoly. At the time of writing, there are no other 1TB Thunderbolt 3 NVMe external drives – the X5 is in a league of its own. You can buy an external Thunderbolt 3 enclosure for around £300 and then fit it with a 1TB NVMe SSD for around £325, bringing the price as close as darn it to the Samsung’s.
I wouldn’t recommend that approach, especially as you’ll miss out on Samsung’s Portable SSD Software. This allows you to check for firmware updates and protect the drive with a password. Note it has AES 256-bit hardware encryption, too.
So, should you buy it? The X5 is expensive, can’t be used with nonThunderbolt computers and isn’t waterproof. If I had to buy an external SSD, I’d opt for the cheaper Samsung T5 (£260 for 1TB) or the ADATA SE730, which are both a lot more versatile than the X5. Still, I’m tempted: after all, this is the world’s fastest portable drive. SPECIFICATIONS 1TB PCIe SSD up to 2,800MB/sec sequential read up to 2,300MB/sec sequential write AES 256-bit hardware encryption Thunderbolt 3 interface only 62 x 19.7 x 119mm (WDH) 150g 3yr limited warranty