Samsung 850 Pro 2TB

Say “hello” to the $1,000 SSD

NEARLY A THOUSAND BUCKS? For a SATA SSD? Really? At least it comes from Samsung, de facto king of solid-state storage. But, still, that’s one hell of a price tag.

However, let’s put money to one side and have a sniff around this, the latest in Samsung’s long line of worldbeaters. It’s the 850 Pro in mega-meaty 2TB format, and it’s absolutely the state of the art when it comes to SATA SSDs. Of course, anything based on the SATA interface will have limitations compared to the new PCI Express generation. Raw bandwidth is limited to about 550MB/s, and the AHCI control protocol used by SATA was conceived for use with magnetic hard disks, not NAND flash drives.

Those caveats aside, the 850 Pro is special. Along with that 2TB capacity, it’s worth remembering that Samsung does everything in-house, giving it complete control over integrating the NAND memory with the controller chipset and the firmware. And in-house at Samsung means cutting-edge technology. For the 850 Pro, that includes exotic 3D VNAND, which involves layering the memory in vertical stacks. That doesn’t just increase capacity, it creates new opportunities for super-fast interconnects.

The 850 Pro also has one of Samsung’s powerful triplecore SATA controllers, the MEX. Combine that with a 10year warranty, and you have about the most compelling SATA-based storage imaginable, albeit at that price.

The 850 Pro isn’t the fastest SATA drive in every single benchmark. It’s even beaten on occasion by its cheaper Samsung sibling, the 850 EVO. But it is consistent—it’s among the fastest, whatever the benchmark.

The context is SATA drives. The 850 Pro is blown back into 2015 by the next-gen PCI Express drives, including Samsung’s 950 Pro. What’s more, if you can afford the 850 Pro’s price, you might be better off modernizing your PC with support for PCI Express storage, even if that means a new mobo. But if you are committed to sticking with SATA, and you want the fastest, most reliable SSD, backed by a bullet-proof warranty, this is almost definitely it.

Samsung 850 Pro 2TB

BY GRABTHAR’S HAMMER! The finest SATA drive money can buy; huge 10-year warranty.

CREWMAN NUMBER SIX It’s a SATA drive; it’s nearly $1,000; did we mention the $1,000?

$918, www.samsung.com