Samsung 970 Evo 500GB

Www.samsung.com $150

Samsung’s 900 series M.2 SSDs have ruled the roost for the last several years thanks to blistering performance and competitive pricing. The latest 970 models continue that trend.

The 970 Evo is the cheaper, more consumer-centric option, though it still comes with a relatively high price compared to SATA SSDs.

But, while you’re paying 50% more than the likes of the Crucial MX500, you’re getting 700% more speed. This drive tops out at 3554MB/s sequential read and 2461MB/s sequential write, which is frankly more than anyone needs. But it is nice to have. You also get a huge 233688IOPS random read and 218890IOPS random write. Oh, and there’s the impressive 300TBW write endurance.

Samsung’s own 3D NAND is under the hood, and it’s run by the Samsung Phoenix controller that also includes hardware AES encryption. These are high-end drives, and they deliver in every way, except one. These drives, like the others in this test except the Samsung 970 Pro, use TLC NAND. That results in slower performance and much lower write endurance than the 970 Pro drive, so if you really want the absolute pinnacle of performance, you know where to go.