SABRENT Q4 2230 M.2 NVMe Gen 4 2TB Internal SSD 5000MB/s Read PCIe 4.0 X4 M2 Solid State Drive Compatible with Steam Deck, ASUS ROG Ally, Mini PCs [SB-213Q-2TB]

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Revitalize and expand the storage of your M.2 2230 SSD compatible laptop such as many Microsoft ® Surface and Dell™ models. I had ARK running once on Linux: It loaded ARK faster from a hard disk than Windows loaded it from NVMe...

Generally, we would expect BiCS5 to be less efficient than B47R. In our testing, these drives largely peak at 3-4W when something like the 2TB SN740 is rated for a peak of 6.3W, a substantial difference. Our 2TB SN770 reached a peak of 4.91W, which is noticeably less efficient at 1TB and 2TB. In practice, the difference probably isn’t massive as long as you have a newer controller, though - the TN436’s E19T is objectively much less efficient. abufrejoval said:I guess the biggest question is: how do you ensure it's done steady-state processing before you turn the device off?

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Windows and Linux will see just a committed write, turning off the device won't loose you any data, it might just not have the opportunity to do the house-keeping and the SLC cache will remain permanently filled while the drive has to bypass it for new data resulting in HDD class write speeds. Official write specifications are only part of the performance picture. Most SSDs implement a write cache, which is a fast area of (usually) pseudo-SLC programmed flash that absorbs incoming data. Sustained write speeds can suffer tremendously once the workload spills outside of the cache and into the "native" TLC or QLC flash. And when the firmware has to deal with things like host buffers, that require interaction with host firmware that could be buggy, too, and simply sprinkle your most critical data structures with random bits, you wonder if these firmware engineers might have burn out or a drinking problem, especially since these junior guys only get to work on the cheaper entry level products, which are much harder to handle than when you've got everything fully under your own control. While M.2 2230 SSDs have been in some laptops, like Microsoft's Surface devices, for quite a bit now, they aren't nearly as ubiquitous in stores or online as physically larger drives, though it's not impossible to find them. At the very least, potential customers that can't find what they're looking for can know they're getting these drives through a reputable source.

What I really want is a local shared Steam cache on my 10Gbit LAN, only one copy of every game in a houshold with nearly 10 Steam devices of various kinds. We use the Quarch HD Programmable Power Module to gain a deeper understanding of power characteristics. Idle power consumption is an important aspect to consider, especially if you're looking for a laptop upgrade as even the best ultrabooks can have mediocre storage.

The more, the merrier.

It'd be like making a 5kg washing machine that only works if you put exactly 5kg of clothing in it, if you put 4 or 3 or 2 or 1 kg it just refuses to operate ... At 2TB for your Steam stash, at least you won't have to swap games in and out as often, which significantly helps to lessen the write burden.

You're after the best value for money: 1TB 2230 NVMe drives are simply better value for money than this 2TB drive right now. I guess even if the OS isn't really needed running, the OS will decide to put the SSD into sleep state and there is very little the SSD can do without risking to have its juice cut off, should it try to refuse.

Thank you!

But then perhaps, you'd never trust it with your data again, when you see how badly even firmware can be written =:-O It would be interesting to try testing this. Like, a decent SSD and controller should write initially to the pSLC cache, but if it's only at ~40 MB/s, the cache can then be immediately flushed to QLC and would perhaps never fill up (until the SSD is completely full). The problem is that writing even 100GB of data at 40 MB/s takes a while, about 40 minutes. I guess that would be the question: if write speeds are slow, like sub-100 MB/s, do the SSDs even use their pSLC caches, or do they just write straight to TLC/QLC NAND?Yup, it's at that point when you want to start reading the controller's source code.

Though if you fill up this drive's capacity, or throw a lot of big files at it at once without giving it time to write that to the slower QLC, it will drop dramatically to near hard drive levels of performance. You really need that pseudo SLC buffer to keep that QLC from taking the brunt of the write job.Note that with a 2TB SSD, the pSLC cache could be up to 500GB in size for a completely empty drive. So, if you could do sustained writes at max speed and fill that up, and then had to drain it at ~100 MB/s, it could take over 1.38 hours just to empty the pSLC to QLC. LOL. (Related: The drives take a while to recover in our Windows testing, unless you just wipe/format them.) You're chasing speed and capacity: this 2TB drive makes some sacrifices to hit that sort of capacity. A 1TB or smaller drive will usually offer a lot higher write speeds.