Samsung 470 Series 256GB SSD Review

Samsung 470 Series 256GB SSD – MZ-5PA256/US

With just about every major technology company jumping on the solid state drive gravy train, it was only a matter of time before one landed on our desk with the Samsung brand name proudly displayed. After all, Samsung is no stranger to storage devices and their platter drives have enjoyed commercial success for some time now. Unlike some of the other SSD makers, Samsung has forged their path using their own components rather than taking the SandForce, Indilinx or JMicron route – the three most popular controllers which encompass the majority of consumer SSDs available today.

The big question is, can they put out a product that stands out from the crowd? Before we had the drive in hand, we couldn’t help but wonder how well they would compete with the drives already on the market. Forgoing the suspense, we’ll state up front that the 256GB Samsung 470 Series drive we received performed extremely well and stood tall with some of the best drives we’ve tested to date. Samsung lists the performance of the 256GB drive as 250MB/s reads and 220MB/s writes which is how they derived the naming convention with 470 being the sum of both metrics. Those are big performance numbers to match its equally large price tag of $486 for the 256GB drive.

While our sample drive arrived as a rather unassuming black plastic shell in a 2.5″ form factor and generic model stickers, the retail version is much more appealing with a brushed metal casing and orange accents. Samsung has three capacities available at 64GB, 128GB and 256GB and we’ve listed the specifications for each below. All carry a 3-year warranty and Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF) rate of 1.5 million hours. The drives do support TRIM and garbage collection which just about everyone is on the lookout for these days.

Samsung 470 Series Specifications:

Model	470 Series	470 Series	470 Series
Capacity	64GB	128GB	256GB
Form factor	2.5-Inch	2.5-Inch	2.5-Inch
Dimensions (HxWxL)	9.5×69.85×100 (mm)	9.5×69.85×100 (mm)	9.5×69.85×100 (mm)
Weight	Max 64g	Max 68g	Max 68g
Interface	Serial ATA 3.0Gbps	Serial ATA 3.0Gbps	Serial ATA 3.0Gbps
Sequential read	Up to 250 MB/sec	Up to 250 MB/sec	Up to 250 MB/sec
Sequential write	Up to 170 MB/sec	Up to 220 MB/sec	Up to 220 MB/sec
Random read	Up to 31,000 IOPS	Up to 31,000 IOPS	Up to 31,000 IOPS
Random write	Up to 11,000 IOPS	Up to 20,000 IOPS	Up to 21,000 IOPS
Active power use	0.24W	0.24W	0.24W
Idle power use	0.14W	0.14W	0.14W
Allowable voltage	5V 5%	5V 5%	5V 5%
TRIM support	YES	YES	YES
Reliability (MTBF)	1.5 million hours	1.5 million hours	1.5 million hours
Warranty	3 year (= 21.9TBW, 20GB@day)	3 year (= 21.9TBW, 20GB@day)	3 year (= 21.9TBW, 20GB@day)
Temperature	-55 to 95 (Non-Operating)	-55 to 95 (Non-Operating)	-55 to 95 (Non-Operating)
Humidity	5% to 95% (Non-Operating)	5% to 95% (Non-Operating)	5% to 95% (Non-Operating)
Vibration	Operating: Random 2.17Grms(5~700Hz) Non-Operating: Random 3.13Grms(5~800Hz) Swept sine: 20G peak @10~2KHz	Operating: Random 2.17Grms(5~700Hz) Non-Operating: Random 3.13Grms(5~800Hz) Swept sine: 20G peak @10~2KHz	Operating: Random 2.17Grms(5~700Hz) Non-Operating: Random 3.13Grms(5~800Hz) Swept sine: 20G peak @10~2KHz
Shock	1500G, duration 0.5ms, Half Sine Wave	1500G, duration 0.5ms, Half Sine Wave	1500G, duration 0.5ms, Half Sine Wave

We were a little surprised as to what we found we when opened up the shell to get a look at the guts of the drive. Intrigued? Let’s have a look!