There is no denying that a lot of enthusiasts who loved the MX200 would really have preferred to have seen the MX300 make use of MLC NAND and not TLC NAND. This is because planar (aka 2D) TLC NAND was fragile, slow, and got a much deserved reputation for only being fit for entry level ‘cost is everything’ solid state drive series. Above all else, the MX300 show that 3D NAND is an entirely new ballgame with entirely new standards upon which it should be judged.
Throughout testing the MX300 – in and out of RAID we might add – did post numbers that were bloody impressive. Some may argue this is simply because the Marvell controller makes use of a Pseudo-SLC setup in which a portion of the NAND is not three bit capable but one. This may indeed be the case, and does boost performance higher than it normally would be, the fact remains that even when this ‘buffer’ is exhausted the NAND is still pretty peppy.
More importantly by further lowering the overall price consumers can easily afford larger drives than ever before. This means not only more room for storage, but a larger SLC-cache buffer. So much so that the average consumer will never exhaust the 1050GB MX300’s write buffer before it has a chance to empty it. This is doubly so when dealing with two 1050GB SSDs!
To be honest it this is reduction of price per Gigabyte that makes the MX300 so impressive. After all, ‘vale’ is simply a judgement call based upon a fairly simple equation = performance/ cost. When the cost side of the equation is so low value threshold is equally low. Make no mistake, this drive is not just a good value because it is inexpensive but because the overall abilities of this drive are just that good. Onboard capacitors for data loss protection, one of the best hassle free warranties in industry, superb drive write durability, and yes excellent performance, all combine to create a near perfect storm.
As such we strongly recommend consumers look past the ‘TLC’ part of the specifications page and look at the overall value the MX300 in general and the 1050GB capacity version in specific have to offer. When you do that you may just be amazed at what Crucial has been able to do in a single generation.
