Question Is there a problem with my SSD or USB-C port?

[apwood]

My laptop is a Dell Inspiron 7591 2n1, with a USB-A port supporting USB 3.1 Gen 1 and a USB-C/Thunderbolt 3 port supporting USB 3.1 Gen 2. I think that means the USB-A support should support speeds to 5Gbps and the USB-C should support up to 10 Gbps. Internally there is a M.2 NVME Windows 11 system drive, and an internal SATA drive (Western Digital WDS500G2B0A WD Blue 3D NAND Internal SSD 2.5 Inch SATA, 500 GB).

I'm testing an external Kingston XS1000 1TB SSD USB 3.2 Gen 2 Portable drive.

Here are the CrystalDiskMark results using the supplied usb-c cable:

Connected to UBS-C (USB 3.1 Gen2 / Thunderbolt 3 port)

Connected to UBS-A (USB 3.1 Gen1 port)

The SEQ Q8T1 results are as expected, with the connection via USB-C being as per the stated speeds for this SSD drive, and the connection via USB-A being just under half that.

What surprises me is the RND Q1T1 results. This drive is much faster on this benchmark via the slower USB-A port.

I'm getting much lower speeds in real-life file writes - probably as expected, but at least USB-C is always faster than USB-A.

However, for copying a large number of small files, the difference between USB-A and USB-C is small, and my Kingston XS-1000 is much slower for small files than my internal SATA SSD. So, this still begs the question, why is this Kingston XS1000 handling small files so unexpectedly slowly.

Here's the results of my real life tests (in Windows 11 64 bit):

16.8Gb multiple small files (4413 photos)
External SATA 151 Mb/s (via USB-C)
External SATA 135 Mb/s (via USB-A)
Internal SATA 226 Mb/s

24.8Gb one very large file
External SATA 430 Mb/s (via USB-C)
External SATA 306 Mb/s (via USB-A)
Internal SATA 330 Mb/s

15Gb (4 large files)
External SATA 415 Mb/s (via USB-C)
External SATA 295 Mb/s (via USB-A)
Internal SATA 394 Mb/s

Here are the CrystalDiskMark results for my internal SATA SSD:

Other posted results for this drive suggest the RND Q1T1 speeds for Kingston XS-1000 should be around 30Mb/s read and 80Mb/s write, similar my internal SATA SSD.

Is this drive OK - could it be faulty and in need of returning under the guarantee?
Could there be a fault with my laptop or its USB-C port?
Is it worth testing a USB 3.2/thunderbolt cable instead?

Or, do you think the above tests for small files / random read-writes are OK and nothing to worry about? Or, perhaps I'm misunderstanding something ...

 

[Lutfij]

Welcome to the forums, newcomer!

The results you've shown when connected to your Thunderbolt supporting port is in line with the data off of Kingston's product page;
https://www.kingston.com/en/ssd/xs1000-external
although that number is usually manipulated in order for the drive to look favorable to the consumer. They haven't stated which field in the read/wrote dpet they hand picked in order to post it on their product page.

There's this review of the drive though;
https://www.pcmag.com/reviews/kingston-xs1000-external-ssd

Just out of curiosity, have you hooked the drive to another platform, sans a laptop and seen if the speeds while on USB 3.1 Gen1 to see if the results are consistent across other systems?

 

[dwd999]

Or, do you think the above tests for small files / random read-writes are OK and nothing to worry about? Or, perhaps I'm misunderstanding something ...

Writing small files is always slower since the controller has to go back and forth between writing the file data and writing to the FAT and Directory data clusters. Its not as bad as the olden days when you could hear a mechanical drive's head going back and forth between the data area and the FAT and directory areas but it still takes extra time for the controller to go back and forth between the two.

 

[apwood]

Couldn't see anything about the random access / small file transfer speeds on the Kingston website - where is that? What makes me wonder is why it is slower on small files than my SATA 600 internal drive, which has a lower spec both for the drive and the interface, and why other people are getting more than 4x the speed for RND Q1T1 in their CrystalDiskMark tests of the same SSD. I only one other, very old lower spec laptop, but am getting a new laptop (with USB-C /Thunderbolt 4 port) that I'll be able to test on Thursday / Friday next week.