Toshiba XG6 M.2 NVMe SSD Review: Higher Density and Improved Efficiency

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Why bother to review this model if consumers can't even buy it except in a pre-built system? How many people make their system purchase decisions based on the SSD inside? Outside of boutique stuff, how many OEMs actually list the SSD model in their specifications?

Plus, any future SSD design based off of this model won't likely have identical specs, so you'd have to retest it anyway.
 
Why is the Intel Optane 905P included on some benchmarks and not on others? It would be nice to have consistency throughout the review. Either have it in all of the benchmarks, or just don't include it at all.

I understand you may be including results from a previous test on the 905P that may not have had all of the same tests as this XG6. However, it's frustrating to me when I see it one benchmark (I do like that it's included), but then when I want to compare against it on another one, it's not there.

So I would say if you don't have it for all of the tests, just exclude it from all of them.
 


Thanks for the feedback, it is appreciated. Over the last few months we've changed our test regimen entirely to more accurately reflect real-world use cases, much of this due to reader feedback. We are still in a state of flux somewhat with the current line up of tests as we optimize the suite to focus on the things that matter most, and avoid things that don't. Reader feedback has a big impact on our decisions. In either case, the adjustments have led to a few devices not being included until we can complete backfill testing, but we'll work to rectify that.
 


Chris decided to pursue another opportunity, which is unfortunate but part of the business at times. Sean, who has years of experience testing and reviewing storage, has stepped into the role now.
 
"Optane's Earth Shattering Performance" - does it though?
It has low latency, sure. But it's transfer rates are that great are they?
Basically everything I've read about it is it's pretty good but not as good as the Sammy Pro.
 


The part where Optane drives shine is in QD1 (queue depth = 1; that is, only one transaction to complete). It hits top performance transfer-wise and remains consistent. If you think about it, all data transactions start off with the first one; so the faster you fulfill the first one, the faster you can fulfill the next one. Thus, you generally are fulfilling data requests as fast as they come in & keeping the queue low. The performance level remains high, and usually doesn't hit high queue depths (not including servers, which can have significant & varied loads; of course, and perhaps even more so, Optane drives will shine with servers).

SSDs generally rely on pseudo-SLC caching (small portion of overall storage capacity) to hit peak performance; however, that benefit is gone if the cache is filled up. Also, the max transfer rates of those SSDs are often only seen when the QD is in the QD32 range. So Optane drives should generally feel "snappier" than a regular SSD, and if you need more total transfer bandwith than one individual drive delivers, then you just add more Optane drives (like you would with almost any other storage solution).

Now, for most consumers, I would agree that they could be served just as well with a Samsung SSD as an Optane drive as generally consumers aren't generating much of a storage I/O load. But if you had to have the best, then Optane is the best right now. Personally, I am just waiting for these drives to come down in price (especially price!) and add more capacity. I can justify the price for servers, but it's harder to do so for a personal system.
 
Hi Sean,
Are you planning to move your test platform to Windows 10 anytime soon? Would be interesting to see the difference between Redstone 4(meltdown patch included) vs Redstone 3 vs Windows 8.1.
 

Hi. All benchmarks reflect performance with Win 10 Pro RS4 and spectre and meltdown patches enabled. The motherboard firmware is updated for it as well. From my testing, I've seen a reduction of about 10-15% QD1 4k read performance and about 40% reduction in 4K write performance with the updates in place.
 
"Toshiba measures performance when the data lands in the SLC cache...."
In other words, they publish specs for that small window where it runs like an actually good SSD and hope very few people notice that they are lying through their teeth.

I dislike ad-speak. Had to teach my daughter that 12 is not "3 times more" than 4. Which was the correct answer in math class, for the sake of the deity of your choice.
 
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