Samsung 990 EVO Plus NVMe SSD Review: Great Performance at a Great Price

Samsung 990 EVO Plus NVMe SSD Review: Take into account both speed and cost-effectiveness

Samsung's latest 990 EVO Plus M.2 NVMe SSD is a hybrid design and is compatible with PCIe 5.0 x2 and 4.0 x4 interfaces, providing excellent performance at a better price. This hard drive is suitable for desktop and laptop computers.

Samsung 990 EVO Plus: 9/10 Original price $110, current price $80, saving $30

This hard drive has read and write speeds up to 7250MB/s and 6300MB/s respectively, and is compatible with PCIe 5.0 x2 and PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 storage slots. It doesn't come with a heat sink, but it doesn't need it in most cases. It offers three storage capacity options: 1TB, 2TB and 4TB, suitable for various computer configurations.

Pros and disadvantages:

• Advantages: Compatible with PCIe 5.0 x2 and PCIe 4.0 x4; fast and stable read and write speeds; multiple storage capacity is available.
• Disadvantages: Want to see capacity options less than 1TB to meet stricter budget requirements.

Price and purchase channels:

The retail price of Samsung 990 EVO Plus NVMe SSD is: 1TB-$84.99, 2TB-$139.99, 4TB-$269.99.

Specification parameters:

• Storage capacity: 1TB, 2TB, 4TB
• Interface: M.2 (2280)
• Brand: Samsung
• Transfer speed: read 7250MB/s, write 6300MB/s
• TBW: 1200
• DRAM: HMB (Host Memory Buffer)

Full-speed transmission without PCIe 5.0

While PCIe 5.0 is the latest storage standard, the Samsung 990 EVO Plus can reach its maximum speed without PCIe 5.0. In fact, PCIe 5.0 x4 is mostly redundant for storage.

990 EVO Plus supports PCIe 5.0, but is limited to x2, which gives it the same throughput capability as the PCIe 4.0 x4 hard drive. This means that no matter whether your system is PCIe 5 or PCIe 4, you can take advantage of the speeds that the 990 EVO Plus offers.

Samsung makes this hard drive compatible with PCIe 5.0 x2 and PCIe 4.0 x4 slots, which makes it more versatile and can provide high-speed transmission for a variety of systems. Additionally, PCIe 5 systems using expansion cards can install more of these hard drives on each channel while still enjoying full-speed data transfer.

Multiple storage capacity options to meet different needs

Samsung offers a wide range of storage capacity options from 1TB to 4TB, and you can choose the right capacity according to your computer configuration and budget.

Today, the 1TB NVMe SSD read/write speed is over 10 times that of SATA hard drives, and the price is only $85. Whether you are building a budget computer or a high-end system, the 990 EVO Plus can easily meet your needs.

However, I hope Samsung will offer a smaller storage capacity option. If there is a 512GB version that costs half the price of the 1TB version, it will be easier for those who are reluctant to spend nearly $100 to buy a storage hard drive.

990 EVO Plus delivers reliable actual performance

Let's take a look at the actual performance of this hard drive.

Samsung promotes its "sequential read/write speeds up to 7250/6300MB/s", which almost reached this speed in my tests. Using a 2TB hard drive, I used CrystalDiskMark 8 to measure the read speed is 7040MB/s and the write speed is 6065MB/s. This is completely within acceptable range for this hard drive, and it can easily reach the speed that Samsung advertises based on cooling, load and other factors.

This read/write performance makes it ideal for all use cases. Whether you are a video or photo editor, gamer, programmer or average user, the 990 EVO Plus won't make you feel short of speed. In fact, I have a PCIe 5.0 SSD with a transfer speed of 12400MB/s, but I found the actual performance difference between the 990 EVO Plus and the high-end PCIe 5.0 x4 hard drive is small.

I also like that it doesn't require a heatsink, although many motherboards now have heatsinks built-in. The hard drive is able to maintain stable performance under repeated tests and loads, although adding some form of cooling device is not a bad thing for hard drive life.

Anyway, this hard drive can handle any tasks I have assigned it. I use it to do video editing, photo editing and 4K gaming on my desktop and it does everything I ask it to do easily.

One thing I like about modern NVMe storage is that storage is hardly a bottleneck. In the past, you would hear the sound of mechanical hard drives running, and you would feel the slowness of data transmission speed. However, with modern NVMe, especially PCIe 4.0 x4 and PCIe 5.0 x2, it just -- works. Storage moves data at an astonishing speed, which was unimaginable eight years ago.

Is it worth buying the Samsung 990 EVO Plus?

Overall, I was impressed by the Samsung 990 EVO Plus SSD. It offers ample storage space and stable speed at a reasonable price. While there are cheaper hard drives on the market, no (from well-known manufacturers) can offer similar performance at significantly lower prices.

While I'm usually a Western Digital fan when it comes to storage, the Samsung 990 EVO Plus has been recognized by me for NVMe SSDs on desktops or laptops. In fact, the 4TB model is very competitive in price and if I end up upgrading my desktop and adding storage space, it will be one of the hard drives I'm considering buying.

Samsung 990 EVO Plus: 9/10 Original price $110, current price $80, saving $30

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