SAMSUNG 990 EVO SSD 1TB, PCIe 5.0 x2 M.2 2280, Speeds Up-to 5,000MB/s, Upgrade Storage for PC/Laptops, HMB Technology and Intelligent Turbowrite (MZ-V9E1T0B/AM)[Canada Version]

I ordered this drive to add to my gaming desktop computer. I wanted both extra storage and faster speeds over my current Samsung 970 EVO drive. I didn't think I'd notice much of a difference, but I did. I only use this drive for my Steam Library and specifically for Starfield. There is a lot of loading in this game, so having a dedicated drive made a difference. The game loads several seconds faster then when it was on my 970 EVO, and that includes the in-game loading too. I'm able to move large files between the two drives at lightning speeds. Overall this drive performs very well. I'm getting Performance Benchmarks on Sequential Read of 3216 MB/s, Sequential Write of 2616 MB/s, Random Read 257567 IOPS, Random Write 196044 IOPS. Compared to my older 970 EVO which was Sequential Read 3060 MB/s, Sequential Write 1926 MB/s, Random Read 246582 IOPS, and 187988 IOPS. Overall, I'm super happy with this drive and it comes from a major name brand that I can trust for my data storage. Great job Samsung!

First, PCI-E gen 4 and 5 support in one drive mean it can do the same speed in 2 5.0 lanes as it does in 4 4.0 lanes, meaning as we go forward to newer CPUs and chipsets, this type of drive will transition well and use less resources to do it. The 5000 MB/s seems low given 10K+ drives exist, but that's the Sequential read speed, rated using ideal conditions. The GREAT majority of stuff we actually DO with computers uses far more Random Access, and those numbers are much lower pretty much across the board. This drive is in the top 3 fastest, hitting over 5000 MB/s in RANDOM reads. The practical upshot of this is - if you are moving a lot of big files, this drive will be fairly average and get toasted by the fastest drives out there, no question. It wont be SLOW, but it wont be able to move stuff around your PS5 at 7GB/s either. On the other hand, this will feel like the snappiest drive ever for an OS/data/programs drive. The random read and Overall System numbers in PC Mark are in the top 5 of all consumer M.2 drives out today, in the top 3 for pure random reads. This metric has traditionally been played down if its mentioned at all, because it is SO much lower than the Sequential Read numbers, but it is probably a far better indicator of how a system will "feel" when using the drive for actual work/play/GPs, and this one is extremely good at this. I have run the PC Mark suite a few times each on Intel 460, 570, and 790, with the 790 using PCI-E 5.0x2, with extremely consistent results. Easily the best system/general data drive for the price, and its not even a question at this point. (Feb 2024)

- Note: Crystalmark Scores are for External Drive usage over a standard USB3 C port, not internally on the machine - I've been a fan of Samsung SSD and NVME and use a few myself. When I signed up to review this one I knew it wasn't the fastest or best SSD possible, and thus couldn't be used in things like the PS5, but I did want to test it specifically as an external hard drive. Installing the SSD was pretty simple. If you haven't worked with M.2's before it's pretty much like working with a old Nintendo or super Nintendo cartridge and then just screw it in. Formatting the drive and getting it ready is system dependent, but on Windows it’s fairly quick. The drive was able to read and write data fairly quickly, but did notice that the external SSD enclosure I was using got pretty warm after a while. It hit over 110F using a laser temp reader when doing a big data dump to the drive. The CrystalMark scores are for using the drive externally running off a USB-C port on the laptop. I'm sure if the drive was installed internally on a proper M.2 it would hit the 5000mb/s as rated. In fact, I will probably end up installing it in my daughters PC as she is sporting a 256gig M.2 that's getting long in the tooth, and she's been having to uninstall games to get the latest Fortnite updates installing. Update : Installed it in the daughters Ryzen 5000 series pc, and was able to get a score of 3576.42 read and 2875.30 write using the m.2 of the board. It's an older b550 board but those rates are still pretty decent. Overall I'm happy with the drive. It's not the best performer compared to the PRO line from Samsung, but it worked well for the purpose I wanted it for. This drive would be a good data drive for games, or as an update for a kids pc. Sadly I do not suggest this drive for the PS5, though I did not test it in mine. It will work in a PS5, but you will experience a little more load time in some scenarios, and you might get hitches in games that actively and use the throughput of the NVME. If you do use it for the PS5, make sure to pick up a heatsink for it also.

I ordered this for my PS5, I wasn't sure it was going to work well because it doesn't have DRAM therefore it won't be able to take advantage of the gen 5 capabilities without the PS5 being able to use HMB like PC's otherwise would. But to my surprise once it was installed in the PS5, it identified and formatted the drive with zero issues. The only issue is that it doesn't have a heatsink, and therefore suffered from some throttling, this is just a small storage drive, and won't be played on too much, so I'm fine without having a heatsink for now, but will order one shortly. I was able to transfer the New COD Modern Warfare III's massive 177GBs to the new drive in about 65 seconds. And it did throttle towards the end of the transfer, but not by a lot. I also played the game for about an hour after the install, and suffered no performance loss, nor was I able to detect any sort of stuttering. This isn't the fastest m.2 out there but it is very efficient, and affordable. I see a lot of pre-built PC's coming stock with this, which is nice because normal stock capacity of pre-built m.2's range from 256-500gb, and the 990 EVO's lowest capacity is 1tb. I would recommend this for the OS on mini pc's and other compatible consoles for storage. I genuinely like this hard drive and think it's going to have staying power in the PC market for awhile.

I purchased this SSD to replace my laptop SSD. The SSD that I replaced was the Samsung EVO 970. The EVO consistently operated at 60 to 70 degrees Celsius. This is to hot for the life expected of the SSD. The EVO 990 operates at 40 to 43 degrees Celsius, a vast improvement. I expect it to outlast the life of the laptop. Great SSD, I recommend it highly.