Hardware Bistro

Product: V+ 100 128GB
Manufacturer: Kingston
Supplied by: Kingston
Price: 238USD/RM709
Launch Date: Nov 2010

 

Kingston is not only the world leading memory vendor but also having the biggest piece of market share in term of shipment and volume. Besides memory and USB flash drive products, SSD is another upcoming hot product and today we are going to have a look on their improved SSD V+ drive; V+ 100 with enhanced garbage collection.

 

Company Profile

Kingston Technology Company, Inc. is the world's independent memory leader. Founded in 1987 with a single product offering, Kingston® now offers more than 2,000 memory products that support nearly every device that uses memory, from computers, servers and printers to MP3 players, digital cameras and cell phones.

With global headquarters in Fountain Valley, California, Kingston employs more than 4,500 people worldwide. Regarded as one of the "Best Companies to Work for in America" by Fortune magazine, Kingston's tenets of respect, loyalty, flexibility and integrity create an exemplary corporate culture.

 

Features

• Innovative - Uses MLC NAND flash memory components.
• Silent - Runs silent and cool with no moving mechanical parts.
• Shock Proof - No moving mechanical parts so the SSD handles rougher conditions.
• Supports S.M.A.R.T functions
• Guaranteed - 3 year legendary Kingston warranty, free tech support

 

Specifications

• Form Factor - 2.5"
• Interface - SATA 1.5 Gb/sec. and 3.0 Gb/sec
• Capacities* - 64GB, 96GB, 128GB, 256GB, 512GB
• Dimensions - 69.85 x 100 x 9.5 mm
• Weight - 128 - 151 grams
• Storage temperatures - -40 - 85°C
• Operating temperatures - 0 - 70°C
• Vibration operating - 2.7G
• Vibration non-operating - 20G
• Sequential Read Throughput** - 230MB/s
• Sequential Write Throughput** - 180MB/s
• PCMARK® Vantage HDD Suite Score+
64GB - 35,046
96GB - 34,971
128GB - 35,073
256GB - 34,795
512GB - 34,697
• Power specs - 3.6 W (TYP) Active / 0.05 W (TYP) Idle
• MTBF - 1,000,000 Hrs

 

Kingston SSDNow V+100 Drive Part Number:

SVP100S2/64G (stand-alone drive)
SVP100S2/96G (stand-alone drive)
SVP100S2/128G (stand-alone drive)
SVP100S2/256G (stand-alone drive)
SVP100S2/512G (stand-alone drive)
SVP100S2B/64G (upgrade bundle kit)
SVP100S2B/96G (upgrade bundle kit)
SVP100S2B/128G (upgrade bundle kit)
SVP100S2B/256G (upgrade bundle kit)
SVP100S2B/512G (upgrade bundle kit)

 

Package & Contents

 

It is our first time to receive a full retail package of Kingston SSD product. Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 (stand-alone kit) is packed in a sealed plastic container with eye-catching theme while a solid cardboard box is provided for upgrade bundle kit. 

 

Nothing else is shipped together with Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 except the SSD itself plus a short brief user manual. All the Kingston SSDs come with three years warranty with free tech support and this is same for Kingston SSDNow V+ 100.

 

A Closer Look on Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 128GB

Kingston has expanded their SSD portfolio and existing active series are E-Series, SSDNow S 100, SSDNow V+ 100, SSDNow V+ 100E, SSDNow v+ 180 and SSDNow V100. Each of these series has their own purpose of existence like SSDNow V+ 100 is ideal for extreme performance result.

 

In term of physical layout of Kingston SSDNow V+ 100, it has no different with other Kingston 2.5" SSDs; grey chassis with 69.85 x 100 x 9.5 mm and 140 grams. Available models of Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 are 64GB, 96GB, 128GB, 256GB and 512GB where 96GB is the newly added capacity.

 

The sequential read and write throughputs of Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 are 230MB/s and 180MB/s. These read and write speeds are quite good for SATA II SSD but we are more looking forward to test out Kingston SSD with SATA III interface; could easily reach up to 500Mbps for read/write speeds.

 

Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 is having SATA II interface but it is also compatible with SATA I and SATA III controllers but speed will be limited. Unlike the earlier version of SSD, Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 does not come with USB port or else it could act as an portable storage without any additional enclosure.

 

Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 comes with aluminum chassis which is good for heat dissipation with reasonable cost. Besides that Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 is also equipped with a thick adhesive thermal pad which is used to further enhance the heat dissipation more effectively.

 

Toshiba T6UG1XBG comes with enhanced garbage collection and the "Always On" garbage collection function allows SSD to be Optimized in both TRIM and non-TRIM supported OS. Besides that this new Kingston SSDNow V+100 offers 25% performance increase than previous version.

 

Micron OKA17 128MB buffer chip is also added to work together with the Toshiba controller to improve the SSD's performance. Eight units of Toshiba branded TH58NVG7D7EBAK2 MLC flash chips are used on Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 which is non-volatile NAND flash memory.

 

Same with other Kingston SSD products, upgrade bundle kit is also available for Kingston SSDNow V+ 100. However Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 does not only come with either desktop or notebook kit but both of them; desktop kit + SATA/power cables, external enclosure + USB cable and clone software.

Here is the chart to assist you to have better understanding about the Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 and Kingston SSDNow V 100. Basically Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 is having slower speed for both read and write performance which could be due to the different SSD controller.

Here are some of the performance comparison between traditional HDDs (5400RPM & 7200RPM) and Kingston SSDNow drives (V 100 & V+ 100); lower is better. As you can see, there are major improvements for SSD over traditional HDDs especially with full encryption with TrueCrypt.

This table further explains the advantages of Kingston SSDNow drive over traditional HDD. In short SSD is much better in all the aspects; reliability, performance, durability as well as power consumption; the only disadvantage of SSD is its extremely costly price.

 

Installation, Testing & Performance

 

We have installed Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 on our rig with the help of Icy Dock MB994SP-4S internal quad 2.5" HDD rack. Basically there is no tedious setup in our test bed environment; just plug and play the Kingston SSDNow V+ 100. Upgrade bundle kit could be better choice for certain users; just playing additional small amount of money. 

 

Test Bed

Processor: Intel Core 2 Duo E8300 @ 2.83GHz
Motherboard: Gigabyte GA-EP45-DS3/Gigabyte G31M-ES2L
Heatsink: Noctua NH-C14
Memory: Kingston HyperX 4GB DDR2 8500
Hard Drive: 250GB 7200RPM 8MB Seagate
Graphic Card: Galaxy GeForce GTX260+
PCIe: Aten IC320U USB 3.0
Casing: In Win Maelstorm
HDD Cage: Icy Dock MB994SP-4S
PSU: OCZ ZX 850W
Optical Drive: HLDS DVD RW +/-
Controller: Aerocool Touch 2000
Monitor: Dell 22" Wide Screen LCD
Speaker: Edifier R501
Mouse: SteelSeries Ikari Laser
Mouse Pad: SteelSeries QcK+
HeadSet: SteelSeries 3H
Router: TRENDnet TEW-639GR
Operating System: Window XP Pro SP2/Win 7 HP
Ambient Temperature: 27 Degree Celsius

Performance is one of the important factors when getting an expensive SSD instead of traditional HDD. We have tested Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 with one of the famous and popular storage benchmarking tools; CrystalDiskMark. The sequence read and write results that we have obtained are quite accurate according to its specifications but its performance is slightly lower than what we have obtained on our Kingston V 100 SSD review although both of them are having similar price tags. However Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 is having better feature like "always on" garbage collection feature to cleans redundant data for preventing performance degradation and maintaining the drive over its life cycle. Other important factors when considering SSD instead of traditional HDD will be noiseless, lower power consumption and reliable performance; Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 is able to deliver all these aspects without any doubt throughout our test. 

 

Verdicts

Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 is newly launched in Nov 2010 with new features like 'always on' garbage collection feature, greater performance and of course better pricing. Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 is able to deliver decent performance which is definitely value with its price and its suggested retail price has been dropped from 390USD to roughly 230USD in some online store hence if you are looking for a SSD to replace your traditional HDD then it is a good time to grab one although the SSD's price is always been revised/dropped. Besides that Kingston is also offering upgrade bundle kit for Kingston SSDNow V+ 100 which comes with additional desktop and notebook mounting accessories for those need hassle-free setup.

Pros:

+ Decent read/write performance
+ Decent read/write performance
+ Affordable MLC NAND flash
+ Noiseless operation
+ Shock proof
+ Low power consumption
+ 3 year legendary warranty
+ Upgrade bundle kit is available

Cons:

- Costly

 

Thanks to Kingston for providing this sample for us to review.

 

 

 

 

Only registered users may post a comment.

There are currently no user submitted comments.