By Brady Betzel
It seems that the SSD drives are dropping in price by the hour. (This might be a slight over-exaggeration, but you understand what I mean.) Over the last year or so there has been a huge difference in pricing, including high-speed NVMe SSD drives. One of those is the highly touted Samsung EVO Plus NVMe line.
In this review, I am going to go over Samsung’s 500GB version of the 970 EVO Plus NVMe M.2 SSD drive. The Samsung 970 EVO Plus NVMe M.2 SSD drive comes in four sizes — 250GB, 500GB, 1TB, and 2TB — and retails (according to www.samsung.com) for $74.99, $119.99, $229.99 and $479.99, respectively. For what it’s worth, I really didn’t see much of price difference on other sites I visited, namely Amazon.com and Best Buy.
On paper, the EVO Plus line of drives can achieve speeds of up to 3,500MB/s read and 3,300MB/s write. Keep in mind that the lower the storage size the lower the read/write speeds will be. For instance, the EVO Plus 250GB SSD can still get up to 3,500MB/s in sequential read speeds, while the sequential write speeds dwindle down to max speeds of 2,300MB/s. Comparatively, the “standard” EVO line can get 3,400MB/s to 3,500MB/s sequential read speeds and 1,500MB/s sequential write speeds on the 250GB EVO SSD. The 500GB version costs just $89.99, but if you need more storage size, you will have to pay more.
There is another SSD to compare the 970 EVO Plus to, and that is the 970 Pro, which only comes in 512GB and 1TB sizes — costing around $169.99 and $349.99, respectively. While the Pro version has similar read speeds to the Plus (up to 3,500MB/s read) and actually slower write speeds (up to 2,700MB/s), the real ticket to admission for the Samsung 970 Pro is the Terabytes Written (TBW) warranty period. Samsung warranties the 970 line of drives for five years or Terabytes Written, whichever comes first. In the 500GB line of 970 drives, the “standard” and Plus 970 cover 300TBW, while the Pro covers a whopping 600TBW.
Samsung says its use of the latest V-NAND technology, in addition to its Phoenix controller, provides the highest speeds and power efficiency of the EVO NVMe drives. Essentially, V-NAND is a way to vertically stack memory instead of the previous method of stacking memory in a planar way. Stacking vertically allows for more memory in the same space in addition to longer life spans. You can read more about the Phoenix controller here.
If you are like me and want both a good warranty (or, really, faith in the product) and blazing speeds, check out the Samsung 970 EVO Plus line of drives. Great price point with almost all of the features as the Pro line. The 970 line of NVMe M.2 SSD drives fits the 2280 form factor (meaning 22mm x 80mm) and fits an M key-style interface. It’s important to understand what interface your SSD is compatible with: either M key (or M) or B key. Cards in the Samsung 970 EVO line are all M key. Most newer motherboards will have at least one if not two M.2 ports to plug drives into. You can also find PCIe adapters for under $20 or $30 on Amazon that will give you essentially the same read/write speeds. External USB 3.1 Gen 2, USB-C enclosures can also be found that will give you an easier way of replacing the drives when needed without having to open your case.
One really amazing way to use these newly lower-priced drives: When color correcting, editing, and/or performing VFX miracles in apps like Adobe Premiere Pro or Blackmagic Resolve, use NVMe drives for only cache, still stores, renders and/or optimized media. With the low cost of these NVMe M.2 drives, you might be able to include the price of one when charging a client and throw it on the shelf when done, complete with the project and media. Not only will you have a super-fast way to access the media, but you can easily get another one in the system when using an external drive.
Summing Up
In the end, the price points of the Samsung 970 EVO Plus NVMe M.2 drives are right in the sweet spot. There are, of course, competing drives that run a little bit cheaper, like the Western Digital Black SN750 NVMe SSDs (at around $99 for the 500GB model), but they come with a slightly slower read/write speed. So for my money, the Samsung 970 line of NVMe drives is a great combination of speed and value that can take your computer to the next level.
Brady Betzel is an Emmy-nominated online editor at Margarita Mix in Hollywood, working on shows like Life Below Zero and The Shop. He is also a member of the Producer’s Guild of America. You can email Brady at bradybetzel@gmail.com. Follow him on Twitter @allbetzroff.
