1TB SN850 vs 500GB P5 PLUS for boot drive

[TatamiMatt]

Hi All, just looking to know your opinion on which drive would be a faster boot and OS drive?

 

The exact drives in question:

 

SN850

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/PwNgXL/western-digital-black-sn850-1-tb-m2-2280-nvme-solid-state-drive-wds100t1xhe

 

P5 Plus

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/9XM48d/crucial-p5-plus-500-gb-m2-2280-pcie-40-x4-nvme-solid-state-drive-ct500p5pssd8

[Dedayog]

14 minutes ago, TatamiMatt said:

Hi All, just looking to know your opinion on which drive would be a faster boot and OS drive?

 

The exact drives in question:

 

SN850

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/PwNgXL/western-digital-black-sn850-1-tb-m2-2280-nvme-solid-state-drive-wds100t1xhe

 

P5 Plus

https://pcpartpicker.com/product/9XM48d/crucial-p5-plus-500-gb-m2-2280-pcie-40-x4-nvme-solid-state-drive-ct500p5pssd8

They're both 4x4, so theoretically they should be damn similar.  Real World booting?  Couldn't tell if your life depended on it. 

 

If they're the same price, get the 1TB for capacity.

[TatamiMatt]

6 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

They're both 4x4, so theoretically they should be damn similar.  Real World booting?  Couldn't tell if your life depended on it. 

 

If they're the same price, get the 1TB for capacity.

I own both already and am looking to reinstall windows due to an unrelated thing, just curious about the performance and latency, i get that itd be near enough unnoticable, but if i can just download the OS onto the faster drive while im already reinstalling then why not, no point leaving performance on the table no matter how little if it doesnt impede me in anyway

[Dedayog]

3 minutes ago, TatamiMatt said:

I own both already and am looking to reinstall windows due to an unrelated thing, just curious about the performance and latency, i get that itd be near enough unnoticable, but if i can just download the OS onto the faster drive while im already reinstalling then why not, no point leaving performance on the table no matter how little if it doesnt impede me in anyway

Then I don't know the miniscule benefit of one or the other.    Since they're both Gen 4 x4, you'd have to factor in DRAM, controller, etc.  I get what you're saying, just don't have that minute info.   Hope someone else can compare them better.

 

Not sure any minor performance can overcome 500GB extra room, unless you simply don't need the space either.  Or are installing both in the machine anyway?

[PDifolco]

35 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

They're both 4x4, so theoretically they should be damn similar.  Real World booting?  Couldn't tell if your life depended on it. 

 

If they're the same price, get the 1TB for capacity.

iirc both are pretty close in performance, so get the bigger one

I have one SN850, it's a good SSD, but can get toasty without heatsink

[TatamiMatt]

40 minutes ago, Dedayog said:

Then I don't know the miniscule benefit of one or the other.    Since they're both Gen 4 x4, you'd have to factor in DRAM, controller, etc.  I get what you're saying, just don't have that minute info.   Hope someone else can compare them better.

 

Not sure any minor performance can overcome 500GB extra room, unless you simply don't need the space either.  Or are installing both in the machine anyway?

Both are already actually in the machine, the 500gb running through the chipset and the 1tb running through the CPU. The 1tb also has better latency and IOPS, both are similar on the read/write front, the sn850 being faster for smaller due to the higher max R/W but for larger files the (disregarding size) P5 Plus edging out the SN850 i believe due to stronger sustained R/Ws but thats at the 15+ minute mark i think, The P5 Plus also having DRAM and the sn850 not having it was another consideration. Im leaning toward the SN850 due to higher size headroom, cpu vs chipset position and the fact i dont transfer a ton of huge files that will take 15+ mins, and the DRAM should be somewhat irrelevant for my use case.

 

15 minutes ago, PDifolco said:

iirc both are pretty close in performance, so get the bigger one

I have one SN850, it's a good SSD, but can get toasty without heatsink

My SN850 is the one with an integrated heatsink and i have plenty of airflow through my case so shouldnt be too big an issue, also own and have both in my pc atm anyway (see above)

 

Just wanted to double check my homework before commiting to one or the other

[kokosnh]

1 hour ago, TatamiMatt said:

The P5 Plus also having DRAM and the sn850 not having it was another consideration.

they both have DRAM, Both are good SSD. 
They should both run fine, SN850 1TB is faster, but it's not really a big difference.

I would just think what you are going to use them for, is it more convenient for you to have free 1TB SSD, and OS on separate 500GB SSD? 

I have intel optane 905p 960GB, and no difference in windows starting time, to my top PCIe 4.0 PNY CS3140. 

[TatamiMatt]

13 hours ago, kokosnh said:

they both have DRAM, Both are good SSD. 
They should both run fine, SN850 1TB is faster, but it's not really a big difference.

Thanks for the tip, did some googling and they actually both have 1gb of DRAM cache, the 1tb and 500gb drives, post cache though the sn850 has a write speed of 1050Mb/s whereas the P5 PLus has a higher sustained write speed of 1800Mb/s, but again i doubt ill be transferring enough big files regularly to overcome the extra speed the sn850 brings to the table and its position in regards to the cpu/chipset

[kokosnh]

4 hours ago, TatamiMatt said:

Thanks for the tip, did some googling and they actually both have 1gb of DRAM cache, the 1tb and 500gb drives, post cache though the sn850 has a write speed of 1050Mb/s whereas the P5 PLus has a higher sustained write speed of 1800Mb/s, but again i doubt ill be transferring enough big files regularly to overcome the extra speed the sn850 brings to the table and its position in regards to the cpu/chipset

Nope.

You have to cut it down by capacity.

 

 

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/wd-black-sn850-m-2-nvme-ssd-review/3

 

 

https://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/crucial-p5-plus-m2-nvme-ssd-review/3

 

You have to divide the 1TB version score by 2. As you have the 500GB version. 

And the 1TB versions score are better for sn850. 

 

[TatamiMatt]

19 hours ago, kokosnh said:

Nope.

You have to cut it down by capacity.

Yeah ive looked at the Tom's hardware pages, but both drives do have the above stated DRAM cache sizes (500gb p5 has 1gb of DRAM and 1tb sn850 has 1gb DRAM)

 

Though the sn850 does seem to outperform the P5 Plus is everything but 15min+ sustained R/W's