Top 8 best SSDs for 2024
By ForGeeks Now that solid state drives (SSDs) have become lower in price, their use in computers and devices is becoming a necessity. PlayStation 5 and Windows 11 consoles support Direct Storage technology, which allows games to load quickly, as does the Xbox Series X console when using a supported drive. PCs, meanwhile, offer high performance through the use of PCIexpress 4.0 and 5.0 bus. The Steam Deck handheld console also benefits from the use of SSDs for storing large game libraries.
If you’re looking to improve your internal storage or need an external storage solution, SSD will provide fast and reliable read and write speeds. Flash memory is used in these devices to store data, making them faster than traditional mechanical hard drives. However, not all solid state drives are the same. You’ll need one of the best SSDs for the fastest data transfer possible, and we’ve compiled the top best SSDs for 2024.
Solid State Drives (SSDs).
Best SSD — Samsung 990 Pro
The Samsung 990 Pro is the latest in Samsung’s lineup of high-end SSD drives and it is impressive. This drive builds on the strengths of the 980 Pro and offers high sequential read and write speeds of 7450MB/s and 6900MB/s respectively. This figure is limited by PCIe 4 speeds, but it is a significant improvement over the 980 Pro.
The SSD builds on the strengths of the 980 Pro.
This performance is enough for fast file sharing and game installation. In terms of general usage and gaming, the high IOPS (IOPS) for random reads and writes of 155000000 really help this drive stand out. It’s 9% higher than the 980 Pro, which shows that without taking advantage of the new PCIe generation, this drive is still fast. It’s great for those looking to optimize their PC for gaming with DirectStorage, or for those looking to upgrade their existing PlayStation 5 storage with something fast and powerful.
TeamGroup T-Force Z540 2TB
If you need the fastest SSD ever, the TeamGroup T-Force Cardea Zero Z540 2TB model — is the one to get. Incredible sustained read and write speeds of 12400MB/s and 11800MB/s respectively are unrivaled. The random read and write speeds are also impressive — 1400000 operations per second and 1500000 respectively.
Sustainable read and write speeds of 12400MB/s and 11800MB/s are unrivaled.
Although there aren’t many scenarios where such high performance would be needed, it’s nonetheless a useful feature that will help keep you ahead of any advances in DirectStorage gaming over the next few years. However, this drive will require a PCIe 5 interface to work properly, so make sure your motherboard supports it.
Samsung 980 Pro 500GB
The 980 Pro may no longer be Samsung’s flagship SSD, but it remains a top-of-the-line NVMe SSD drive nonetheless. With sustained read speeds of up to 7000MB/s and sustained write speeds of up to 5000MB/s, the 980 Pro is an SSD drive that takes full advantage of PCIe 4.0.
The 980 Pro is an SSD that takes full advantage of the PCIe 4.0 interface.
It’s important to note that it’s also PCIe 3.0 compatible, but the transfer speeds over PCIe 4.0 are twice as fast. The price point for this model is higher than some of its counterparts, but Samsung SSDs offer a great combination of high performance and reliability to ensure a long life for your SSD drive.
Samsung SSDs offer a great combination of high performance and reliability to ensure a long life for your SSD drive.
The 512GB model can be purchased at a lower price, but the price to performance ratio for the 1TB model will be much better. The 2TB model is more expensive, but offers better reliability due to a higher TBW (Total Bytes Written) rating. Overall, the 1TB model offers a great price to performance ratio. If you want one of the best SSDs on the market, this model is a good choice.
Crucial MX500 SATA 2TB
Although SATA connections are not as fast as today’s PCIe interfaces, drives with this type of connection can be much more affordable. If you need a lot of storage and don’t want to give up the benefits of SSDs, this Crucial drive provides as much as 2TB of storage at a fraction of the price of others.
The sustained read and write speeds are high for the SATA interface model, at 560MB/s and 510MB/s respectively. This model is equipped with power failure protection and also supports 256-bit AES encryption for security. You won’t get the highest performance from the Crucial MX500 SATA model, but this drive can hold a lot of data without emptying your wallet.
Western Digital Black AN1500 1TB
Western Digital Black SN850 — is an interesting SSD. It is a separate PCIe board that actually contains two Western Digital Black SSDs. Instead of addressing each drive separately, Western Digital has combined them into a RAID 0 array. This approach allows the drive to distribute data between the two drives, sharing the workload between them and achieving higher speeds.
This drive uses a PCIe version 3.0 interface. So if you have an older computer, the Western Digital Black SN850 drive will be a great solution to increase system performance over many other SSDs without having to upgrade your entire system. The sustained read speed is 6500MB/s, sustained write speed — 4100MB/s. This performance exceeds even the fastest PCIe version 3.0 SSDs.
Sustainable read speeds of 6,500MB/s are higher than even the fastest PCIe version 3.0 SSDs.
Corsair MP600 Pro LPX
There aren’t many SSD models on the market that can match the performance of the Corsair MP600 Pro LPX. It features a massive heatsink for efficient cooling and a whopping 8TB of storage capacity. Despite this large capacity, it delivers high performance with sustained read and write speeds of 7100MB/s and 5800MB/s respectively.
It’s also compatible with the PlayStation 5 game console, giving your system a huge amount of storage capacity, though it will require you to pay twice as much for it as the console itself. Overall, the drive works well with any desktop PC equipped with 4th generation PCIe or newer.
It’s also compatible with the PlayStation 5 game console, giving you a huge amount of storage for your system, even though you’ll need to pay twice as much as the console itself.
Sabrent Rocket 2230
If you’re looking to replace the SSD in a laptop or gaming system like Steam Deck, the 1TB Sabrent Rocket 2230 is a great choice. It’s compact enough to be easy to install, but still delivers excellent performance. It offers sustained read/write speeds of 4750MB/s and 4300MB/s respectively, and random speeds of — 450000 and 545000.
Sustained read/write speeds are 4750MB/s and 4300MB/s respectively, and random speeds are — 450000 and 545000.
These figures are noticeably lower than the highest-performing SSDs on the market, but they’re significantly better than those of the standard Steam Deck drive. You can also consider the 512GB model —it’s cheaper, but not only is it smaller, it’s also slower.
Seagate Storage Expansion Card for Xbox
The Seagate Storage Expansion solid state drive can’t be installed directly into a PC, but it can be used in an Xbox game console. The drive is the optimal choice for the Xbox Series X or Series S game console, providing an additional one terabyte of high-speed storage directly inside the game system. In addition, the drive is even easier to install by simply inserting it into the back of the console like a memory card.
Seagate’s SSD brings all the features of the Xbox gaming system, including faster boot times than external hard drives. It also supports Direct Storage technology, which is used in supported game projects, and Quick Resume, which lets you seamlessly switch between running games without losing game progress. Of course, performance isn’t as good as onboard storage, but it’s not a huge difference.
So you can’t get the same performance as onboard storage.
