Corsair P64 64GB SSD Review

Conclusion

If anything, this review of the Corsair P64 SSD is easily the best example of why we do both synthetic and real world testing on drives. If you skipped the rest of the review in order to read the conclusion, this is one review where you will want to go back and really take a close look at the differences between synthetic and actual usage testing.

To our way of thinking, the synthetic testing did what it is meant to do: highlight weakness in the controller and / or firmware. This is because most of the differences we saw between the Corsair's Samsung controller and the one from Indilinx would go totally unnoticed by a user. As such this demonstrated how synthetics can make a mountain of a mole hill when it comes to actual performance differences. Real world testing on the other hand is great at picking out issues that would affect a consumer's perception of a product but is a poor way to gauge twchnological differences . On their own, neither is an optimal benchmarking solution, when combined they give a good understanding of what exactly is going on at the basic level of a Solid State Drive.

In the case of the P64 if we had done ONLY synthetic tests we would now be slamming this harder and faster than some in the US have been slamming Canadian health care. In quite a few tests, the P64 lags behind the competition so badly it looks more like a last generation device rather than one from a newer generation. Granted, the P64 hung in there and did end up putting down some good results here and there but they were far from what we were expecting from this Samsung-based drive.

Conversely, if we had only run real world tests we would have singing the P64's praise by saying how close it is to the best of the best and how a simple firmware could put it head and shoulders above the competition. This too is an unrealistic view of the P64, albeit on the overly optimistic side. The fact of the matter is the Samsung controller which is the heart and soul of this device has lower latency but is a less than optimal design that heavily relies on its purposely oversized cache.

The real saving grace of this drive is its price / performance ratio. Granted, for many of us 64GB isn't quite enough space for a primary OS drive but if you don't have a huge number of files (HD videos and the like), it should be enough. The true cost per GB coupled with the overall real-world performance of the P64 really does give it an edge when compared to many of the other SSDs on the market today. At this point, we couldn't really ask more of Corsair considering they are providing a perfect upgrade path for HDD users with a sub-$150CAD price tag. In addition, that $150 price tag puts many last-gen JMicron-based SSDs to shame while offering significantly higher performance numbers.

The Corsair P64 may not be the highest performing drive on the market today when it comes to synthetic benchmarks but it makes for a perfect OS drive considering how well it did in our real world tests. This, coupled with a drool-worthy price means it takes home our Dam Good Value Award.



Pros:
- Great real world performance
- Great value
- Great warranty and support
- Upgradeable firmware w/ promise of TRIM for Win 7 release
- ITGC included in this firmware


Cons:
- Controller relies heavily on its large cache
- Last gen synthetic benchmark results
- Labeling issues