This is a basic performance review of the MSI Spatium M390 NVME M.2 drive coming in with 1TB of storage space. The article provides some information and data on how the drive performs under various programs like CrystalDiskMark, AS SSD, ATTO Disk Bench, and more.
NVME and SATA SSD’s have really dropped in price over the years with even sub-$0.05/GB recently for good non-DRAM models.* Many people have shied away from DRAM-less drives, especially for the system or boot drive. But DRAM-less SSD/NVME’s have really progressed over the years.
Note: I am not well versed in disk drives or much of the software used to test them. So I won’t be able to add much beyond the results. If there is any information I have wrong please let me know.
* I actually very recently got a nice deal on a Neo Forza eSports NFP075 512GB M.2 NVME SSD which has a DRAM cache for about $32 making it just a touch over $0.06 per GB. I also have the performance numbers for that drive which I plan to upload soon.
CrystalDiskInfo 8.17.6×64
HMB: An Important Feature for DRAM-less SSDs
One of the bigger advancements that have really helped the budget NVME (Non-Volatile Memory Express) SSD market is a feature called: Host Memory Buffer or HMB. HMB is a technique added to the NVME 1.2 spec and Windows 10 Update 1703 (of course supported on Linux as well) that makes it possible to store the Logical To Physical (L2P) lookup table into the computers standard system ram instead of a DRAM cache or NAND flash, which helps alleviate a bottleneck with DRAM-less controllers. Basically making it faster to keep track of where the data is located on the drive by using a small pool of the system’s host memory (for instance DDR3 or DDR4) instead of NAND flash (or an on board DRAM cache if one was present) which also reduces NAND wear. On boot up the SSD will request a small allocation of host memory to store the L2P tables and on shutdown will store them in flash memory. If you’re interested in learning more about this feature you can check out this webpage.
System Configuration and Setup
| Feature | Specification |
|---|---|
| Processor | Intel Core i3-12100f (Golden Cove Cores; Alder Lake Platform) 4C/8T |
| Motherboard | Asrock B660 RS Pro (LGA1700) |
| Memory | 2 x 8 GB Corsair Vengeance 3000 MHz 15-17-17-35 Timings 1.35v |
| Video Card | MSI Radeon RX 6600 Mech2x 8GB |
| System Drive | 1TB Neo Forza NFP035 NVME M.2 SSD |
| Operating System | Microsoft Windows 10 Update 21H2 |
| MSI Spatium M390 Slot Configuration | Installed in PCIe 4.0 M.2 x4 Lanes Slot |
The host system is a good, up to date Alder Lake setup. It uses what’s probably the current best bang for the buck budget CPU (and has been since release) in the Core I3 12100f with 4 cores and 8 threads. The system uses a B660 Asrock motherboard that cost about $105 and 2 x 8 GB sticks of DDR 4 3000 MHz ram. The boot/operating system drive at the time of testing was using a Neo Forza NFP035 NVME M.2 SSD which I actually have the performance numbers on and will have it’s own article in the future. I afterwards made the Spatium the OS or boot drive which is for good reason after you see the performance numbers for both.
The most important computer spec for performance with the NVME drive is the M.2 slot you use. For this build I used a PCI Express 4.0 M.2 slot linked from the processor SOC that automatically negotiates and communicates using the PCI Express 3.0 protocol with all 4 lanes that the drive supports. So the Spatium is running at it’s full interface speed capability.
| Feature | Specification |
|---|---|
| Model | SPATIUM M390 NVMe M.2 |
| Capacity | 1 TB |
| SSD Controller | PHISON E15T |
| Flash Memory | 3D NAND |
| Form Factor | 2280 M.2 |
| Interface | PCIe Gen3x4, NVMe 1.4 |
| Dimensions | 80.00mm (L) x 22.00mm (W) x 2.15mm (H) |
| Sequential Read | up to 3300 (MB/s) |
| Sequential Write | up to 3000 (MB/s) |
| Random Read 4KB | up to 420,000 (IOPS) |
| Random Write 4KB | up to 550,000 (IOPS) |
| Maximum Operating Power | 4.0 Watts |
| Idle Power PS3 | 30 mWatts |
| Terabytes Written (Maximum) | 400 (TBW) |
| Mean Time Between Failure: (MTBF) | Up to 1,500,000 Hours |
| Limited Warranty | 5 Years, or the coverage for the maximum TBW as stated, whichever comes first. |
| Advanced Features | TRIM (Performance Optimization, OS support required) SMART (Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology) LDPC (Low Density Parity Check) ECC Algorithm End to End Data Path Protection APST (Autonomous Power State Transition) Pyrite (Encryption, Data Security) |
| Release Date | September 24, 2021 |
| Prices ($USD) | MSRP: $109 I Paid: $63.99 New |
Unlike many of the other NVME drives I’ve worked with this drive uses the the v1.4 NVME specification and not v1.3. If interested you can click here to check out the changes/additions for v1.4.
It also uses the Phison E15T controller and according to it’s claimed performance it looks to push 4 Lane PCIe 3.0 pretty close to it’s limits with 3300 MB/s Reads and 3000 MB/s Writes.
From what I saw mentioned on another site the drive looks to have an MSRP price of $109 USD. I actually got mine in September from Woot.com for $64 shipped brand new. As you will see from the performance results, it is a very good performing drive that I got for a very good price.
Benchmark Performance Results
CrystalDiskMark 8.0.4 x64
In the very first test you can see the Spatium M390 living up to its advertised transfer rate. It’s getting 3400 MB/s in Reads and not far from 3300 MB/s in Writes using sequential 1 MB data transfers. The 4K transfers are very good as well.
Anvil’s Storage Utilities 1.1.0
I am not familiar with this test. So I do not know the type of data used and so on. As far as Sequential transfers are concerned, the drive put up 2.5 GB/s Reads and 2.5 GB/s Writes.
AS SSD 2.0.7316
AS SSD is a well known storage benchmark utility that has been around for many years. From what I recall this program uses all uncompressible data. I did have a fairly hard time getting it to give consistent results, especially for 4K results but settled on run three. The Sequential rates are 2.66 GB/s Reads and 2.15 GB/s Writes.
AJA System Test 2.1.0.262
This is another application I am not familiar with. This tool appears to center around video data performance. Both the Reads and the Writes got over 2.8 GB/s in transfer rates.
ATTO Disk Benchmark 4.01.0f1
The results for ATTO are a little different than I kind of expected. The Write transfer rates are around 3.08 GB/s which is a touch better than advertised and much better than the Reads. But the Read speeds are on the low side. They are more than a 1.0 GB/s below their advertised rates of 3.3 GB/s.
TxBENCH 0.98 Beta
The drive performs very good under this application. It’s not far from it’s advertised Read transfer rate and easily meets the advertised Write transfer rates. All in all it performs very well.
I’m not all that knowledgeable with SSDs and most of the programs I used for testing. I provided the tests results so you can get an overview yourself of how the drive performs in the various data sets tested. For most people, especially when it comes to the boot/OS drive 4K results would be a very important metric to go by.
From the benchmark results it is definitely one of the better DRAM-less drives. It really is a very good drive and if you can get it close to the $64 price I paid it’s one of the best bang for the buck SSDs you can get.