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Testing & Methodology
We suspect that we tested the 480GB HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD a little differently than a lot of review sites. We tested the 480GB HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD two ways; with and without an operating system on it. We also suspect that a lot of testers turned off all background programs and ran with no GPU on a lot of X97 boards using the built-in Intel HD graphics included on the CPU.
Those scenarios aren’t very similar to real life; you don’t spring $480 on a drive to sit around and bench it in a machine with no GPU and just leave the drive empty because it might produce prettier benchmark numbers. Most end users are going to load an operating system, boot from the drive, have a massive enthusiast GPU in the primary PCIe slot and Nerd Commander forbid, a virus scanner running while you look for that sweet head shot on a less well-equipped player. To that end, we tested with a fully operational operating system with virus scanner (Norton) running, an NVIDIA GTX 960 in the primary PCIe slot and the 480GB HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD empty. We ran the full spectrum of tests on the empty drive, then cloned the operating system drive onto the 480GB HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD so that the tests would be run from the same operating system environment.
No special tweaks were done to Windows, no firewalls turned off, no GPU’s removed, no Windows background tasks disabled to obtain better benchmark numbers. We loaded Windows 8.1 off the original disk, updated Windows 8.1 completely, downloaded the latest drivers and BIOS for the Asus X99 Deluxe and completely updated all drivers. We then loaded all the testing software onto the test rig, fired up a good, solid 4.3 GHz OC and ran stability tests for an hour. After all the updating, OCing and testing, we loaded a full-blown Norton Internet Security suite with default options. We also loaded all the utilities from the Asus X99 Deluxe’s support CD or the most updated version from ASUS directly.
We have nothing else like the Kingston Predator drive at this time. There are a couple of OEM, hard-to-get M.2 drives that rival the speed, but those are in notebooks and not commercially available to the public. Since that is the case, we will be doing a standalone review on the 480GB HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD.
X99 Test Rig
Test Rig
| Test Rig “Hexzilla” |
|
| Case Type | SilverStone Raven SST-RV01B-W |
| CPU | Intel Haswell E 5820k 4.3GHz |
| Motherboard | ASUS X99 Deluxe |
| Ram | Kingston Fury 32GB 2400MHz (15 – 15 -15) |
| CPU Cooler | SilverStone Tundra TD03-E |
| Hard Drives | 480GB HyperX Predator M.2 PCIe SSD 2 x Crucial MX 100 SSD 1 x Two TB Seagate Platter Storage Drive |
| Optical | ASUS Quiet Trac BR Liteon DVD Burner |
| GPU | EVGA GTX 960 SSC |
| Case Fans | 2 X 180mm 700 RPM 18dBA 1 x 120mm 950 RPM 18dBA |
| Docking Stations | None |
| Testing PSU | SilverStone 1500W |
| Legacy | None |
| Mouse | Razer Lachesis |
| Keyboard | Razer BlackWidow Chroma |
| Any Attempt Copy This System Configuration May Lead to Bankruptcy |
|
CrystalDiskInfo Report
The Samsung XP941 is commercially available! You don’t know what you’re talking about. Moreover the Plextor M6E doesn’t quite give this a run for its money but in most practical situations you’re not going to see much difference.
The Samsung XP941 is not the same speed drive and substantially slower ergo my statements hold true, The XP941 runs at max 1GB/s and 800MB/s a second read. As mentioned the Plextor M6E is also substantially slower and close to impossible to get. Intel now has a drive that smokes the Kingston drive but you better believe it will smoke Kingston’s price as well.
why everyone is testing only the 480gb version? i did not find not a single review of the 256gb version on the internet