E21

May 15, 2023

AORUS Gen 4 5000E SSD 1TB actual measurement GIGABYTE launched the new AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB, which belongs to the latest mainstream Gen4 model, replacing the old AORUS NVMe Gen4 SSDz, using the PHISON E21 controller with Micron 176 Layers 3D TLC NAND Layers with stronger performance, the 1TB version provides up to 5,000MB/s Read, 4,600MB/s, 4K random read and write can reach up to 800K IOPS level, and provide a 28% SLC cache configuration on the entire disk, which greatly reduces the chance of SSD slowdown. The 1TB version is priced at HK$559, and the manufacturer provides a maximum of 5 years warranty. Received the AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB version sent by GIGABYTE for testing. AORUS LOGO and model number were printed on the front of the black packaging box, and multi-language instructions, speed specifications, and regulatory requirements of different countries were written on the back of the black box. Made In was printed on the EAN Lable. Taiwan. AORUS Gen4 5000E 2TB version model is AG450E1T for M.2 2280 Form Factor, PCI Express 4.0 x 4 transmission interface, supports NVMe 1.4 transmission specification, 1TB total writing capacity reaches 600 TBW, MTBF mean time between failures reaches 1,500,000 hours, standby The power consumption is about 20nW, and the load power consumption is 4.3W. PHISON PS5021-E21 + Micron B47R particles It adopts PHISON PS5021-E21 Gen 4 main controller, focuses on the mainstream market, DRAMless design, uses 12nm process, built-in 32bit ARM Cortex R5 processor, has 4 Channels, 16CE data transmission channels, supports up to 1,600MT/s 3D TLC NAND particles, bringing 5GB/s speed and 800K IOPS performance, The NAND Flash uses Micron 96 Layers 3D TLC (B27B) particles, and the AORUS Gen4 7300 SSD is replaced with Micron IA7BG94AYA 3D TLC NAND (B47R) FortisFlash particles with higher performance, which has up to 176 layers, and its read and write delay performance has been improved. About 35%, this aspect is most obviously reflected in the IOPS, the writing speed is also significantly enhanced, and the writing life is also increased by 25%. Adopt DRAMless design Many people will misunderstand the purpose of DRAM Cache. It is mainly used to store the FTL logic-physical mapping table, and at the same time, temporarily store the fine data to be written in DRAM, and wait for a page to be written to the NAND particles at one time to improve IOPS. Performance, and DRAM cache can be used to do garbage collection and wear leveling. Without DRAM Cache, the FTL table must be stored in NAND Flash. Although the cost is reduced, the speed will be slower. Since continuous writing will not use DRAM Cache, so The difference with or without DRAM Cache is mainly in IOPS performance and response time. However, NVMe has added Host Memory Buffer (HMB) technology since version 1.2. In Windows 10 / 11 operating systems, PCIe protocol can be used to borrow part of the system memory as Cache for storing FTL logical-physical mapping table and fragment The data to be written is temporarily stored to improve the performance of DRAMless SSD in terms of IOPS. Usually, 64MB to 128MB of capacity is borrowed. The memory called by this part will intelligently coordinate the data exchange between the host CPU and SSD according to the read and write conditions. In fact, everyone has a bad impression of DRAMless SSD. The main reason is that the performance of the main controller of early DRAMless SSD is too poor, and it does not support HMB acceleration technology. In fact, when DRAMless starts HMB acceleration, the performance is not as good as that of real DRAM Cache, but it will definitely not lose too much. ugly. If you want to test the difference in performance with and without HMB, you can make changes in the Registry on Windows 10/11: In HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINESYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlStorPort, create a new DWORD value named HMBAllocationPolicy, A setting of 0 disables HMB. Set to 1 to enable and allocate the minimum value allowed by the device Set to 2 to enable and 1 to assign the maximum expected by the device Set to 3 to enable and dynamically adjust according to SSD usage testing platform︰ RAM︰G.SKILL TridentZ DDR5-6000 CL30 32GB Kit SSD：AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB OS︰Windows 11 Professional 22H2 ATTO Disk Benchmark test: ATTO Disk Benchmark is a disk performance testing tool launched by ATTO. This test uses a data size of 256MB, and increases the data size to 64MB in multiples of 0.5K, 1K, and 2K to test the impact of different file sizes on the speed of disk writing. , and the test results are expressed in columnar graphs. It uses sequential writing to test the best read and write capabilities of the disk, which is the theoretical value benchmark test that marks the highest performance of products in the industry. According to the test results, the maximum read speed of the AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB version is about 4.54GB/s, and the write speed is 4.69GB/s. CrystalDiskMark test: CrystalDiskMark is a set of disk test programs developed by Hiyohiyo, a Japanese. It provides continuous disk read and write speed tests and 4K random multiplex read and write performance tests with different queue depths (Queue Depth). Tested with CrystalDiskMark version 8.0.4, the sequential read and write speeds of AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB version Q8T1 are 5,063.66 MB/s Read, 4,620.79 MB/s Write; the sequential read and write speeds of Q1T1 are 3078.47 MB/s Read, 4,627.34 MB/s s Write; 4K Q32T1 random multitasking read and write speeds are 1,049.64 MB/s Read and 721.96 MB/s Write; 4K Q1T1 random multitasking read and write speeds are 91.96 MB/s Read and 473.63 MB/s Write. AS SSD Benchmark test: AS SSD Benchmark is also one of the main benchmarks for testing SSDs in the current industry. On the premise of not using system memory acceleration, it tests the read and write performance and speed of SSDs in all aspects by measuring the reading and writing of large files of 1GB. The performance benchmark score of AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB version in AS SSD Benchmark is 7771, of which the read performance score is 2,535, the write performance score is 3,907, and the 4K random read and write performance with a queue depth value of 64 is 2,017.92 MB/s Read and 3,16.36 MB/s Write. Copy-Benchmark is set up to simulate file copying in different situations. In the “ISO” test, two large ISO image files will be simulated to be copied to the test target; in the “Program” test, a large number of random-sized files will be written. Fragmented files, simulating a typical program folder usually has many small files; in the “Game” test, a large file and a small number of fragmented files are written, simulating the game folder usually contains a large game body file and some small Material files, etc. The results show that the simulated copying speed of the ISO image file reaches 2,572.20 MB/s, the simulated copying speed of the typical program folder is 1,940.32 MB/s, and the simulated copying speed of the game folder is also 2,800.03 MB/s. Anvil’s Storage Utilities Test: Anvil’s Storage Benchmark is a set of professional disk performance testing software. It has a built-in IO Threaded test program, which can analyze the IO performance of multitasking read, write, and mixed read and write of a disk with a queue depth of 4K 32. In terms of IOPS performance, 4K QD128 Read recorded 592,902.1 IOPS, 4K QD64 Write recorded 976.709.3 IOPS, 4K QD64 Read/Write mixed read and write recorded 1,030,829.6 IOPS, and finally scored 26,384.04 points in Anvil’s Storage Benchmark test results . AIDA64 Disk Benchmark full disk write test: AIDA64 Disk Benchmark provides a full-disk write test. The test uses 4MB Block Size to write. The SLC Cache strategy of the SSD Firmware is measured in a clean and empty state, which truly reflects the capacity range of the SLC Cache. After the SLC Cache is saturated, it enters the TLC direct write mode. Extent, and write capacity has reached a critical point that requires three different phases of the Merge job. It can be seen from the test that the SLC Cache of AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB works best at 25% capacity (232.87 GB), and an average write speed of about 4.3 GB/s is recorded in this range. When the disk reaches 25% to 60% capacity (232.87 GB to 558.94 GB), the SLC Cache is saturated and enters the TLC writing stage. The speed at this stage is the real speed of pure TLC. This range records an average of about 1.65 GB/ s Write speed. After the written capacity exceeds 60% (558.94 GB), the SLC Cache has reached the threshold set by the Firmware, and the main controller starts to enter the Merge operation, releasing the SLC Cache data back to the TLC space, and the SSD must process data writing at the same time And Merge jobs, so the writing speed will drop significantly. It can be seen that the writing speed will drop to about 250MB/s at this stage. When the written capacity exceeds 80% (745.25 GB), part of the SLC Cache data has been written back to the TLC space, and the speed at this stage will hover between the true speed of pure TLC and the speed of Merge operations. It needs to be emphasized that many people will misunderstand that when the SSD is written to a certain capacity, the SLC Cache will no longer work. In fact, the current SLC Cache strategy is dynamically replenished. The SSD will execute the Merge job in the background when it is idle, and the SLC Cache The data is written back to the TLC space, and then the main controller divides the SLC Cache again in proportion according to the remaining capacity of the SSD, so that the next continuous write speed will return to full capacity, but the less the remaining capacity, the capacity of the SLC Cache will also decrease. Just drop faster when disc. PCMark 10 Storage test: The PCMark 10 Storage test simulates the speed of reading and writing programs such as document software, art software, and games on computer storage devices, and can reflect the performance of opening programs or saving files in real use. In the PCMark 10 Storage test, the score of AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB is 3,082. After combining different usage scenarios, its average Bandwidth is 498.31 MB/s. 3DMark Storage test: The 3DMark Storage test simulates computer storage devices to read games, record games, install games, save games, etc., and can reflect the game performance of SSDs in real use. In the 3DMark Storage Benchmark test, the AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB scored 3,564. After combining different usage scenarios, its average Bandwidth is 618.07 MB/s. AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB Price: HK$559 Editor’s comment: AORUS Gen4 5000E SSD 1TB is priced at HK$559. Although it is not the cheapest mainstream Gen4 SSD on the market, it is difficult to compete with the mainland Yangtze River NAND in terms of cost performance if it always uses Micron B47R 3D TLC Cache. The E21 controller will definitely have advantages in reliability and write life, and it will be a good choice to use it as the system master. By: John Lam/Test Center