Crucial CT256M225 256GB SSD review. Keen pricing making sense?

Final thoughts, conclusion, HEXUS.right2reply

It's been a while since Crucial first etailed solid-state drives. In the intervening time, capacities have become greater and advances in controller-logic have rendered 18-month-old drives obsolete.

Crucial has taken the only sensible path to re-entering the high-speed SSD market, by leveraging existing technology and etailing it with a keener price.

The M225 range of drives, available in 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB capacities are based on the Indilinx controller and Samsung NAND combination favoured by a slew of other recognised SSD vendors. Indeed, our benchmarks show startling parity with OCZ's Vertex, which is, ostensibly, the same drive.

As an SSD-wide comparison, the CT256M225 is slower than price- and capacity-equivalent all-Samsung drives with respect to random reads but a little faster for random writes. Intel's first-generation X25-M continues to set the pace for both counts, though.

What may well clinch the deal in favour of Crucial is its pricing. The entire range is between 10-20 per cent cheaper than identical models from other manufacturers. A case very much in point is the reviewed 256GB model, which etails for a touch over £400. Competitors such as OCZ, G.Skill, and Patriot are currently etailing the same drive for nearer £500.

Where Crucial needs to improve upon is with the timely release of newer firmwares that keep performance at 'near-new' levels. We've yet to see a TRIM function rolled in - scheduled for the end of August - which the likes of OCZ (Vertex) have implemented for a while now.

SSDs are still very much a nascent sector with much improvement to come, especially under Windows 7. Crucial adds to the mix of high-speed drives by using existing, proven technology allied to a better price. £400 is still a lot of wedge to pay for a single SSD and we'd suggest our readers wait at least a couple of months to see how the sector plays out, but if Crucial can continue to provide better-than-competitor pricing backed by excellent customer service and timely firmware releases, there's no reason why it won't increase market share.

Bottom line: the Crucial CT256M225 is a decent SSD at a (relatively) attractive price, and it's certainly worthy of recommendation if building a very high-end PC. £400 too rich for you? We'll be looking at the 64GB model, priced at £115, next week.

HEXUS Rating

We consider any product score above '50%' as a safe buy. The higher the score, the higher the recommendation from HEXUS to buy. Simple, straightforward buying advice.

The rating is given in relation to the category the component competes in, therefore the SSD is evaluated with respect to our 'high-end components' criteria.

Crucial CT256M225 SSD

HEXUS Awards

We'd urge the majority of readers to wait a while and let the SSD market take its course, at least for a couple of months. However, if you're an enthusiast who wants super-fast storage and don't mind paying for it, we can see a point in opting for this drive.

Crucial CT256M225 SSD

HEXUS Where2Buy

The Crucial 256GB SSD is currently available for £405.94, the 128Gb model for £223.09, and the 64GB drive for £114.99. All drives include free shipping.

HEXUS Right2Reply

At HEXUS, we invite the companies whose products we test to comment on our articles. If any company representatives for the products reviewed choose to respond, we'll publish their commentary here verbatim

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They're getting there!

But how can this get such a generally positive review, yet end up with a much lower score than the fairly rubbish corsair case that was recently reviewed?

kalniel
They're getting there!

But how can this get such a generally positive review, yet end up with a much lower score than the fairly rubbish corsair case that was recently reviewed?

A couple of reasons. Firstly, this just costs significantly more and will be come redundant far, far sooner than a chassis will. We see a high-quality case as a 10-year investment - I still have one of the first Cooler Master aluminium chassis going strong - and, as such, £209 isn't a great stretch.

Secondly, it would have scored several points higher had Crucial brought TRIM functionality to the drive as soon as it was released. We're still waiting for that. The whole ‘slowing down’ issue is yet to be resolved and it wouldn't be right to award a drive 90 per cent when there appears to be a fundametal flaw in the underlying technology.

You may well see higher scores when testing under Windows 7, along with a few firmware releases from all the major vendors.

I got one of these recently, despite telling myself I wasn't going to bother.

I got it from Overclockers and it came to around £375 delivered.

I've not had chance to test it much but the limited experience I've had suggests it's a little bit slower than the G.skill Falcon 128 I've got but it's still very nippy.

Thanks for the reply.

I don't have any concerns about the price of the case you reviewed - I happen to have a £30 Coolermaster case that's also going to last 10 years - but price or longevity don't seem to be a reason to give it such a high score when there are so many negatives in the text.

Wheras aside from lack of trim support (which doesn't seem to be supported by any OS at the moment anyway) there doesn't seem to be a huge reason to mark down this drive - yes it seems expensive compared to mechanical drives, but it's cheaper than the competition and provides way better performance than the hard drive. Whether you include concerns about a company's future support in the product score or not is another matter :p

I think what I'm getting are two things:
1) It seems strange to mark a product up or down as a function of its comparitive price and longevity across the entire spectrum of hardware products instead of within it's competing market. Eg it seems strange to me to praise (via the score) a case for it's longevity when all cases are long lasting, and to damn an SSD for it's lack of longevity in the face of redundancy when all SSDs and even hard drives, CPUs etc. have the same.

2) The tone of the text doesn't seem to match the final score - if you are able to justify the score in discussion afterwards then you clearly have the reasons, they just need to be made clearer in the review.

If I wasn't planning to buy a DreyTek 2820n, I would probably get one these for my rig instead, as well as the cooling upgrade, the RAID 5 array, and maybe the sound card. It seems in the next major upgrade of my rig, if this tread continues, I'll be getting an SSD. :)