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Review: Kingston SSDNow V+200 (120GB)

by Parm Mann on 29 February 2012, 11:03 4.0

Tags: Kingston

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Final thoughts and rating

The SSDNow V+200 has been introduced to fill a gap in Kingston's product range. Appreciating that the existing HyperX is the first choice for enthusiasts willing to spend top dollar, the V+200 takes its place as a strong alternative for users wanting the power of the SandForce controller at a more palatable price.

At around £1-per-gigabyte, the SSDNow V+200 makes a compelling argument; it isn't too costly for a high-end system, it's blisteringly quick, and it's available from a reputable brand that offers a three-year warranty and an excellent upgrade kit. The latter, available as an optional extra, includes an external 2.5in USB enclosure, hard-disk cloning software, 3.5in mounting brackets and both SATA power and data cables - everything you need in order to make the transition to a new system drive.

But the SSD marketplace is fiercely contested, and the magic behind the V+200 is something we've seen before. Drives made up of the SF-2281 controller and asynchronous NAND are available from a wide range of manufacturers, and price acts as the only obvious variable. Right now, practically-identical drives from Corsair and OCZ are available for a few pounds less, and while performance is strong for typical desktop workloads, users working regularly with data that isn't easily compressed - such as photos, music and video - may see the benefit in upgrading to the premium HyperX.

Bottom line: the SSDNow V+200 is the latest in a long line of blazing-fast SandForce SSDs and represents a spectacular upgrade over a traditional hard disk.

The Good

Soars past 500MB/s via SATA 6Gbps
Good performance at high queue depths
Available with an excellent upgrade kit

The Bad

Performance takes a hit with certain data types

HEXUS Rating


Kingston SSDNow V+200 (120GB)

HEXUS Awards


Kingston SSDNow V+200 (120GB)

HEXUS Where2Buy

The 120GB Kingston SSDNow V+200 solid-state drive is available to purchase from ebuyer, dabs and amazon.

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.



HEXUS Forums :: 4 Comments

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Why is the Crucial M4 being benchmarked with firmware 0001? The newer firmwares make a massive difference to the speed?
cheesemp
Why is the Crucial M4 being benchmarked with firmware 0001? The newer firmwares make a massive difference to the speed?

Yes, very poor comparison.

Also the Corsair 120GB Force GT has come down to £135 in recent weeks, this offer's a more consistent high performance on all data types - this makes a much better buy and really does make the Kingston a bad buy in comparison.

http://www.ebuyer.com/273572-corsair-120gb-force-gt-ssd-2-5-sata-iii-6gb-s-read-555mb-s-cssd-f120gbgt-bk?utm_source=google&utm_medium=products
i was wondering why it wasn't compared to the agility 3, because as mentioned it seems it's kingstons version of that drive. so i was wondering what is faster

but with the a3 being £105 or so for the 120gb at the moment, and this being new and £120, what would be the point in going for the new drive, over the a3? presumably by the time the kingston is in the market the a3 will be closer to £100

i have an older kingston v100 in my macbook which is a great drive. it certainly brings an old laptop to life, and in general i've read nothing but good things about kingston SSD's whilst the OCZ drives are getting a bit of a dodgy rep. in saying that i got an A3 120gb the other week which gives a 2.5 quad core 8gb ram desktop a nice boost

the older SSDs have fallen in price so much recently that the OCZ petrol budget drive doesn't seem much of a bargain when you can get an older faster model for about the same price or even cheaper
Unique
i was wondering why it wasn't compared to the agility 3

I would imagine they are very similar, all drives using this controller seem all generally the same and all have the same issue with compressed data.