PlexTurbo
Plextor's RAM-caching technology is called PlexTurbo. It works by using the system's memory pool as a fast cache, but compares data in the RAM cache and drive to ensure nothing is duplicated. Plextor says that using hot data, kept in an off-drive cache, prevents unnecessary writes and helps protect against data loss if the system crashes.
Other companies also use RAM-caching technology to boost speeds for frequently-used data, with Samsung's RAPID mode being the obvious comparison. The mechanism by which the two work is slightly different, but both aim to increase throughput.
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PlexTurbo in action on the right
We're looking at a peak read speed of almost 4GB/s and write speed of 4.3GB/s, circumventing the limitations imposed by the SATA interface. Benchmarking the drive in PlexTurbo mode shows improvements in straight-line speed used in CrystalDiskMark and ATTO but less of a gain in Iometer and PCMark's extended tests.
Looking across to the Samsung drives in RAPID mode, the Plextor is a little slower in sequential tests but a touch faster when smaller files are moved around in a random fashion.
Appreciating this piece of software is free and improves performance in every benchmark, we believe it should be left on as default.
