SK hynix Gold S31 500GB 3D nAND review

SK Hynix’s Gold S31 may be a top SATA SSD pick. With performance figures of up to 560MBps, it trades blows with a number of the simplest and is competitively priced. Find details in SK Hynix Gold S31 500GB 3D NAND Review.

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Pros & Cons

FOR
Competitive performance
Competitive pricing
Cloning software included
Five-year warranty

AGAINST
Small write cache capacity
1TB maximum capacity

SATA SSDs are a quick and reliable thanks to add more space for storing and possibly gain some performance, too. Typically we recommend one among the highest drives, just like the Crucial MX500, Samsung 860 EVO, or WD Blue 3D, but with specs and killer performance that rivals even Samsung’s 860 EVO, we’ve a newcomer to feature to our list: The SK Hynix Gold S31.

SK Hynix, a South Korean memory semiconductor, is best known for its DRAM, but it also produces NAND and SSDs for OEMs, too. However, SK Hynix hasn’t attacked the US consumer SSD market love it has the OEM, enterprise, and data center spaces. a minimum of so far .

The Gold S31, SK Hynix’s latest SATA 6Gbps SSD within the company’s SuperCore series, is bent prove itself against the foremost popular SATA SSDs. Does the Gold S31 have what it takes? supported the specs and support, it just might.

Most manufacturers will launch next-gen M.2 NVMe SSDs this year, but SATA remains one among the foremost popular and reliable choices for PC upgrades. SATA SSDs aren’t the fastest storage available, but if you are looking to save lots of a couple of bucks compared to M.2 NVMe SSDs, SATA gets the work done.

Capacity & speed – SK Hynix Gold S31 500GB 3D NAND Review

SK Hynix offers the Gold S31 in three capacities of 250GB, 500GB, and 1TB, which may be a bit limited compared to what other brands offer. But pricing is extremely competitive at $0.11 – $0.15 per GB. Endurance figures are almost like Samsung’s 860 EVO; the Gold S31 is warrantied to face up to up to 600TB of writes and features a five-year warranty period (whichever comes first).

As a SATA 6Gbps SSD, performance is sort of limited compared to NVMe competitors, but the drive should still saturate the SATA bus with up to 560/525 MBps of sequential throughput. It also weighs in with up to 95,000/87,000 random read/write IOPS.

Like latest SSDs, the Gold features an SLC write cache. meaning write performance degrades after you write a couple of gigabytes of knowledge , which we’ll cover a touch more on the subsequent page. Additionally, the drive supports the secure erase command so you’ll wipe your data, but it lacks the AES 256-bit hardware encryption support that has become a typical feature with the highest competing SSDs.

SK Hynix designed and built the SSD from the bottom up around its own SSD controller and NAND, even as Samsung does with its drives. In contrast, both the Crucial MX500 and WD Blue 3D use a third-party SSD controller.

Software and Accessories

SK Hynix doesn’t have an SSD Toolbox out quite yet, but the corporate does offer a free cloning/data migration utility for download.

The SK Hynix Gold S31 adheres to the two .5” 7mm form factor, and therefore the metal casing is fairly rigid compared to some SSDs that are available plastic cases. The PCB, which houses two NAND packages, a controller, and a DRAM chip, is simply a fraction of the dimensions of the case.

SK Hynix’s own Quartz SATA controller powers the drive. it is a fourth-gen design that uses the company’s LPDDR3 DRAM cache for FTL table mapping. It interfaces with SK Hynix’s fourth-generation 72-Layer 3D TLC flash.

Comparison Products

We tested the SK Hynix Gold S31 against the foremost popular SSDs during this segment. We include the Adata XPG SX8200 Pro and Intel SSD 660p as two mainstream NVMe contenders. We also included a bunch of SATA competitors, including the Crucial MX500, Samsung 860 EVO and QVO, and WD Blue 3D. Finally, we threw during a WD Black HDD permanently measure.

Game Scene Loading – Final Fantasy XIV

The Final Fantasy XIV StormBlood benchmark may be a free real-world game benchmark that easily and accurately compares game load times without the inaccuracy of employing a stopwatch.

While the SK Hynix Gold S31 is beaten by the 2 NVMe SSDs, it only lost by a second or two. The Gold S31 is really one among the fastest SSDs during game scene loading, beating even the Samsung 860 EVO. Compared to an HDD, it cuts off 1/3rd off the load time.

SK Hynix Gold S31 500GB 3D NAND performance Review

Transfer Rates – DiskBench
We use the DiskBench storage benchmarking tool to check file transfer performance with our own custom 50GB block of knowledge . Our data set includes 31,227 files of varied types, like pictures, PDFs, and videos. We copy the files to a replacement folder then follow-up with a reading test of a newly written 6.5 GB file.

The SK Hynix Gold S31 can copy and skim files without a sweat. Samsung’s 860 EVO took the crown because the fastest SATA SSD to repeat the 50GB folder , but the Gold S31 still did well and scored similarly to the MX500.

Trace Testing – PCMark 8 Storage Test 2.0
PCMark 8 may be a trace-based benchmark that uses Microsoft Office, Adobe Creative Suite, World of Warcraft, and Battlefield 3 to live the performance of storage devices in real-world scenarios.

The Gold S31 is simply nearly as good as the other mainstream SATA-based SSD. It landed in fourth place overall, making it the second-fastest in our test pool. It also delivered up to 16 times more performance than the HDD.

Trace Testing – SPECworkstation 3
Like PCMark 8, SPECworkstation 3 may be a trace-based benchmark, but it’s designed to push the system harder by measuring workstation performance in professional applications.

While not the simplest option for your workstation, the Gold S31 still did an excellent job while handling I/O heavy applications. Compared to the Adata drive, it took twice as long to finish the test, but landed in second place in time to completion, and third place overall. Again, it outscored the 860 EVO and MX500.

Synthetics – ATTO
ATTO may be a simple and free application that SSD vendors commonly use to assign sequential performance specifications to their products. It also gives us insight into how the device handles different file sizes.

We tested the Gold S31 in file access tests with various block sizes. It performed similarly to most SATA SSDs, but was easily outperformed by the PCIe NVMe competition across the board.

Synthetic Testing – iometer
iometer is a complicated and highly configurable storage benchmarking tool that vendors often use to live the performance of their devices.

Peak sequential throughput clocks in at 562/529 MBps, which may be a great result for a SATA SSD. Random performance is analogous to most other SATA drives.

Sustained Write Performance, Cache Recovery, and Temperature

Official write specifications are only a part of the performance picture. Most SSD makers implement a write cache, which may be a fast area of (usually) pseudo-SLC programmed flash that absorbs incoming data. Sustained write speeds can suffer tremendously once the workload spills outside of the cache and into the “native” TLC or QLC flash. We use iometer to hammer the SSD with sequential writes for quarter-hour to live both the dimensions of the write cache and performance after the cache is saturated. We also monitor cache recovery via multiple idle rounds.

When possible, we also log the temperature of the drive via the S.M.A.R.T. data to ascertain when (or if) thermal throttling kicks in and the way it impacts performance. Bear in mind that results will vary supported the workload and ambient air temperature.

The SK Hynix Gold S31 features alittle 12GB cache that recovers within 30-seconds. We noted a write rate of about 522 MBps until it degraded. After degradation, throughput averaged 471 MBps. This result isn’t too shabby for our 1TB model, but smaller capacities will degrade to a slower rate . The controller didn’t overheat because the case does an excellent job of transferring heat out of the controller.

Power Consumption

We use the Quarch HD Programmable module to realize a deeper understanding of power characteristics. Idle power consumption may be a vital aspect to think about , especially if you are looking for a replacement drive for your laptop. Some SSDs can consume watts of power at idle while better-suited ones sip just milliwatts. Average workload power consumption and max consumption are two other aspects of power consumption, but performance-per-watt is more important. A drive might consume more power during any given workload, but accomplishing a task faster allows the drive to drop into an idle state faster, which ultimately saves power.

The Gold S31 scored fourth overall in our efficiency metric. on the average , it consumed but 2W during out file copy test and peaked at just 3.2W. It also consumed little or no power at idle: The drive consumed the smallest amount amount of power within the group with LPM disabled, and matched the WD Blue 3D once we enabled the feature.

SK Hynix hit a homerun with the Gold S31, so while the corporate is late to enter the retail consumer SSD market within the USA, it apparently spent its time tweaking and tuning its new design to perform alongside the simplest .

The Gold S31 delivers stellar performance for a SATA SSD: It consistently traded blows with the mainstream competition and proved itself a worthy adversary. The drive responded quickly to requests, and performance was still solid even after saturating the write cache. it had been also rather efficient during file transfers, and at idle, too.

The Gold S31 isn’t quite as flashy as some SSDs we’ve reviewed, but it holds its own with what looks like an Onigiri or rice ball-inspired label on the highest of the silver case. It’s 2.5” 7mm form factor is large compared to M.2 options like Adata’s XPG SX8200 Pro. Because it uses the SATA interface, it requires an additional cable which may detract from a clean-looking build, but that’s par for the course with SATA drives.

The Gold S31 isn’t quite as fast as NVMe options, but SK Hynix outfitted the S31 Gold with competitive endurance ratings and a five-year warranty. it is also priced very competitively, making it a top value at the time of writing and earning our recommendation. Overall, the Gold S31 may be a good selection for the budget gamer or overclocker even as very much like it’s for those trying to find a reasonable and straightforward upgrade for his or her laptop or desktop.

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SK hynix Gold S31 500GB 3D nAND review – how to do firmware upgrade?

Pros & Cons