# Kingston NV2 1 TB M.2 NVMe SSD



## W1zzard (Sep 20, 2022)

The Kingston NV2 is a huge improvement over the NV1. It comes at similar pricing but is significantly faster. Thanks to the new Phison E21 controller, the drive offers the highly popular PCIe 4.0 capability at only $80 for the 1 TB version, making it a great choice for any cost-optimized system.

*Show full review*


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## zmeul (Sep 20, 2022)

done right 

I'm sorry .. where is the DRAM cache? oh, it's non-existent


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## Dragokar (Sep 20, 2022)

Thanks for the review.

I don't know about the NV2.....I can get the Mega Fastro MS200 with DRAM cache for around €130 on sale in DE with DRAM. Yeah, that brand is not known well in the EU, but compared to NV2.....


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## ZetZet (Sep 20, 2022)

zmeul said:


> done right
> 
> I'm sorry .. where is the DRAM cache? oh, it's non-existent


You missed the first part of the title I think. DRAM cache seems like an obsolete feature for most consumer drives already.


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## Wattery Fowls (Sep 20, 2022)

Components not guaranteed. Kingston in a nutshell.

Bought three V300 series sata ssd models once all three failed inside of 6months never bought from them again after that, that series of drives where plagued with async nand modules


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## W1zzard (Sep 20, 2022)

Dragokar said:


> Thanks for the review.
> 
> I don't know about the NV2.....I can get the Mega Fastro MS200 with DRAM cache for around €130 on sale in DE with DRAM. Yeah, that brand is not known well in the EU, but compared to NV2.....


This drive is €75 for 1 TB. MS200 seems to be PCIe 3.0 using SM2262, so same as HP EX900 and ADATA SX8200 Pro, so similar performance as NV2


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## Dragokar (Sep 20, 2022)

W1zzard said:


> This drive is €75 for 1 TB. MS200 seems to be PCIe 3.0 using SM2262, so same as HP EX900 and ADATA SX8200 Pro, so similar performance as NV2


It does have DRAM, NV2 does not.


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## W1zzard (Sep 20, 2022)

Dragokar said:


> It does have DRAM, NV2 does not.


and yet it's not much faster than NV2 .. check my results vs SX8200 Pro


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## Dragokar (Sep 20, 2022)

I do have a MS200 in my LAN-PC. Could provide it for testing after the LAN. That's a quick & dirty CDM run from mydealz:


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## Wirko (Sep 20, 2022)

It would be great if you could measure the size of the pseudo-SLC cache once again when the drive is 80% full. Is it as large as physically possible (so ~66 GB) or is it at 20% of 88 GB (so ~18 GB)? Or something else?

I think that there must be some technical reason, not just product segmentation, to limit the pSLC cache and not let it expand over the entire flash memory. Maybe it's because of controller limits (small internal RAM etc.) or related to the size of the host memory buffer. Phison's blog gives a small hint:


> But DRAM-less SSDs aren’t exactly a “one-size-fits-all” solution either. The performance of DRAM-less SSDs generally suffers due to innate deficiencies in the caching space reserved for intermediate data and mapping tables.


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## Chrispy_ (Sep 20, 2022)

NV1 vs NV2 is another shining example of why QLC is an unflushable turd.

The only way you can make it _not_ horrible is to spend the money on DRAM cache, then allocate a lot of pSLC and overprovision it hard. That hurts its value proposition enough to make it untenable, which is why I just completely avoid QLC at any cost, for any reason, at all times and the rest of humanity would be doing themselves a favour if they followed my example. The sooner QLC dies due to lack of economic viability, the better, IMO.


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## mechtech (Sep 21, 2022)

Great review

but

Still waiting for all the 4TB SSDs for $300


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## Chaitanya (Sep 21, 2022)

Given Kingston is notorious for bait and switch(along with AData and WD), would like to see a follow up of this drive few months later with a retail SKU.


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## Verpal (Sep 21, 2022)

320 TBW? 
I have a feeling it is another case of TLC for reviewer, QLC for retailer.


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## chrcoluk (Sep 21, 2022)

Page 6 typo. GB instead off MB.



> Filling the whole 1 TB capacity completed at 620 *GB*/s average, a good result,



I tried to quote you @W1zzard but the forum blocks me, so hopefully you see this.


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## lexluthermiester (Sep 21, 2022)

I think this is a good value drive. DRAMless isn't as bad as it was in years past.


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## Ferrum Master (Sep 21, 2022)

Chaitanya said:


> Given Kingston is notorious for bait and switch(along with AData and WD), would like to see a follow up of this drive few months later with a retail SKU.



I got burned about it so many times, I simply black listed them. What's the point of the shiny reviews W1z does that in store I get a completely different SKU? And hey usually an underperforming one.


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## W1zzard (Sep 21, 2022)

Chaitanya said:


> with a retail SKU.





Verpal said:


> TLC for reviewer





Ferrum Master said:


> that in store I get a completely different SKU?


I bought my drive in retail. It's literally mentioned at the end of the 1st paragraph in conclusion



lexluthermiester said:


> DRAMless isn't as bad as it was in years past.


Yeah, controller vendors have been working on this for years, it's their highest priority.



chrcoluk said:


> Page 6 typo. GB instead off MB.


Fixed, thanks!


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## TheUn4seen (Sep 21, 2022)

Chrispy_ said:


> NV1 vs NV2 is another shining example of why QLC is an unflushable turd.
> 
> The only way you can make it _not_ horrible is to spend the money on DRAM cache, then allocate a lot of pSLC and overprovision it hard. That hurts its value proposition enough to make it untenable, which is why I just completely avoid QLC at any cost, for any reason, at all times and the rest of humanity would be doing themselves a favour if they followed my example. The sooner QLC dies due to lack of economic viability, the better, IMO.


Honest curiosity: Why does it matter to a consumer who has no emotional attachment to a particular technology or an equally emotional stance against one? In the machine I'm currently using I have two Intel 660p 1TB drives - those horrible, life destroying, first generation QLC drives, universally hated and warned against by the "enthusiast" tribe. Even more horrifyingly, one of them is an OS drive with some games on it, the other has mixed data, with both being more than 80% utilized. If the tribe is half-correct, by this time my cat should be dead, my wife pregnant with another man and I should have no less than two more debilitating diseases than I have now.
In other words: Would changing to proper, five times more expensive, community-accepted, "enthusiast" devices make my life better? Or, at least, make my OS boot significantly faster than 15 seconds it takes now, games load instantly, browser start in less than a second it takes currently? Would I actually see any difference outside of synthetic benchmarks which I dare not to spend my whole days running?

I believe SSDs are far into the realm of rapidly diminishing results. Even in this test differences between cheapest and most expensive drives are imperceptible to anyone other than obsessive types running benchmarks in a loop since the moment they open their eyes.


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## Ferrum Master (Sep 21, 2022)

W1zzard said:


> I bought my drive in retail. It's literally mentioned at the end of the 1st paragraph in conclusion



Well that's the SKU at your local store from your distribution channel, there are absolutely no guarantees I would get the same in mine, not mentioning even after few months as it was reviewed. They source stuff from anywhere and anyone.

That's life with those type of companies. You have to keep in mind that always picking up their products.


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## lexluthermiester (Sep 21, 2022)

W1zzard said:


> Yeah, controller vendors have been working on this for years, it's their highest priority.


It shows. Performance is good.


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## 50eurouser (Sep 21, 2022)

Perfect candidate based on endurance rating for a future Ninja switch to QLC TRASH flash. None really wants QLC for the same price as TLC, those ssd's only make sense for super big 4/6/8TB drives or when discounted. (1TB/40€) Kingston are the kings of nand flash switch since the compressed days of Sandforce controllers. Kioxia exceria, intenso premium nvme and some teamgroup models are cheap examples of TLC that can be found for ~60€ on the EU market. The competition is really tough and the QLC ones (NV1,P1,P2,660P) are pointless. Lets hope for a pure $/TB/TBW/Warranty review in the future.


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## W1zzard (Sep 21, 2022)

50eurouser said:


> Perfect candidate based on endurance rating for a future Ninja switch to QLC TRASH flash


Yeah ... that's why they put such a low endurance rating, so they can go QLC later. It still won't matter, you're not writing that much data



50eurouser said:


> TLC that can be found for ~60€ on the EU market


These are Gen3 though. The NV2 is the cheapest Gen 4 drive on the market right now (which of course is Kingston's strategy)


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## Wirko (Sep 21, 2022)

W1zzard said:


> These are Gen3 though. The NV2 is the cheapest Gen 4 drive on the market right now (which of course is Kingston's strategy)


Not much advantage over Gen3 ... except of course in cases where you can only give it 1 or 2 PCIe lanes to use.



TheUn4seen said:


> Honest curiosity: Why does it matter to a consumer who has no emotional attachment to a particular technology or an equally emotional stance against one? In the machine I'm currently using I have two Intel 660p 1TB drives - those horrible, life destroying, first generation QLC drives, universally hated and warned against by the "enthusiast" tribe. Even more horrifyingly, one of them is an OS drive with some games on it, the other has mixed data, with both being more than 80% utilized. If the tribe is half-correct, by this time my cat should be dead, my wife pregnant with another man and I should have no less than two more debilitating diseases than I have now.
> In other words: Would changing to proper, five times more expensive, community-accepted, "enthusiast" devices make my life better? Or, at least, make my OS boot significantly faster than 15 seconds it takes now, games load instantly, browser start in less than a second it takes currently? Would I actually see any difference outside of synthetic benchmarks which I dare not to spend my whole days running?
> 
> I believe SSDs are far into the realm of rapidly diminishing results. Even in this test differences between cheapest and most expensive drives are imperceptible to anyone other than obsessive types running benchmarks in a loop since the moment they open their eyes.


The most important reason to not recommend a QLC drive is not the performance or (stated) TBW. It's the general perception (and I don't object to it) that they are low quality and low reliability products, being ahead of everything else in the race to the bottom.

As for your 660p's, if they work fine for you then fine. It's not like most of them will die in a couple years. But Storage Review tested it and found that "the 660p puts up large block sequential reads of 225MB/s and writes of 77MB/s". For me that's unacceptable because my 80GB Intel X25-M G2 from 2008, with a 3 Gb/s SATA interface, which is a good fit for my old Core 2 Duo PC, reads at 250 MB/s and writes at 70 MB/s as well.


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## Chrispy_ (Sep 21, 2022)

TheUn4seen said:


> Would changing to proper, five times more expensive, community-accepted, "enthusiast" devices make my life better?


Five times more expensive? What FUD and nonsense are you talking about?! - Decent "Editor's Choice Award" TLC drives are NOT more expensive: This NV2 and the excellent SN570 are both the same cost/TB as the QLC NAND options:







TheUn4seen said:


> Or, at least, make my *OS boot* significantly faster than 15 seconds it takes now, *games load* instantly, *browser start* in less than a second it takes currently?


Not one of those three things is sensitive to the NAND used, or in fact particularly storage-bottlenecked - which is why even 235MB/s SATA2 SSDs are barely any slower in those three scenarios. Either IOPS, software wait timers, or CPU/RAM decompression and operations dominate the time all of those tasks take. If you don't need to write data, then you don't need to care about performance, only reliability and price, in which case QLC has historically been reliable enough, but with a measurably lower lifespan, and still costs just as much as faster, higher-endurance options. I'm not saying QLC will ruin that experience, but even as an extremely light, consumer workload with zero signiricant write requirements, you're still giving up both endurance and write performance for free. Why? Will the next person who gets your PC also have the same requirements as you, or will they be disappointed that moving large files for archive/video editing/indexing/collation absolutely sucks on your drive?

If you were offered a good, fast, fun, long-lasting, reliable car for the _exact _same price as an acceptable, highway-speed-capable, boring, short-lived (but still as reliable) car - which one would you pick? You don't care about fun or driving faster than highway speeds, holding onto it for decades, or resale value? Then fine - it makes no difference if you genuinely have no concern about all the caveats.



TheUn4seen said:


> Even in this test differences between cheapest and most expensive drives are imperceptible to anyone other than obsessive types running benchmarks in a loop since the moment they open their eyes.


Did you even read the review? it's 4x faster than the QLC NV1 - that's not 'imperceptible to anyone' and copying large files is something a lot of people do. Maybe not daily, but having to wait four minutes instead of one minute _every single time_ quickly gets tiresome if you do any amount of it more than once in a blue moon:

 

Further to that, the software installations and just general search/indexing performance of identically-priced TLC drives like the SN570 or NV2 can be anywhere from 20-50% faster in a huge range of everyday tasks. Photoshop and Premiere performance are night-and-day different.

I get it, you just boot your PC and game/browse and the inferior QLC drives are just fine for that. Not everyone has such a limited demand of their storage, and the bit that irks me about QLC is that it absolutely sucks for people who do need the performance, yet manufacturers are taking the cost savings and failing to pass them onto the consumer. If slower QLC drives were much cheaper than TLC, I'd have a different stance, but they're not. They're provably worse in almost every measurable way and still cost just as much as the *objectively better *hardware.


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## TheUn4seen (Sep 21, 2022)

Chrispy_ said:


> (snip)


Replace "five times more expensive" with just "more expensive" and my point stays the same - I did try to compare the NV1 to the most expensive, "obsessive enthusiast" level of devices in practical applications. In the shop I usually buy from, NV2 is, at the moment, the least expensive m.2 NVME drive or very close to being one, about five times cheaper than the most expensive drives of similar capacity. So what would I get for more money, no matter if just a tiny bit or a lot more? No practical improvement in any of the use cases the drive is intended for - it being a consumer device. I did not count SATA drives, a choice I should have mentioned, since I have no use for anything other than m.2 NVME. The car analogy you mentioned holds true for me - I don't care for "fun", whatever it would mean for a mass storage device. I want it to work for the intended purpose, a hybrid Toyota is an infinitely better car than a Maserati if you live in a city.

Don't take it as me trying to be snarky, I'm genuinely trying to understand the rationale behind buying unnecessarily expensive products. Does a typical consumer spend his days transferring large files or installing software all day long? This is a simple drive for people with simple, limited needs. If a person needs unparalleled performance for an income generating machine, there is a whole world of extremely fast and reliable storage. As for QLC not being cheaper than TLC - there's a lot going on with pricing a product. Manufacturing and sales volumes come to mind, TLC is probably being phased out of manufacturing because QLC has more density and therefore allows for bigger margins. Corporations never ever, in any market segment, pass their savings to consumers, "whatever the market will bear" pricing strategy is alive and well. Your problem therefore seems to be with corporate pricing practices, not with products.

Again and honestly not being sarcastic: What do you do with consumer hardware to be limited by it's capabilities? "Objectively better" doesn't mean anything if there's no need for it being better, it just becomes a waste of money a person spends on underutilized capacity.


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## Wirko (Sep 21, 2022)

For one, I tend to buy a bit better (faster, more capable, larger, etc.) than I currently need. It has worked very well for me in the long term.


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## Chrispy_ (Sep 22, 2022)

TheUn4seen said:


> Replace "five times more expensive" with just "more expensive" and my point stays the same


More expensive? I cannot take you seriously. Are you being intentionally blind and ignorant?






It's *the same* price (or actually cheaper); _Not_ more expensive. Where are you getting that dumb shit into your head from? QLC is just worse for no cost savings whatsoever. You're getting a weaker, slower, shorter-lifespan drive for no reason.

If you're talking about QLC budget drives vs high-end PCIe 4.0 flagship drives, then yes, but that's not the discussion we're having, at least that's not the discussion I started. You quoted me on QLC vs TLC, and since QLC only exists at the rock-bottom/entry-level of the market, I have no idea why you're bringing premium flagship PCIe 4.0 storage into the discussion at all. That stuff is aimed at rich people with money to burn, and pro users who need fast local storage for _writing_ to huge datasets like pointcloud analysis, high-res video editing, realtime market analysis etc. Those people can spend $25K on a PC and don't even consider dirt-cheap entry-level storage like the NV1, 660p, or RocketQ - so it's completely irrelevant to the discussion.

To put it simply, QLC is bad - but its weaknesses can be hidden well enough that it won't significantly underperform a TLC drive in the right combination of lightweight consumer workloads. A QLC drive will die in around one-third the lifespan of a TLC drive, and if you use a QLC drive for content creation it will absolutely suck the whole time you're using it and possibly die within the warranty period.

If QLC and TLC are the same price, there is absolutely no reason for QLC to exist. It's simply worse, weaker, slower, more fragile NAND that offers absolutely zero benefits. The one benefit it was *supposed* to offer, was reduced costs - but that simply hasn't materialised, so we're getting_ all _of the downsides of QLC for no benefit at all.


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## to001 (Sep 26, 2022)

Any chance to review cn600 warhalberd ?


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## W1zzard (Sep 26, 2022)

to001 said:


> Any chance to review cn600 warhalberd ?


I've had it here for a while, haven't had time for it yet


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## Aizou (Oct 6, 2022)

I am considering the 2 TB version of this drive and I have a question(its under 150 euro). The 2TB has 3.500/2.800 MB/s reads which are borderline gen3 speeds. 

So my question is, does this drive require a gen 4 slot to fully work at its advertised speed? Or a gen3 slot is enough to saturate the drive since it does not even hit full gen3 potential.


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## lexluthermiester (Oct 6, 2022)

Aizou said:


> So my question is, does this drive require a gen 4 slot to fully work at its advertised speed? Or a gen3 slot is enough to saturate the drive since it does not even hit full gen3 potential.


Gen3 will work fine. You'll either get right on or very close to those numbers.


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## Wirko (Oct 7, 2022)

Aizou said:


> I am considering the 2 TB version of this drive and I have a question(its under 150 euro). The 2TB has 3.500/2.800 MB/s reads which are borderline gen3 speeds.
> 
> So my question is, does this drive require a gen 4 slot to fully work at its advertised speed? Or a gen3 slot is enough to saturate the drive since it does not even hit full gen3 potential.


I don't know what magic Wizz does but even the 1 TB model does sequential reads at up to 7000 MB/s in this review. Not that it matters much, or at all. 7000 is achieved on sequential reading of large blocks and it needs to be queued (QD > 1). In the real world, that's useful if you copy large files to another storage device (capable of writing at the same speed) or send them over the network (at no less than 56 gigabits per second). Not much else.


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## TP555 (Oct 8, 2022)

Hi

Anyone have the 2TB Version  ?
How to Perform the 2TB with Sustained Writes ?

The 2 TB Version is very affordable now for 144€ !

Cheers  !


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## cooldavy (Oct 22, 2022)

Thank you for this awesome review.

I am looking for a low thermal choice for my 14 liter ITX case (NZXT H1 v2), which has a vacant m.2 slot on the back side of the mobo(ROG Strix B660-I) and less than half inch away from an ROG Strix 3080/12. My 2TB Samsung 970 Evo Plus installed under mobo heatsink can hit 82C during gaming that leaves me with fear of adding the second SSD drive without any thermal issue. DRAM-less and "lower-end" performance seems to be a good SSD for my need and I have just ordered a 2TB NV2.

I will update the post once I receive the drive.


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## ShurikN (Oct 25, 2022)

Just got the 500GB version today, and these are the first bench result at 40% full
I'm satisfied TBH, especially since I got it for less than 50eur, and it was by far the cheapest nvme drive that actually performs ok


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## cooldavy (Oct 28, 2022)

I finally got the 2TB version from Amazon. The performance is, like it's price ($129.99) you shouldn't expect too much. I put it in between the Mobo and an RTX3080 it can hit 81C during gaming.





Half full test results are laughable, now I am really on the fence whether to return it or not:


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## Chrispy_ (Nov 10, 2022)

cooldavy said:


> I finally got the 2TB version from Amazon. The performance is, like it's price ($129.99) you shouldn't expect too much. I put it in between the Mobo and an RTX3080 it can hit 81C during gaming.
> 
> Half full test results are laughable, now I am really on the fence whether to return it or not:


Your results are very different from the review sample.

CDM 8.0 isn't a like-for-like test that matches what @W1zzard tests but I wouldn't expect read speeds to deteriorate as the drive fills up! Even on garbage-tier QLC drives, the read speed rarely suffers.

Could be symptom of something else entirely - heat, controller issues, firmware bugs - _or_ it wouldn't be the first time Kingston had pulled the old bait-and-switch tactic. I note on page 1 of the review that when asked, Kingston declined to comment on what the components used were. That's _potentially_ because the person being asked didn't know, but also gives them wiggle room to change components in a classic bait-and-switch by not nailing down the NV2 to any particular spec.


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## cts (Nov 11, 2022)

For those who are looking to buy this disk - not all Kingston NV2 are based on Phison PS5021 controller as shown in this review. Some have SM2267XT. Nvme itself is also visually a little bit different.


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## W1zzard (Nov 11, 2022)

cts said:


> For those who are looking to buy this disk - not all Kingston NV2 are based on Phison PS5021 controller as shown in this review. Some have SM2267XT. Nvme itself is also visually a little bit different.


Any tips on how to identify them visually? i.e. do you have a photo of the SM2267 XT version?


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## cts (Nov 11, 2022)

Controller itself is soldered in different location and some smd elements around it (and nand flash chips) are different. Probably based on reference SM design pcb.


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 11, 2022)

cts said:


> For those who are looking to buy this disk - not all Kingston NV2 are based on Phison PS5021 controller as shown in this review. Some have SM2267XT. Nvme itself is also visually a little bit different.


Are the actual performance numbers similar or the same?


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## cts (Nov 11, 2022)

Didn't have time to check performance yet. Will run some tests later.


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 11, 2022)

cts said:


> Didn't have time to check performance yet. Will run some tests later.


I think the changes would be ok if the performance is on par with the original design. If not they should have changed the model number to indicate the change.


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## W1zzard (Nov 12, 2022)

lexluthermiester said:


> I think the changes would be ok if the performance is on par with the original design. If not they should have changed the model number to indicate the change.


Kingston confirmed to me that they are the official specs, but nothing else. that's also why some numbers are more conservative than what I found in my review.


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## uwotm9 (Nov 12, 2022)

Purchased my 1TB NV2 a few days ago and installed it into MSI GF76 laptop yesterday. Test speeds are from laughable to acceptable as mentioned above (varies from run to run). However, temperatures are not. *Idle* (!) temp is 55-70 degrees (Celsius not Fahrenheit lol), typically *60-65*. What's even more strange, under load, say, writing some 50-100 GB stuff, it goes... colder. Not sure is it throttling or broken firmware or something. I checked disk usage - maybe idle is not idle right? - but it's 0.000%. GF 76 comes with 500 GB WD SSD and that one runs withing 25-40 deg C and hits 48 under full load. Seems normal SSD appearance to me. Both (WD and NV2) have no heatsinks etc.

I've even opened a laptop again to check it and touch: yes, NV2 goes painfully hot.
What else? TRIM is enabled and overall there's nothing special to make it perform like that. 
Even its location in laptop is a bit aside from hot parts and it doesn't go any hotter at gaming sessions.

Any thoughts? Should I return it?
Installing heatsink seems an option but I'm not sure if it will fit the laptop.
There's no firmware updates for now.


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## cts (Nov 12, 2022)

Some benhmarks.
System - Msi B450 Tomahawk Max, R3600 stock, 2X8GB 3200 ram.
Nvme disk is working in Pcie 3.0 x4 mode and has some airflow blowing on to it.





 




 









At least Nand is the same Toshiba 112-layer 3D TLC BiCS5 as in review.


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## ROGU (Nov 12, 2022)

I bought NV2 1TB in Canada. Package says made in Taiwan. It's most definitely one with SM2267XT, not Phison E21.
It seems these two versions are easily distinguishable by placement of parts that you can see sticking out of sticker.
A couple of reviews of 2TB version I saw on web also says it has SM2267XT.
I don't know which controller is better in performance but supposedly SM2267XT is 28nm while E21 is 12nm, so I guess SM2267XT will run hotter.
Only reason I got NV2 is because it was cheaper than other PCIE 4.0 nvme, so it doesn't really matter. I rather keep $$$ than buying high-end model.


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 12, 2022)

W1zzard said:


> Kingston confirmed to me that they are the official specs, but nothing else. that's also why some numbers are more conservative than what I found in my review.


Ok, cool. Looks like the drive performs on par to the advertised specs, as shown...


cts said:


> Some benhmarks.
> System - Msi B450 Tomahawk Max, R3600 stock, 2X8GB 3200 ram.
> Nvme disk is working in Pcie 3.0 x4 mode and has some airflow blowing on to it.
> View attachment 269674
> ...


...here. 

So your review sample might not have been final specs, but as long as the final product performs as required, that's not a terrible problem. Given that the NAND does seem to be the same, I think the change in controller can be forgiven.


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## W1zzard (Nov 13, 2022)

lexluthermiester said:


> So your review sample


I didn't test a review sample, I purchased the drive myself from a German retailer


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 13, 2022)

W1zzard said:


> I didn't test a review sample, I purchased the drive myself from a German retailer


Oh! Interesting twist. Maybe it was a regional thing for a short time?


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## kaktus1907 (Nov 16, 2022)

Can you guys review SSD HIKVision E2000 ‘CRIUS’ M.2 NVME 2TB?
It's a peculiar drive that has a 8 channel Maxio MAP1001A-F2C controller with 2*1GB DRAM modules. No Maxio controller drive in TPU review sheet yet.


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## W1zzard (Nov 16, 2022)

kaktus1907 said:


> No Maxio controller drive in TPU review sheet yet.


Good suggestion.. I have Colorful CN600 and CN700 here, just no time to review yet


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## Dinosaullo (Nov 17, 2022)

Guys between this SSD and the WD SN570, which one is more worthwhile? By the tests in the review it seemed that the NV2 excelled in everything, but i see many people recommending the WD. Thanks


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 17, 2022)

Dinosaullo said:


> Guys between this SSD and the WD SN570, which one is more worthwhile? By the tests in the review it seemed that the NV2 excelled in everything, but i see many people recommending the WD. Thanks


The WD performs a little better(1%) but is a bit more expensive($10) depending on where you buy it. Both use TLC NAND from Toshiba, which is good quality. The Kingston has a 3year warranty, where as the WD has a 5year. You're effectively paying $10 for two extra years of warranty. So it comes down to personal preference. I like the Kingston as is seems the better value, but that's just me..

BTW, Welcome to TPU! Don't be a stranger!


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## CatalinT (Nov 17, 2022)

Hello. The review says it has 2 temp sensors. My 1tb smi controller NV2 shows just 1 temp in hwinfo...Is there another way to test ? Thanks


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## CatalinT (Nov 27, 2022)

Can we call this thread dead ? And close it since nobody answers ?


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 27, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> Hello. The review says it has 2 temp sensors. My 1tb smi controller NV2 shows just 1 temp in hwinfo...Is there another way to test ? Thanks





CatalinT said:


> Can we call this thread dead ? And close it since nobody answers ?


The question you're asking is fairly technical. It's not that anyone is being rude, but as a rule, if we don't have an answer, we tend not to chime in. The second sensor may not be visible to the external system if it's just wired to the SSD controller for internal monitoring. There could be a variety of other reasons why that second sensor doesn't show up in any given utility, including that the utility in question may not be programmatically able to see it.


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## CatalinT (Nov 27, 2022)

lexluthermiester said:


> The question you're asking is fairly technical. It's not that anyone is being rude, but as a rule, if we don't have an answer, we tend not to chime in. The second sensor may not be visible to the external system if it's just wired to the SSD controller for internal monitoring. There could be a variety of other reasons why that second sensor doesn't show up in any given utility, including that the utility in question may not be programmatically able to.


I think the model i have with smi controller is worse than the phison one. Like everybody says one for reviews and one for retail. In my country i cant find the phison one anywere so i guess phison is the better one. Thanks for the answer and sorry for my way of say it above.


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## Wirko (Nov 27, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> I think the model i have with smi controller is worse than the phison one. Like everybody says one for reviews and one for retail. In my country i cant find the phison one anywere so i guess phison is the better one. Thanks for the answer and sorry for my way of say it above.


It's a thread that belongs to a review by TPU, and I don't think those are ever closed.


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 27, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> Like everybody says one for reviews and one for retail.


That really doesn't happen very often. W1zzard stated earlier that he bought his review sample himself at retail, so Kingston didn't send him anything. What's likely going on is that Kingston, like a great many other companies, are feeling the effects of the chip shortage and are doing their best to keep their stock flowing. This likely means sourcing NAND controllers from multiple vendors. It's not an attempt at anything shady, it's just getting the job done.

Does that make sense?


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## CatalinT (Nov 27, 2022)

lexluthermiester said:


> That really doesn't happen very often. W1zzard stated earlier that he bought his review sample himself at retail, so Kingston didn't send him anything. What's likely going on is that Kingston, like a great many other companies, are feeling the effects of the chip shortage and are doing their best to keep their stock flowing. This likely means sourcing NAND controllers from multiple vendors. It's not an attempt at anything shady, it's just getting the job done.
> 
> Does that make sensi





lexluthermiester said:


> That really doesn't happen very often. W1zzard stated earlier that he bought his review sample himself at retail, so Kingston didn't send him anything. What's likely going on is that Kingston, like a great many other companies, are feeling the effects of the chip shortage and are doing their best to keep their stock flowing. This likely means sourcing NAND controllers from multiple vendors. It's not an attempt at anything shady, it's just getting the job done.
> 
> Does that make sense?


I will say nothing is shady until i will see a side by side comparation of this two versions


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 27, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> I will say nothing is shady until i will see a side by side comparation of this two versions


You can make a determination yourself. Run some drive benchmarks and compare to this review. If the results are close enough, there you go.


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## chrcoluk (Nov 28, 2022)

Wirko said:


> It would be great if you could measure the size of the pseudo-SLC cache once again when the drive is 80% full. Is it as large as physically possible (so ~66 GB) or is it at 20% of 88 GB (so ~18 GB)? Or something else?
> 
> I think that there must be some technical reason, not just product segmentation, to limit the pSLC cache and not let it expand over the entire flash memory. Maybe it's because of controller limits (small internal RAM etc.) or related to the size of the host memory buffer. Phison's blog gives a small hint:


Mapping tables has always been my concern on dramless, as I believe where its stored cannot be wear levelled well so DRAM greatly improves endurance, this flaw might be long resolved but not mentioned in reviews hence my decision to keep buying DRAM SSDs.

If HMB has managed to take on 100% DRAM tasks like mapping table caching then review guides should state this.



TheUn4seen said:


> Replace "five times more expensive" with just "more expensive" and my point stays the same - I did try to compare the NV1 to the most expensive, "obsessive enthusiast" level of devices in practical applications. In the shop I usually buy from, NV2 is, at the moment, the least expensive m.2 NVME drive or very close to being one, about five times cheaper than the most expensive drives of similar capacity. So what would I get for more money, no matter if just a tiny bit or a lot more? No practical improvement in any of the use cases the drive is intended for - it being a consumer device. I did not count SATA drives, a choice I should have mentioned, since I have no use for anything other than m.2 NVME. The car analogy you mentioned holds true for me - I don't care for "fun", whatever it would mean for a mass storage device. I want it to work for the intended purpose, a hybrid Toyota is an infinitely better car than a Maserati if you live in a city.
> 
> Don't take it as me trying to be snarky, I'm genuinely trying to understand the rationale behind buying unnecessarily expensive products. Does a typical consumer spend his days transferring large files or installing software all day long? This is a simple drive for people with simple, limited needs. If a person needs unparalleled performance for an income generating machine, there is a whole world of extremely fast and reliable storage. As for QLC not being cheaper than TLC - there's a lot going on with pricing a product. Manufacturing and sales volumes come to mind, TLC is probably being phased out of manufacturing because QLC has more density and therefore allows for bigger margins. Corporations never ever, in any market segment, pass their savings to consumers, "whatever the market will bear" pricing strategy is alive and well. Your problem therefore seems to be with corporate pricing practices, not with products.
> 
> Again and honestly not being sarcastic: What do you do with consumer hardware to be limited by it's capabilities? "Objectively better" doesn't mean anything if there's no need for it being better, it just becomes a waste of money a person spends on underutilized capacity.


Yeah same with SMR not been cheaper than CMR.

To prevent the better tech phase out been successful as consumers we need to avoid buying the QLC/SMR stuff.


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## CatalinT (Nov 29, 2022)

cts said:


> Some benhmarks.
> System - Msi B450 Tomahawk Max, R3600 stock, 2X8GB 3200 ram.
> Nvme disk is working in Pcie 3.0 x4 mode and has some airflow blowing on to it.
> View attachment 269674
> ...


Hello. My drive has 300 gb free of 900gb. It is running in pci 3.0 mode like yours but there is a HUGE difference in write speed...Any ideea why ? Thanks



CatalinT said:


> Hello. My drive has 300 gb free of 900gb. It is running in pci 3.0 mode like yours but there is a HUGE difference in write speed...Any ideea why ? Thanks


Same test but now the drive has 463gb free out of 931gb.This makes a HUGE difference in write speeds.


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## Wirko (Nov 30, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> Hello. My drive has 300 gb free of 900gb. It is running in pci 3.0 mode like yours but there is a HUGE difference in write speed...Any ideea why ? Thanks
> 
> 
> Same test but now the drive has 463gb free out of 931gb.This makes a HUGE difference in write speeds.


Interesting. Around 700 MB/s is what W1zzard got once the SLC cache was exhausted. So your previous results might mean that a 2/3 full drive is unable to use the cache, or exhausts it in a very short time (much earlier than ATTO finishes its job), or something like that.


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 30, 2022)

Wirko said:


> Interesting. Around 700 MB/s is what W1zzard got once the SLC cache was exhausted. So your previous results might mean that a 2/3 full drive is unable to use the cache, or exhausts it in a very short time (much earlier than ATTO finishes its job), or something like that.


That sounds about right. There are limits to how far and effect the SLC cache can be.


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## DarrenW (Nov 30, 2022)

lexluthermiester said:


> Given that the NAND does seem to be the same, I think the change in controller can be forgiven.


I bought NV2 1TB from AliExpress for just $57.99. The nand is Intel 144L QLC. The BOM of Kingston entry level consumer SSD is not stable.


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## CatalinT (Nov 30, 2022)

So i guess its safe to say that the 2Tb version is the better choice if someone wants better performance. 
Its weird that i have to keep my drive half empty if i want better performance....


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## lexluthermiester (Nov 30, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> So i guess its safe to say that the 2Tb version is the better choice if someone wants better performance.
> Its weird that i have to keep my drive half empty if i want better performance....


Yes. But you can always partition less space so that the NAND controller always has enough unused space to have an SLC cache. For example: With a 1TB drive, only partition 900GB of it and leave the remainder unallocated. With a 2TB drive, partition 1800GB and leave the rest unallocated. You lose that space but maintain the SLC cache buffer performance. This doesn't work on all drives, but the newer DRAMless models which employ SLC caching schemes, like the Kingston, are highly likely too benefit from such a partitioning tactic.


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## CatalinT (Nov 30, 2022)

DarrenW said:


> I bought NV2 1TB from AliExpress for just $57.99. The nand is Intel 144L QLC. The BOM of Kingston entry level consumer SSD is not stable.
> View attachment 272247


It was about time for them to switch to qlc trash...At least the price is good but in my country i paid 65 euro for the tlc toshiba nand version...


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## W1zzard (Nov 30, 2022)

DarrenW said:


> Intel 144L QLC


Oh wow that sucks .. somehow I don't think it'll reach the quoted specs



http://imgur.com/ghjf1tK


Any lawyers here? could be a fun project .. I doubt any reasonable judge will buy the "up to" argument


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## Wirko (Nov 30, 2022)

lexluthermiester said:


> Yes. But you can always partition less space so that the NAND controller always has enough unused space to have an SLC cache. For example: With a 1TB drive, only partition 900GB of it and leave the remainder unallocated. With a 2TB drive, partition 1800GB and leave the rest unallocated. You lose that space but maintain the SLC cache buffer performance. This doesn't work on all drives, but the newer DRAMless models which employ SLC caching schemes, like the Kingston, are highly likely too benefit from such a partitioning tactic.


But what do you do if SLC caching (apparently) stops working while your SSD still has 300 GB free out of 900 GB total?

I do have a theory, stupid maybe, but here it is. The free space became very fragmented after a lot of writing and erasing of files. The fragmentation may be internal, not even visible to the OS. On the other hand, the pseudo-SLC caching requires a large unbroken chunk of storage space to work. A few GB, maybe tens of GB. That unbroken space didn't exist until @CatalinT removed ~160 GB. On the second benchmarking attempt, it was there, and pSLC could ingest the data very fast.

@W1zzard : testing the behaviour of the pSLC cache once again when the drive is 80% full would be a great addition to your set of SSD tests. It's a situation very much related to real-life use. It may be revealed that SSDs manage their pSLC poorly, meaning that they offer very little caching, or none at all, in this state.


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## CatalinT (Nov 30, 2022)

Write speed with Kingston 20% full and copying from Samsung 970 evo plus 1tb.


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## lexluthermiester (Dec 1, 2022)

Wirko said:


> But what do you do if SLC caching (apparently) stops working while your SSD still has 300 GB free out of 900 GB total?


Good question. I don't have an answer for you.



Wirko said:


> I do have a theory, stupid maybe, but here it is. The free space became very fragmented after a lot of writing and erasing of files. The fragmentation may be internal, not even visible to the OS. On the other hand, the pseudo-SLC caching requires a large unbroken chunk of storage space to work. A few GB, maybe tens of GB. That unbroken space didn't exist until @CatalinT removed ~160 GB. On the second benchmarking attempt, it was there, and pSLC could ingest the data very fast.


That is strange. There's got to be a logical answer.


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## Nas (Dec 1, 2022)

Hello! I got this drive yesterday for my laptop and this is the results:










The drive is working in PCIE 3.0 x4. Is this is a normal speed for the PCIE 3.0? Or i need to return it? (I got it for 30-40$) Thanks.


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## 50eurouser (Dec 1, 2022)

DarrenW said:


> I bought NV2 1TB from AliExpress for just $57.99. The nand is Intel 144L QLC. The BOM of Kingston entry level consumer SSD is not stable.


We predicted it when this model came out with the Endurance rating (TBW) that suspiciously low. Ninja switch always comes after the reviews, a review update now as QLC will be pretty nice btw to expose them once again. Even junk SM2263XT 1TB models have 600TBW now and up to 5y warranty, its pure non-sense to buy this one.


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## DarrenW (Dec 1, 2022)

DarrenW said:


> I bought NV2 1TB from AliExpress for just $57.99. The nand is Intel 144L QLC. The BOM of Kingston entry level consumer SSD is not stable.


Here are some details of my 1TB QLC NV2.

Packaging:




Totally different packaging.
On the label it says "Sales in China" in Chinese. Maybe a special edition only sales in China?

Chips under the label:



SM2267XT + Intel 144L QLC according to flash id.

I will run a quick test later.

Here are some benchmarks.
System - Colorful CVN B550M Gaming Frozen, AMD 5600X@4.6GHz all cores, 2x16GB 3200 C16 ballistix ram, Windows11 pro 21H2.
The disk is working in PCIE 4.0 x4 mode. Just behind my idle rtx3060ti, sharing a heatsink with the b550 chipset.
My case is good in ventilation and room temperature is 23 Celsius.




Disk info in CDI:




CDM of half full:






W1zzard said:


> somehow I don't think it'll reach the quoted specs


It actually meets the specs. Emm...... with SLC cache and pcie 4.0 bonus?

I have already installed an OS on this drive, so I can't run some large seq write benchmark on it.
Instead, I created a 200GB empty file in my pm981 connected to the chipset, using cmd "fsutil file createnew D:\test.bin 214748364800", and copy the file to NV2(half full).
Sorry for the Chinese in my system since I am a hardware enthusiast in China Mainland. Translation is attached.(And sorry for my poor grammar)






Write speed starts out at around 2.2 GB/s. Out of SLC cache at about 110GB, and speed dropped to approximately 130 MB/s.



It took 13min to finishing the 200GB file. Avg. speed is 262 MB/s.

Disk temperature in HWinfo during the whole test:


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## LeKai (Dec 1, 2022)

Just tested my NV2 1TB obtained from Walmart in the US. 

Flash ID says [SM2267XT] + Intel 144 layers QLC.  

Aida64 seems to have some issue recognizing it. Showing PhisonE19/E21 TLC/QLC.

Apparently, Kingston is starting to sale shit but in a TLC price now. Not sure if I can still return this to Walmart after it has been installed.


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## lexluthermiester (Dec 2, 2022)

Nas said:


> Hello! I got this drive yesterday for my laptop and this is the results:
> View attachment 272405View attachment 272406
> View attachment 272407


Nice results!


Nas said:


> The drive is working in PCIE 3.0 x4. Is this is a normal speed for the PCIE 3.0? Or i need to return it? (I got it for 30-40$) Thanks.


You're on a laptop. While some would say that shouldn't affect performance, it always does. Laptops and Desktops are in two different performance classes and always have been.High-end laptops can perform well enough to be considered a "desktop replacement" but it's never a perfectly fair comparison. 

Based on the numbers you've shown, you're getting very near the best you can expect from that drive in your system.

BTW, Welcome to TPU!


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## CatalinT (Dec 2, 2022)

This is the reply i got from kingston regarding qlc nand


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## chrcoluk (Dec 2, 2022)

Kingston do provide a means for the budget end of the market to get something affordable, but I think mixing TLC drives with QLC under the same model number isnt right.  If they couldnt afford to 100% TLC these drives, they all should have been QLC.


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## CatalinT (Dec 2, 2022)

Nas said:


> Hello! I got this drive yesterday for my laptop and this is the results:
> View attachment 272405View attachment 272406
> View attachment 272407
> 
> The drive is working in PCIE 3.0 x4. Is this is a normal speed for the PCIE 3.0? Or i need to return it? (I got it for 30-40$) Thanks.


I think i got a better score with as ssd. Please download this program SMI NVME SSD flash id by Ochkin Vadim and check the nand if its tlc or qlc. My as ssd score is 4927 so something is not right with your drive. My guess it is using qlc nand.


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## lexluthermiester (Dec 3, 2022)

chrcoluk said:


> but I think mixing TLC drives with QLC under the same model number isnt right.


Agreed. That's not ok.


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## teemuki (Dec 7, 2022)

DarrenW said:


> Here are some details of my 1TB QLC NV2.
> 
> Packaging:
> View attachment 272476
> ...


I've been getting similar performance out of my 2TB drive, though I am running it through Thunderbolt 3.

What makes me a bit confused is that I bought mine pretty early on - the chips suggest too that it is using the rebranded Toshiba 112L TLC.

When plugging the drive in, I get around 2GB/s sequential speeds, but after a while the write speeds drop to pretty pathetic numbers. During file transfer, it is pinned around 130MB/s, and it doesn't seem to recover its speed until I reinsert it.

I don't have a motherboard to test the drive on currently, but at least for my use case (editing drive) this SSD is not very good. I did expect a bit better, though.







teemuki said:


> I've been getting similar performance out of my 2TB drive, though I am running it through Thunderbolt 3.
> 
> What makes me a bit confused is that I bought mine pretty early on - the chips suggest too that it is using the rebranded Toshiba 112L TLC.
> 
> ...


Okay now I tested right after a reformat and the best I can get with this is 1800 read and 700 write. Might be a faulty drive, then.


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## CatalinT (Dec 7, 2022)

teemuki said:


> I've been getting similar performance out of my 2TB drive, though I am running it through Thunderbolt 3.
> 
> What makes me a bit confused is that I bought mine pretty early on - the chips suggest too that it is using the rebranded Toshiba 112L TLC.
> 
> ...


Or a qld nand one. How did you test the memory chips ? Peeld of the sticker or by software ?


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## lexluthermiester (Dec 7, 2022)

teemuki said:


> Okay now I tested right after a reformat and the best I can get with this is 1800 read and 700 write. Could be a faulty drive, then.


Or it could be a thunderbolt/nvme thing. Have you tested it natively in an nvme slot on a board/in a system?


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## teemuki (Dec 7, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> Or a qld nand one. How did you test the memory chips ? Peeld of the sticker or by software ?


I removed the sticker - SM2267XT is written on the controller and FB51208UCT1-B8 on the memory.


lexluthermiester said:


> Or it could be a thunderbolt/nvme thing. Have you tested it natively in an nvme slot on a board/in a system?


I haven't. It could be that too, though I cannot test this at the moment.


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## lexluthermiester (Dec 7, 2022)

teemuki said:


> I haven't. It could be that too, though I cannot test this at the moment.


You're going to want to test that to rule it out before returning it. They will run those tests and reject the return if they can't find a problem.


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## vmiki88 (Dec 11, 2022)

Chrispy_ said:


> Five times more expensive? What FUD and nonsense are you talking about?! - Decent "Editor's Choice Award" TLC drives are NOT more expensive: This NV2 and the excellent SN570 are both the same cost/TB as the QLC NAND options:


You are right, The WD Black SN750   2 TB drive only costs twice as much as the Kingston NV2 2 TB drive in my country...

Using my Intel 665p for two years now as a system/gaming drive, smart telling me that im hitting now the 32 TB total data written limit. I'm mostly using my computer for gaming, i have still a few HDD. Not everybody needs a tlc drive. But of course they are better but it's not worth it for me.

Thinking about that i'm gonna purchase a 2 Tb NV2 SSD as a secondary drive.


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## Chrispy_ (Dec 11, 2022)

vmiki88 said:


> You are right, The WD Black SN750   2 TB drive only costs twice as much as the Kingston NV2 2 TB drive in my country...
> 
> Using my Intel 665p for two years now as a system/gaming drive, smart telling me that im hitting now the 32 TB total data written limit. I'm mostly using my computer for gaming, i have still a few HDD. Not everybody needs a tlc drive. But of course they are better but it's not worth it for me.
> 
> Thinking about that i'm gonna purchase a 2 Tb NV2 SSD as a secondary drive.


Ugh, that's some horrible pricing - but yeah, presumably the NV1 and NV2 are similar prices for you like they are here? The NV2 is a vastly better drive (thanks, mainly, to TLC instead of QLC)

Also welcome to TPU - I can't say for sure how everyone here uses TPU's SSD testing data, but I always use the "relative performance" chart from the latest SSD review when looking to see if an SSD is good or bad. It's the first chart on this page at the moment:









						Kingston Fury Renegade Heatsink 2 TB Review
					

The Kingston Fury Renegade has been upgraded with a heatsink. Thanks to its solid metal construction, the heatsink can absorb a lot of heat and reduce temperatures considerably. Thermal testing in our review reveals that there is no thermal throttling, even when the drive is hit with hundreds of...




					www.techpowerup.com
				




If your regional pricing doesn't follow the US and Western Europe, you'll probably need to compare stuff manually rather than using the other two charts on that page, but IMO if an SSD scores less than 90% in the relative performance chart, then there's something wrong with it that requires further reading. It may be a good drive that's old, or it may have some serious use-case issues. 90% sounds like a high bar to pass, but application and system performance on Windows is almost entirely bottlenecked by software and CPU compression/decompression if the SSD is any good - so if an SSD that falls behind by any significant amount in the relative performance chart, it is actually so bad that it has problems big enough to notice _all the time_ in daily use.

That doesn't mean you shouldn't buy an SSD like the Crucial P1 (at 88% of the current fastest-tested drive) - it just means that there are several caveats. If you find one on sale for dirt-cheap, go and check out the review and see if you can live with its downsides, which for the P1 are overheating and abysmal performance if you fill the cache, which should be a rare occurrence unless you're using a laptop and the drive is almost full.


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## vmiki88 (Dec 11, 2022)

Chrispy_ said:


> Also welcome to TPU - I can't say for sure how everyone here uses TPU's SSD testing data, but I always use the "relative performance" chart from the latest SSD review when looking to see if an SSD is good or bad. It's the first chart on this page at the moment:


Dont know, writing back when im gonna using the NV2. 

The relative performance looks great actually.


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## Dasha (Dec 14, 2022)

To add a datapoint: I have a 500GB model of the NV2 I purchased 1 month ago. It is a SM2267XT with a Toshiba 112L TLC NAND.

Mainly using this NVME as a USB flash drive. I tried to use the Flash ID on the RTL9210B enclosure and it didn't work. I just plug it into my computer to get the drive specs.

I considered purchasing another 1TB NV2 for a friend's laptop since it stays relatively cool in an external  enclosure but I am hesitant now due to the QLC swap. I have a Crucial P5 and it stays extremely hot in an external enclosure and PC. For a laptop a TLC version of NV2 would have been great since it doesn’t generate as much heat.

Deciphering the NAND: It seems like the following might be an accurate way to decipher between TLC/QLC for the NV2 series.

*TLC drives has the following terms:*

*FxxxxxxUCT1*
500GB: FH12808UCT1 - Source: Attachment
1TB: FB25608UCT1 - Source: https://www.techpowerup.com/review/kingston-nv2-1-tb-m-2-nvme-ssd/2.html
2TB: FB25608UCT1 - Source: https://www.techporn.ph/kingston-nv2-pcie-4-nvme-2tb-ssd-review/
Note:
The Kingston A1000 series uses a similar code for TLC https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet...LpuxIVUKm07SXy45ddVcpnHtas/edit#gid=630251863


*QLC drives has the following terms:*

*FxxxxxxUCN1*
1TB:  FH25608UCN1 - Source: https://www.techpowerup.com/forums/threads/kingston-nv2-1-tb-m-2-nvme-ssd.298942/page-4
2TB: ?


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## wembley (Dec 15, 2022)

Where can I safely download this utility called: Flash ID? I'm about to buy a NV2 1TB. I wrote to a store to give me information about the controller and the type of memory, they didn't answer me


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## CatalinT (Dec 15, 2022)

wembley said:


> Where can I safely download this utility called: Flash ID? I'm about to buy a NV2 1TB. I wrote to a store to give me information about the controller and the type of memory, they didn't answer me











						SMI Flash ID reader v0.564a (smi_flash_id)
					

SMI Flash ID reader by Ochkin Vadim (VLO) - программа предназначена для определения конфигурации флеш-памяти у SSD дисков на контроллерах SMI SM224x/225x, например Adata SP610, также SD карт на конт...



					www.usbdev.ru
				



I got it from here and had no problems.

Please dont forget to share the result .


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## Aminoff (Dec 17, 2022)

today i bought 3x Kingston NV2 2Tb from newegg.ca and all 3 are QLC intel.
write speed suffer a lot after SLC cache.





v0.27a
OS: 10.0 build 17763 
Drive     : 1(NVME)
Scsi      : 4
Driver    : OFA
Model     : KINGSTON SNV2S2000G                     
Fw        : SBM02103
HMB       : 65536 - 65536 KB
Size      : 1907729 MB [2000.4 GB]
LBA Size  : 512
AdminCmd  : 0x00 0x01 0x02 0x04 0x05 0x06 0x08 0x09 0x0A 0x0C 0x10 0x11 0x14 0x80 0x84 0xC0 0xC1 0xC2 0xE0 0xE1
I/O Cmd   : 0x00 0x01 0x02 0x04 0x05 0x08 0x09
Controller:  [SM2267XT] bufferless
Bank00: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank01: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank02: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank03: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank04: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank05: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank06: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank07: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank08: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank09: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank10: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank11: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank12: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank13: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank14: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank15: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Channel: 4
CE     : 4
Plane  : 4
Die/Ce : 1
Ch map : 0x0F
CE map : 0x0F
Bit Per Cell  : (SLC)
Inter.        : 4
Pages/Block   : 9216(2304)
First Fblock  :    1
Total Fblock  :  258
Total Hblock  : 29809
Fblock Per Ce :  258
Fblock Per Die:  258
Original Spare Block Count :    21
Vendor Marked Bad Block    :     0
Bad Block From Pretest     :     5

SM2263XT Telemetry data:


----------



## lexluthermiester (Dec 18, 2022)

Aminoff said:


> today i bought 3x Kingston NV2 2Tb from newegg.ca and all 3 are QLC intel.
> write speed suffer a lot after SLC cache.
> 
> 
> ...


It should be noted that the 2TB model is different from the 1TB model, by design.


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## CatalinT (Dec 19, 2022)

lexluthermiester said:


> It should be noted that the 2TB model is different from the 1TB model, by design.


How is that ? Can you explain please ? Thanks


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## kapone32 (Dec 19, 2022)

lexluthermiester said:


> It should be noted that the 2TB model is different from the 1TB model, by design.


The 2TB Kingston NV2 is currently on sale for $144 Canadian ($105 US) at that price it is a great buy for the price. The truth about NVME is regardless of the drive it is difficult to measure the performance gap without long term use. It would be difficult to tell the difference between the 1 and 2 TB drives in daily use. The narrative has been very negative for QLC. I bought several Intel 660P 1 TB when they first launched and every one of them still works just fine. I have said this before but that narrative influences people to buy drives like the 870 QVO instead of drives like these which are fine. There is a post that it drops after writing about 110 GB of data and that is about the size of most modern Games. These are great drives for Game Libraries. I built a PC for a Customer using 2 of these (2TB) drives and a cheap Adata SX8200 512GB. The thing is I found a B550 Strix XE for $219 on Newegg so I put those in the expansion card (4.0) that comes with the MB and they got a nice 4TB RAID 0 card that gives about 6.5 GBs Sequential and maxes out Windows at it's 2.9 GB/s limit. It is possible the 5.0 drives may be able to go past that but that remains to be seen. What needs to happen now is 4 TB on the budget class of NVME and ultimately 8 TB in the range of $200 and $400 respectively. They can do it. Cost is BS as Kingston or Samsung or SK Hynix could easily make a 22110 M2 drive with that much NAND. Just about every single Motherboard with M2 would support that natively too. The new controllers have more than enough lanes to handle more NAND chips on the pcb.


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## papayoyo (Dec 19, 2022)

I have the 2TB NV2 bought in the UK, fitted internally in an Asus laptop... I can't get Flash ID to work no matter what I try... latest version v0.564a, run as administrator, tried in safe mode, with/without the "u" modifier, running the exe directly or through command line... always the error message "IOCtl: Identify failed 0x32!". Could it be a driver problem, or windows 11?

Benchmarks on the freshly formatted drive:


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## CatalinT (Dec 19, 2022)

papayoyo said:


> I have the 2TB NV2 bought in the UK, fitted internally in an Asus laptop... I can't get Flash ID to work no matter what I try... latest version v0.564a, run as administrator, tried in safe mode, with/without the "u" modifier, running the exe directly or through command line... always the error message "IOCtl: Identify failed 0x32!". Could it be a driver problem, or windows 11?
> 
> Benchmarks on the freshly formatted drive:
> 
> ...


I guess you have the TLC version based on your scores...


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## lexluthermiester (Dec 19, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> How is that ? Can you explain please ? Thanks


Sure. Same form-factor + different capacity = different NAND chips + different NAND controller + different PCB design


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## Dasha (Dec 19, 2022)

papayoyo said:


> I have the 2TB NV2 bought in the UK, fitted internally in an Asus laptop... I can't get Flash ID to work no matter what I try... latest version v0.564a, run as administrator, tried in safe mode, with/without the "u" modifier, running the exe directly or through command line... always the error message "IOCtl: Identify failed 0x32!". Could it be a driver problem, or windows 11?
> 
> Benchmarks on the freshly formatted drive:
> 
> ...



i used http://vlo.name:3000/ssdtool/

try both phison and smi


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## kapone32 (Dec 20, 2022)

Went do some Appliance shopping with the Wife and Mother in Law. After they were finished they wanted to go to the Dollar Store. Right beside the Dollar store was a Memory Express. While they were in there is was dispatched to find a Mouse and Keyboard set for my nephew. I picked up a headset for my niece as well and when I was waiting for the associate to get my headset I saw the NV2 on sale. I ended up getting a 1 TB ($72) and will be happy to test it against the 2 TB variant.


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## papayoyo (Dec 21, 2022)

I worked out how to get Flash ID working - had to disable VMD in BIOS.

Results for my 2TB NV2 posted previously... It's QLC...

Drive     : 1(NVME)
Scsi      : 1
IOCtl: NVME_OF failed 0x1!
Driver    : W10
Model     : KINGSTON SNV2S2000G
Fw        : SBM02103
HMB       : 65536 - 65536 KB (Enabled, 64 M)
Size      : 1907729 MB [2000.4 GB]
LBA Size  : 512
Controller:  [SM2267XT] bufferless
Bank00: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank01: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank02: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank03: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank04: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank05: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank06: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank07: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank08: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank09: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank10: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank11: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank12: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank13: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank14: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Bank15: 0x89,0xd3,0xac,0x32,0xc6,0x0,0x0,0x0 - Intel 144L QLC 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die
Channel: 4
CE     : 4
Plane  : 4
Die/Ce : 1
Ch map : 0x0F
CE map : 0x0F
Bit Per Cell  : (SLC)
Inter.        : 4
Pages/Block   : 9216(2304)
First Fblock  :    1
Total Fblock  :  258
Total Hblock  : 29809
Fblock Per Ce :  258
Fblock Per Die:  258
Original Spare Block Count :    21
Vendor Marked Bad Block    :     0
Bad Block From Pretest     :     6
IOCtl: NVME_W10_GetLog 0x45d!


----------



## papayoyo (Dec 23, 2022)

Here are the sustained write & read speeds on my 2TB QLC NV2.

Compared to the reviewed drive and the results posted earlier by member cts, the QLC sustained writes in particular are pretty abysmal. It took 5 hours to fully write to the 2TB QLC drive, vs 34 minutes for the 1TB TLC drive.

QLC is around a quarter the speed of TLC  in sustained writes (bottoming out at 80MB/s when cache is full - slower than a modern mechanical drive)
QLC is around two thirds the speed of TLC in sustained reads.

Also, speeds are strangely fluctuating up & down with this drive.


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## arandjele (Dec 23, 2022)

KINGSTON SNV2S500G, came today:

v0.27a
OS: 10.0 build 22621 
Drive     : 2(NVME)
Scsi      : 1
Driver    : W10
Model     : KINGSTON SNV2S500G                      
Fw        : SBI02102
HMB       : 65536 - 65536 KB (Enabled, 64 M)
Size      : 476940 MB [500.1 GB]
LBA Size  : 512
AdminCmd  : 0x00 0x01 0x02 0x04 0x05 0x06 0x08 0x09 0x0A 0x0C 0x10 0x11 0x14 0x80 0x84 0xC0 0xC1 0xC2 0xE0 0xE1
I/O Cmd   : 0x00 0x01 0x02 0x04 0x05 0x08 0x09
Controller:  [SM2267XT] bufferless
Bank00: 0x98,0x3e,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 512Gb/CE 512Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank01: 0x98,0x3e,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 512Gb/CE 512Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank02: 0x98,0x3e,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 512Gb/CE 512Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank03: 0x98,0x3e,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 512Gb/CE 512Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank08: 0x98,0x3e,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 512Gb/CE 512Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank09: 0x98,0x3e,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 512Gb/CE 512Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank10: 0x98,0x3e,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 512Gb/CE 512Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank11: 0x98,0x3e,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 512Gb/CE 512Gb/die 2Plane/die
Channel: 4
CE     : 2
Plane  : 2
Die/Ce : 1
Ch map : 0x0F
CE map : 0x05
Bit Per Cell  : (TLC)
Inter.        : 2
Pages/Block   : 1344(448)
First Fblock  :    1
Total Fblock  : 1662
Total Hblock  : 29809
Fblock Per Ce : 1662
Fblock Per Die: 1662
Original Spare Block Count :    28
Vendor Marked Bad Block    :     0
Bad Block From Pretest     :    15
IOCtl: NVME_W10_GetLog 0x45d!

SM2263XT Telemetry data:


----------



## Dasha (Dec 24, 2022)

arandjele said:


> KINGSTON SNV2S500G, came today:
> 
> v0.27a
> OS: 10.0 build 22621
> ...



i like how our 500GB models are both TLC


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## MrTPU (Dec 26, 2022)

Summary of _actual _state:

reviews
most of the reviewers got test samples from Taiwan built before y22cw40 equipped with faster TLC memory
an exception is the computerbase.de test for example, they got an 2GB, Taiwan, 2243 with SMI & TLC with 002.A00G and Firmware SBK00104

speed
QLC memory random write speed is lower, example *1TB, SMI, CDM8.04 (1GB), RND4K Q32T1*
*QLC: 295*, see #78
*TLC: 490* , see #47
the values differ depending from drive size and general conditions (test programm, hardware) - example: computerbase.de test results on_ 2TB TLC: 344_

from general specs the Phison controller should be a little bit faster than the SMI

used memory
option 1) install the ssd and use a software tool to see what memory is used, see #103 (you have to use the right programm for your controller otherwise you will get an error message and no result)
for SMI controller: "SMI NVME SSD flash id v0.27a"
for Phison controller: "Phison NVME SSD flash id" (working with E21 not confirmed)

option 2) when removing the sticker (warranty void) it is possible to distinguish the used memory, see #93
TLC drives has memory 'Toshiba 122 BiCS5' with the following terms: FxxxxxxUCT1
QLC drives has memory 'Intel 144L QLC' with the following terms: FxxxxxxUCN1


used controller
option 1) the PCBs for SMI and Phison can be visually distinguished:
SM2267XT controller has many semiconductor components below the memory chips, see #41
Phison E21T controller has only a few components below the memory chips, see techpowerup example

option 2) when removing the sticker (warranty void) it is possible to distinguish the used controller, see #93


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## eddyzor (Dec 27, 2022)

Hello guys 
I'm bringing some contents from french markets.






						SSD interne M.2 NVMe Kingston NV2 (SNV2S/2000G) - 2 To, PCIe 4.0, 3D NAND – Dealabs.com
					






					www.dealabs.com
				








						SSD interne M.2 NVMe Kingston NV2 (SNV2S/2000G) - 2 To, PCIe 4.0, 3D NAND – Dealabs.com
					






					www.dealabs.com
				




Both are QLC, bought on Amazon France


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## CatalinT (Dec 27, 2022)

eddyzor said:


> Hello guys
> I'm bringing some contents from french markets.
> 
> 
> ...


I think it is safe now to say that ALL NV2 are QLC nand.


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## Relaxaflexer (Dec 27, 2022)

In december I bought at Alternate (EU) a Kingston NV2, 2000GB / 2TB SSD and placed it in a Deskmini A300 as a secondary SSD without cooling.
Therefore speeds may not be optimal. Also I could not get the SMI info working. Synthetic CDM seems very good. Aida64 write is much lower.
I cannot explain the 1000 MB/s difference in maximum write speed between Crystaldiskmark and Aida64.


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## MonsterMMORPG (Dec 27, 2022)

I also recently purchased Kingston NV2 M.2 NVMe SSD. It is a beast. Made comparison tests and review with SanDisk Ultra M.2 NVMe 3D. But unfortunately not allowed to post links here.

TL; DR  a very worthy SSD for its price


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## MrTPU (Dec 27, 2022)

@Relaxaflexer Do you have a picture of the SSD sticker/ do know the production date/firmware version?


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## Relaxaflexer (Dec 28, 2022)

MrTPU said:


> @Relaxaflexer Do you have a picture of the SSD sticker/ do know the production date/firmware version?


The Firmware number is, SBM02103.
Data from CD info.

Edit:
Something strange happened today. I had to format the Kingston 2TB NV2 for the second time. Windows 10 would not recognize it anymore as a working disk. 
If this is normal after a write run of Aida64 then pls. let me know.


----------



## insraq (Dec 29, 2022)

I will provide another data point. I have purchased a 2TB version from a Nordic reseller. It's TLC with SM2267XT controller.


```
Drive     : 0(NVME)
Scsi      : 1
IOCtl: NVME_OF failed 0x1!
Driver    : W10
Model     : KINGSTON SNV2S2000G
Fw        : SBK00104
HMB       : 65536 - 65536 KB (Enabled, 64 M)
Size      : 1907729 MB [2000.4 GB]
LBA Size  : 512
Controller:  [SM2267XT] bufferless
Bank00: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank01: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank02: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank03: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank04: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank05: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank06: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank07: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank08: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank09: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank10: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank11: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank12: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank13: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank14: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank15: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Channel: 4
CE     : 4
Plane  : 2
Die/Ce : 1
Ch map : 0x0F
CE map : 0x0F
Bit Per Cell  : (TLC)
Inter.        : 4
Pages/Block   : 1344(448)
First Fblock  :    1
Total Fblock  : 3222
Total Hblock  : 29809
Fblock Per Ce : 3222
Fblock Per Die: 3222
Original Spare Block Count :    28
Vendor Marked Bad Block    :     0
Bad Block From Pretest     :    46
IOCtl: NVME_W10_GetLog 0x45d!
```


----------



## CatalinT (Dec 29, 2022)

Relaxaflexer said:


> The Firmware number is, SBM02103.
> Data from CD info.
> 
> Edit:
> ...


Could you post a screenshot with the error that windows show ?



CatalinT said:


> Could you post a screenshot with the error that windows show ?


You tried the windows disk management utility ?


----------



## Relaxaflexer (Dec 30, 2022)

CatalinT said:


> Could you post a screenshot with the error that windows show ?
> 
> 
> You tried the windows disk management utility ?


Sorry, I don't have screenshots of these events.

What happened was:

Installed the SSD. It popped up in windows that it had to be formatted. I did format it (quick NTFS) under disk management. Did some speedtests with CDM and Aida64.
The next day to my surprise the disk did not appear in my computer: disks. So I looked in disk management and there the disk was seen as not formatted or initialized. 
Formatted it again and now the format seems to be "holding". Never had this B4 in 35 years of harddrives and SSD management. So I figured maybe Aida64 causes this?

Have to say that this SSD is not installed very good. Could not find a screw, so its held in place with tape and it has no cooling at all, not even airflow.


----------



## papayoyo (Dec 30, 2022)

Relaxaflexer said:


> Sorry, I don't have screenshots of these events.
> 
> What happened was:
> 
> ...



This is normal with Aida64. It warns "write tests will destory all data on this drive". Just intialise and format the drive again.


----------



## Relaxaflexer (Jan 2, 2023)

Thanks for the info on Aida64 @papayoyo

Finally I managed to find out my 2TB Kingston NV2 has intel QLC 144L chips with the SM2267XT controller.
Could not copy the text or make a screenshot though.
Also I did some copy tests from the boot drive SS 970 Evo, with Windows explorer original and with Extreme Copy pro.
Both show write speeds up to 2800 MB/s. So that is a lot faster then Aida64 was showing as a max speed: 1880 MB/s.
I cannot explain the speed difference between Aida64 and Real copy tests. Also I cannot explain why this NV2 is twice as fast as @papayoyo 's NV2?


----------



## papayoyo (Jan 2, 2023)

Relaxaflexer said:


> I cannot explain why this NV2 is twice as fast as @papayoyo 's NV2?



Yes, this is strange, for two apparently identical 2TB QLC drives . Could be driver related? I'm using Intel RST VMD driver. Check yours in device manager > storage controllers


----------



## Relaxaflexer (Jan 2, 2023)

papayoyo said:


> Yes, this is strange, for two apparently identical 2TB QLC drives . Could be driver related? I'm using Intel RST VMD driver. Check yours in device manager > storage controllers


I looked in Device manager. It only says Microsoft for NVM Express storage controller and Standard NVM express controller.
It's on a AR deskmini AMD AM4 A300 board. AM4 is S.O.C. based so almost everything is on the CPU and not on the board. It seems there are no AMD NVME controllers in W10.

I am not saying you should or if its possible (or risky?) but maybe you can get better results with the standard W10 Microsoft NVME controller?
Then there is also the M.2 slot that the SSD is placed in. Sometimes secondary M.2 slots have less bandwidth or have combined (key B, M) features for both Sata and NVMe?


----------



## Wirko (Jan 2, 2023)

papayoyo said:


> Yes, this is strange, for two apparently identical 2TB QLC drives . Could be driver related? I'm using Intel RST VMD driver. Check yours in device manager > storage controllers


Do you remember how full your NV2 was before you ran the Aida64 write benchmark? Also, same question to @Relaxaflexer .

Here's my assumption. The more data the drive contains before the start of the test, the more time it will take during the test to erase that data. Erasing is slow and it's inevitable before writing, whether it's files within a file system within a partition or just test data that ignores any file system and partitions.

If you ever decide to burn some precious TBW and run the benchmark again, make sure the drive is (mostly) empty beforehand and give it enough time to digest the TRIM commands and (hopefully) erase all the stuff. A few hours would seem right because that's as much as your last Aida64 run took.


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## papayoyo (Jan 2, 2023)

Wirko said:


> Do you remember how full your NV2 was before you ran the Aida64 write benchmark? Also, same question to @Relaxaflexer .
> 
> Here's my assumption. The more data the drive contains before the start of the test, the more time it will take during the test to erase that data. Erasing is slow and it's inevitable before writing, whether it's files within a file system within a partition or just test data that ignores any file system and partitions.
> 
> If you ever decide to burn some precious TBW and run the benchmark again, make sure the drive is (mostly) empty beforehand and give it enough time to digest the TRIM commands and (hopefully) erase all the stuff. A few hours would seem right because that's as much as your last Aida64 run took.



It was freshly formatted and empty, just before the Aida64 write test. Previously there was about 20GB written to it. Not sure if this matters? Might try again with a 24-hour gap to let TRIM do it's thing.


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## Relaxaflexer (Jan 3, 2023)

My NV2 was New, Formatted and never had any data on it before the Aida64 test.
After Aida64 and a second format the NV2 was 1000 MB/s faster in real life write tests.


----------



## Wirko (Jan 3, 2023)

I need a better theory then. Thanks to both of you!


----------



## SeBoLeX (Jan 5, 2023)

Just got this SDD. Any chance to verify is this TLC or QLC without unboxing?


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## x-ray (Jan 5, 2023)

SeBoLeX said:


> Just got this SDD. Any chance to verify is this TLC or QLC without unboxing?
> 
> View attachment 277704View attachment 277705



Quite a good chance for TLC. I've tested very similiar 2TB version bought a few days ago for around 125 euro.
It has confirmed TLC flash chips with SMI NVME SSD flash id utility:

v0.27a
OS: 10.0 build 19044 
Drive     : 2(NVME)
Scsi      : 1
Driver    : W10
Model     : KINGSTON SNV2S2000G                     
Fw        : SBK00104
HMB       : 65536 - 65536 KB (Enabled, 64 M)
Size      : 1907729 MB [2000.4 GB]
LBA Size  : 512
AdminCmd  : 0x00 0x01 0x02 0x04 0x05 0x06 0x08 0x09 0x0A 0x0C 0x10 0x11 0x14 0x80 0x84 0xC0 0xC1 0xC2 0xE0 0xE1
I/O Cmd   : 0x00 0x01 0x02 0x04 0x05 0x08 0x09
Controller:  [SM2267XT] bufferless
Bank00: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank01: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank02: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank03: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank04: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank05: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank06: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank07: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank08: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank09: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank10: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank11: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank12: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank13: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank14: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Bank15: 0x98,0x48,0x98,0x3,0x76,0xe4,0x8,0x16 - Toshiba 112L BiCS5 TLC 16k 1024Gb/CE 1024Gb/die 2Plane/die
Channel: 4
CE     : 4
Plane  : 2
Die/Ce : 1
Ch map : 0x0F
CE map : 0x0F
Bit Per Cell  : (TLC)
Inter.        : 4
Pages/Block   : 1344(448)
First Fblock  :    1
Total Fblock  : 3222
Total Hblock  : 29809
Fblock Per Ce : 3222
Fblock Per Die: 3222
Original Spare Block Count :    28
Vendor Marked Bad Block    :     0
Bad Block From Pretest     :     9
IOCtl: NVME_W10_GetLog 0x45d!

SM2263XT Telemetry data:


After pseudoSLC buffer this drive achieves around 450-500 MB/s sustained write.


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## DrCR (Saturday at 7:14 PM)

SeBoLeX said:


> Just got this SDD. Any chance to verify is this TLC or QLC without unboxing?
> 
> View attachment 277704



The bottom-right corner appears to matches the photos from #41 and #78.

So if I've read this thread correctly so far, it's using the SM2267XT controller, not the Phison controller.

Which means ... it might be QLC but can't that can't be deduced until after opening the package? I'm fuzzy on this aspect. Maybe there's a visual difference, sticker in place and package unopened, between SM2267XT QLC and SM2267XT TLC that I'm not as of yet aware.


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