The line between Gen4 and Gen5 performance is still very blurry, it would seem. In some cases a mid-tier Gen3 drive does everything at about the same speed.
If there weren't so many issues with Gen5, ie the need for a premium, expensive motherboard, the need for a lot of cooling, and the high cost of the devices, then it would make more sense - but until there are more tangible benefits to offset all the drawbacks, 'bragging rights' would appear to be the only reason to care about buying a Gen5 SSD.
The WD SN580 and Lexar NM790 still remain as the most sensible choice. You geat nearly the same real-world performance with none of the Gen5 drawbacks, at a bargain price - and laptop compatibility since both of them perform well without heatsinks.
The median result of all the various pages of graphs looks something like this:
View attachment 346689
...and if you could use any of those drives, ranging from overpriced flagships to old, discontinued mid-tier gen3 drives and ultra-budge QLC drives, does it really matter about performance in a huge file copy you might do once or twice a month, and it's very likely not a time-sensitive operation?
What matters is cost, heat, power, reliability, compatibility - and Gen5 drives so far fail on all fronts.
