REVIEW: 2TB Mercury Electra MAX SSD by Other World Computing
Originally posted February 11th, 2016 by rob-ART morgan, mad scientist
OWC just started shipping a 2TB version of the Mercury Electra 6Gbps SSD they call "The MAX." To squeeze out the maximum transfer speed, we tested it the PCIe slot of our 2010 Mac Pro.
GRAPH LEGEND
Electra 2TB = OWC 2TB Mercury Electra MAX 6G SSD mounted on the OWC Accelsior S PCIe card
Samsung 2TB = Samsung 2TB 850 Pro 6G SSD mounted on the OWC Accelsior S PCIe card
Tiger 2TB = TransIntl 2TB Tiger 6G SSD mounted on the OWC Accelsior S PCIe card
Test mule was a 2010 Mac Pro 6-core running OS X El Capitan. OWC Accelsior S PCIe SSD adapter was installed in PCIe x4 Slot 3.
LARGE SEQUENTIAL TRANSFER TEST
We used AJA System Test to benchmark file level sequential transfer speed using a 16GB test size. LONGEST graph bar means the fastest overall in Megabytes per Second.
SMALL RANDOM TRANSFER TEST
The QuickBench small random test uses 4K to 1024K test sizes. Though large sequential benchmarks are impressive, OS X and many apps perform small random read/write actions. LONGEST graph bar means the fastest overall in Megabytes per Second.
WHAT DID WE LEARN?
The Mercury Electra MAX 6G SSD joins the 'two terabyte SSD club' with plenty of speed, competitive pricing, and OS independent wear, space, and error management.
The Electra MAX does NOT require external TRIM support from OS X. It does global wear leveling, free space management, error correction, and advanced encryption independently of Mac OS X. You do NOT need to use the 'trimforce enable' command to trigger TRIM support for the Electra MAX. It is engineered to supersede the need for OS X directed TRIM.
If you are currently using SSDs that need TRIM support enabled (using 'trimforce enable' command), that will NOT have any effect on the Electra MAX and other OWC SSDs that built-in functions that supercede TRIM. However be sure you have the latest firmware update applied to your OWC SSD.
NOTE: The Electra MAX is designed to be used internally. It does not work in external enclosures at this time.
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WHERE TO BUY THE 2TB MERCURY ELECTRA MAX SSD
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