ADATA S511 240GB SSD Review (Sandforce 2281)

Solid State Drives are selling well in 2011, with a growing percentage of enthusiast users adopting one as a fast, primary boot drive. A few weeks ago we reviewed the OCZ Vertex 3 240GB drive, and today we will compare it against the ADATA S511 240GB, a hot new model set to offer the same stunning levels of performance, but at a slightly lower price point.

Performance levels are quoted at up to 525MB/s read and 500 MB/s write, which, like the Vertex 3 are staggeringly good. 4k random write performance is also rated at a very sexy 60,000 IOPS.

When compared to the last generation of drives, these are 90 percent faster on paper. As we said before, last year many had assumed that the SATA 6 Gbps interface had plenty of life left in it, but with these latest drives, the 600 MB/s limitations are already under question.

The ADATA S511 we are reviewing today uses the SF-2281 controller which offers TCG OPAL security with 256bit AES encryption and an improved ECC engine (capable of correcting up to 55 bits per 512 byte sector).

All of the SandForce SF-2000 series controllers still utilise the patented DuraWrite technology, on the fly compression which reduces the size of the data written to the drive. When this is paired up with wear leveling and intelligent block management the drive will require fewer write cycles during regular use.

We have the first sample hot from the factory, so let us see how it performs.

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