Crucial MX200 SSD Review (500GB/1TB)

POWER CONSUMPTION

For our power consumption testing, we have the drive connected to the system as a secondary drive. To record the wattage, we use an Amprobe AM-270 multimeter connected in line with the 5v power on our SATA power cable to the drive. The multimeter records the min/max amperage draw from the drive over our testing period.

We also record the drive’s sequential and random read and write power draw using Iometer. We then take the values recorded and calculate the wattage of the drive. Some of the results may seem high compared to a standard notebook HDD because as these are peak values under load. When we see average power draw, SSDs are still more power efficient because they only hit max power for a short period of time.

Crucial MX200s Power Consumption

Based upon the rating on the MX200s’ stickers, the max power consumption is rated for up to 8.5W. In testing we found they were able to stay well under this value. Max draw was under 5W. At idle they consumed very little power at 60 and 65 milliwatts respectfully. This is very good for those who plan on putting this SSD in a laptop, Ultrabook, or tablet.

REPORT ANALYSIS AND FINAL THOUGHTS

While the MX200’s performance in our synthetic test was great and we were even able to hit just under 100K random read IOPs, PCMark 8 revealed a drop in performance compared to the cheaper MX100 during the recovery phase, which is most important as it represents consumer workloads. However, it showed that the MX200 carried over a similar, but improved performance pattern of the Micron M600. During our power testing, we found that the MX200 had very good idle power consumption at only 60mW and 65mW respectively.

Crucial MX200 500GB Final

While we feel that the Crucial MX200 series offers consumers a good bang for their buck from the inclusion of migration software, 7mm to 9.5″ spacer and features; it could be priced a bit more competitively. It’s just at this price point we would like to see a bit more performance over their MX100 line and a longer warranty. However, keep in mind, they have also released the new BX100 series to compete in the low-end/entry level market, so the price increase over it and the MX100 is understandable. And, the endurance rating for these new MX200 SSDs further validate the price premium as it is significantly higher than their predecessor’s. This alone helps to differentiate this drive from their MX100 line.

At the end of the day, the MX200 is mid-tier performing SSD packed with a ton of enterprise features that improve reliability. The fact that Crucial has broadened their form factors to include both M.2 and mSATA to cover a larger market is a smart move on their part. This time around the MX200 introduces Micron’s Dynamic Write Acceleration feature under a Crucial branded SSD. With less parallelism going on, the less performance the SSD can sustain, however, while we weren’t able to test out the difference between an SSD in this new series which had this feature, performance between them should be very similar. It is a great feature to include, especially considering how few NAND packages the smaller form factors have.

The last time a Crucial MX series SSD went through our Test Bench it won the Top Value award with ease. However, this time around, their higher end MX200 2.5″ SSDs are awarded our Silver Seal!

Check out the Crucial MX200 SSDs on Amazon Today!

TSSDR Silver Seal Opt

Review Overview

Build and Components
SSD Performance
Price and Availability
Features
Warranty

Higher Endurance at a Cost

Yet again, Crucial's latest SSD builds upon their past and introduces a new feature, Dynamic Write Acceleration, which has allowed them to dramatically increase this SSD's endurance rating. The Crucial MX200 is packed with a ton of features including AES 256-bit Encryption, power-loss protection, and even DevSleep support. If you are in the market for a feature rich and reliable SSD, Crucial's MX200 may be one to consider.

User Rating: 2.05 ( 105 votes)

18 comments

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    It is obvious that you do not always need the 7mm to 9.5mm spacer. When is a spacer typically necessary? I just replaced two 9.5mm drives with 7mm drives; neither 7mm drive came with a spacer and neither needed a spacer. Micron kind of says the spacer is included so you will have it if you need it.

    Jim

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    Hey Les, long time reader (love the site). Quick question-most of my reading is done to determine which SSDs can help us most in HD video capture & transfer (raw uncompressed). We typically use the Blackmagic Speed Test to determine where a SSD stands before buying. Which of the test that you guys typically run gives me the closest indication to the Blackmagic test? (i.e. which will let me know best how the SSD performs under the test of raw uncompressed data) Thanks 🙂

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    So if you were deciding between the M550 and the MX200 (in 500gb form), which would be the better choice? Assume prices are either exactly the same or not a factor in the decision.

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    Finally, Crucial has released a firmware update to address the problems with the MX100 drives. I haven’t been successful yet in applying the update, as is noted by many on their forum, but I thought it would be good to post the info here (since I decided to get two MX100’s as a result of the review on this site):

    https://forum.crucial.com/t5/Crucial-SSDs/Feedback-Thread-Firmware-MU02-for-MX100/td-p/165974

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    Sean why don’t the MX200 recover in the PCMark 8 test????
    Is this deferred GC or are we stuck with those low speeds????

    • blank

      Those are the speeds it produced going through the test. Due to the firmware it doesn’t seem that it is able to recover quick enough to perform better in the light workloads within the time frame. However, wasn’t developed to deal with constant writes such as are issued out in the PCMark 8 consistency test, thus it doesn’t do too well in it. Our run in PCMark Vantage shows that it does perform a lot better if it isn’t constantly strained. So real world you shouldn’t have much to worry about.

  6. blank

    Nice review. Here is a comparison with Crucial M552! Which is the best ?

    https://www.techwarn.com/crucial-mx200-vs-m550-review/

  7. blank

    Nice Piece of information for the concerned people

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