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It is not often that we start a report off speaking to the interior components of an SSD. This is that exception so bear with us as this will play out very well. Last June, we attended Computex and discovered a new PCIe 5.0 SSD controller by SMI, the SM2504XT. Its extremely small footprint tied into great performance, while having such a low power rating, meant that we may have found our first truly high power low heat Gen5 SSD controller. We left Computex with an engineering sample of that SM2540XT in hand and couldn’t wait to start testing.
Through our testing, we discovered that this DRAMless Gen 5 SSD could achieve just under 12GB/s data transfer speeds and over 1.5 million IOPS, all the while maintaining a very cool operating temperature and having an active power rating of only 2.4w. Could we have found the perfect laptop SSD? Our initial test regimen seemed to think so but that wasn’t enough. We threw our best SSDs into the mix and then published ‘The Ultimate Laptop Battery Test‘ How do you think the SMI SM2504XT Gen5 engineering sample stacked up to the rest?
We already knew the SM2504XT would not stand up to the speed of such power hungry SSDs as the Samsung Pro 9100, SanDisk SN8100 and Crucial 710, but that wasn’t our interest. We were seeking the best laptop SSD in the world. For that, we needed to find a fast, cool running SSD that would achieve great battery life. We spent days conducting in depth laptop battery testing and this was the result. You can click on the chart to enlarge:
At first, you may believe that the Silicon Motion SM2504XT placed third in our PCMark 10 Battery Life/Performance Analysis, but look closer. The SM2504XT not only pulled through with better performance than the top two, but also, it did so at a much lower 2.4 watt active power rating according to its specifications. This means a longer lasting, high performing and much cooler SSD for the laptop. One might actually consider that the SMI SM2504XT came out on top in this test… and thats what brings us to our exclusive review of the Acer FA300 Gen5 2TB SSD today.
To be completely transparent… As of the date of this report, the Acer FA300 Gen 5 SSD is just now being released in European and Asian markets and will be released closer to home in the near future. For now, this just may be the only one on North American soil this morning. The FA300 is a PCIe 5.0 (Gen5) X4 (4-lane) 2280 form factor (22mm wide x 80mm long) SSD that uses the latest NVMe 2.0 operating protocol.
It will be available in one and two terabyte versions and listed specifications speak to 11GB/s read for both, 10GB/s write for the 2TB and 9.4GB/s for the 1TB version with up to 1.7 million IOPS. This is Acers first Gen5 release and aimed at being a value driven SSD. Although this just may be the perfect laptop SSD, it would be just as comfortable situated in a PS5 console.
Our 2TB FA300 sample contains only three chips on its black PCB, two 1TB KIOXIA BiCS8 218-layer TLC 3D NAND flash memory chips and the SMI SM2504XT Gen5 SSD controller. This is a DRAMless SSD which means that there is no onboard DRAM chip used for caching mapping data. This is a good thing, especially in recent times, where that DRAM chip would add significantly to SSD cost. Instead, the needed cache memory comes by way of your PC’s onboard memory in the Host Memory Buffer (HMB).
If you have read our Acer FA200 Gen4 SSD report, BIWIN manufactured the FA200 with QLC NAND which has become the norm in todays SSDs, both for capacity and value. Quite frankly, one could say that the combination of the SM2504XT Gen5 SSD controller with KIOXIA BiCS8 TLC NAND is a mark of ‘BIWIN brilliance’.
This is a single sided SSD, which paired with the very small SM2504XT SSD controller, promises to be a low power and much cooler running SSD than the norm. This speaks directly to an improved battery life. Although pricing and availability has yet to be set in North America, we should see it in Europe and Asia very soon. Our Amazon links will automatically direct you to the appropriate countries Amazon website. Check out FA300 availability and pricing here.
Now let’s take a look at performance…