Testing (continued):

HD Tune Pro 3.50:

HD Tune Pro was the first test to be executed. This benchmark application allows for a quick and easy assessment of the performance of just about any hard drive (or SSD obviously). Higher results are better for average, minimum, maximum, and burst speeds, while lower scores are better for access time.

The first chart takes a look at the results from the "Read" portion of the test. While the Kingston SSD doesn't have the best burst speed of the bunch, it puts up the best numbers in the other four fields, and these are of greater interest to me than the burst speed.

      

Strong reading performance is a nice start, but having strong writing performance may be more critical in an HTPC application (as well as elsewhere). The next chart takes a look at the results from the "Write" portion of HD Tune Pro 3.50. This time around the burst speed is still the lowest, but the average and maximum write speeds are the highest. Minimum write speed dips pretty far down, perhaps a bit farther than I would have expected, but it could have been one brief blip, especially considering how close the average is to the maximum.

      

The drive is rated for 100MB/s read and 80MB/s write, and at least according to HD Tune Pro it is able to meet these figures. Not mentioned yet is the access time. What the traditional hard drives take 16-22ms to accomplish, this SSD does in just 0.2ms. We're talking about being 80 to 110 times faster.