With the right system and drivers, you can hit upwards of 600 MBps for real-world workloads. At this price point, I don't think there is a better performer. The SanDisk Extreme 900 also performs similarly.
No doubt the unit could do with better thermal design, but, transferring upwards of 250GB of data within a short time duration (that causes temperature of the metal case to reach 46C) is, I would imagine, not a frequent use-case.
Netac is already aware of the need for a better thermal solution.
Yeah, I think if they just added a thermal pad that would let the heat transfer away to the case from the pertinent chops quicker than through the PCB and open air to the case would go a long way in keeping the device cooler overall.
I did that with a 2.5" external spinning HDD that was getting too hot; put a thermal pad between its base and the metal USB 3.0 case. That kept it about 15C cooler than the cloth pad(!) they had glued in there, and kept vibrations down as well.
A common misconception with mSATA SSD's is their thermal profile.
They run incredibly hot. My Samsung 840 mSATA SSD idles at 47 degrees C with a load temp in the low 60's.
It's been this way for years and hasn't failed. Samsung, Lite On and Micron all rate their OEM SSD's at a working temp of 0-75C. Yes, 75 Celsius is actually within design specifications!
A lot of it has to do with the PCB. The shape of the mSATA SSD, in addition to it operating at a higher voltage than m2, create a less efficient therma design. But that doesn't make it unreliable, just unusual as far as why we consider the 'norm' for storage temperatures which have historically considered 30-40C to be ideal.
But interestingly even Backblaze has shown in their reliability survey (which I have always found unrealistic because it only considers cold storage applications) that 'high' hard disk temperatures have little correlation to reliability even when approaching 50C. In fact it is low temperatures, below 30C, that have a connection to disk failure. Not unreasonable evidence when you think about the thermal dynamics of spinning metal disks; metals wears less at higher temperatures...bearings, motors, etc.
I understand SSD's are entirely different physics and there is no ideal operating temperature, or rather it is a significantly wider range, but really the only temperature concern with NAND is during cold storage where 20-25C is substantially more ideal than above 30C.
The skin temp of the Netac case was 46C. By the time heat reaches the exterior and is measured by an IR camera, it's dispersed from the sources that are creating it. This implies the internal temps experienced by the flash storage inside is higher. The good news is the Netac isn't throttling due to temperature as is made clear by the review. The temps measured were under atypically high demand too so day-to-day file copies wouldn't likely create that situation. However, since Ganesh has pointed out the company is aware of the thermal performance as a shortcoming, I think being dismissive of thermal concerns might be a mistake.
It's true using thermal pads to mate the controllers to the chassis will improve thermals, but if the drive isn't throttling, it is within design specifications, which means according to the manufacture reliability wont be sacrificed. So Netac concerning themselves with the thermals is superficial, and anything they do to improve them is a solution looking for a problem.
I don't like my gadgets hot anymore than the next guy, but sometimes that's just how they are designed.
Maybe, 'fly by night' if the wrong wording how about 'unproven'.
it looks like they took a reference design for the SM2246EN and slapped or will slap a set of the cheapest mSATA drives to the board. They aren't using their flash or Dram. They aren't available in the US except Amazon and they sell mostly cheap USB drives, uSD cards and a few HDDs with almost no reviews. Googling them basically shows their page, Amazon and this review.
These comments sure makes me feel warm inside.
Never been reviewed before or almost anyone else. Prior to going into the specifics of the Netac Z5, a few words about Netac are in order, as none of their products have been reviewed by us before.
Not their own Flash, Dram or Controller They use the Silicon Motion SM2246EN controller with Nanya DRAM and Micron NAND flash. Based on the package markings, it appears that the mSATA SSDs are using Micron MLC flash.
No Trim on a SSD, so this things is going to slow to a crawl. TRIM support is shown in the information view, but, it is not possible to activate it behind the bridge chip.
No attempt at a thermal solution In terms of actual thermal design, we were quite surprised to find that neither the SSD controllers nor the flash packages had any sort of thermal pad to aid in transferring the generated heat to the metal body.
Also these Chinese companies are adding no R&D effort slapping together or borrowing the design of these drives and marking them down a little and selling them. We put our data on them and they fail and so does all our data. We would never by a spinning disc made by a company like this.
Other than Samsung, SanDisk and Micron / Crucial - who makes their own flash, DRAM or controller?
So, if a company well-established in the Chinese market wants to get a presence / enter into the US market, does one immediately dismiss them because they haven't been reviewed by anyone in the US / EU press circles?
Btw, many of the flash devices that people buy in the US / EU are just the OEM designs developed by companies like Netac so that 'well-known' companies can just slap their labels on it and distribute with minimal QA work. That is how OEM designing works in the current day.
FWIW, the company is targeting distributors in the US market (not end buyers directly) with the Z5. So, someone who wants to distribute / slap their label on the Z5 can make Netac put in an improved thermal solution and/or improve firmware aspects before placing the bulk order.
8W draw and no power brick? AND A USB-C to A cable. So they EXPECT you to run this on USB3 where the max guaranteed power supply is 4.5W? At the very least AnandTech should have run all tests under that scenario to see what happens. Does the box gratefully degrade, or does it just randomly disconnect when the power draw goes too high?
We have been through this discussion on the USB 3.1 Gen 2 SanDisk Extreme 900 review also,
At the outset - the usecase for this device is specifically with USB 3.1 Gen 2 ports.
Second, with USB 2.0 or USB 3.0 ports - it works without disconnects but performance is very limited, not crossing 400 MBps even in artificial workloads. I don't have a setup to measure power consumption with non-Type-C / USB 3.0 / USB 2.0 ports. So, I can't provide power numbers for those cases.
Slower speed is fine, what I would expect. But you need to state these facts upfront for every drive. It's nice that your experience has been that "of course it works properly when connected to older ports" but you've been extremely lucky. Most CE equipment is utter garbage when it comes to how it handles power demand, and part of the value of a review is both praising the few companies that get this right and warning us against the MANY companies that get this wrong. (And this is not theoretical. I've been burned in just the last month by a PoS travel router from Hootoo that is essentially useless because of it's incompetent power design. )
We’ve updated our terms. By continuing to use the site and/or by logging into your account, you agree to the Site’s updated Terms of Use and Privacy Policy.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
22 Comments
Back to Article
Chaitanya - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
Those seq. writes are nothing special.ganeshts - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
With the right system and drivers, you can hit upwards of 600 MBps for real-world workloads. At this price point, I don't think there is a better performer. The SanDisk Extreme 900 also performs similarly.Flunk - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
At about $228, it's forgivable.osxandwindows - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
Thats the same performance of a thunderbolt 1 ssd.R0H1T - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
This thing's hot, quite literally, & not in a good way.WorldWithoutMadness - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
and sooner or later we'll confront data loss because of bga solder fatigueganeshts - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
No doubt the unit could do with better thermal design, but, transferring upwards of 250GB of data within a short time duration (that causes temperature of the metal case to reach 46C) is, I would imagine, not a frequent use-case.Netac is already aware of the need for a better thermal solution.
cygnus1 - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
Yeah, I think if they just added a thermal pad that would let the heat transfer away to the case from the pertinent chops quicker than through the PCB and open air to the case would go a long way in keeping the device cooler overall.kaidenshi - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
I did that with a 2.5" external spinning HDD that was getting too hot; put a thermal pad between its base and the metal USB 3.0 case. That kept it about 15C cooler than the cloth pad(!) they had glued in there, and kept vibrations down as well.Samus - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
A common misconception with mSATA SSD's is their thermal profile.They run incredibly hot. My Samsung 840 mSATA SSD idles at 47 degrees C with a load temp in the low 60's.
It's been this way for years and hasn't failed. Samsung, Lite On and Micron all rate their OEM SSD's at a working temp of 0-75C. Yes, 75 Celsius is actually within design specifications!
A lot of it has to do with the PCB. The shape of the mSATA SSD, in addition to it operating at a higher voltage than m2, create a less efficient therma design. But that doesn't make it unreliable, just unusual as far as why we consider the 'norm' for storage temperatures which have historically considered 30-40C to be ideal.
But interestingly even Backblaze has shown in their reliability survey (which I have always found unrealistic because it only considers cold storage applications) that 'high' hard disk temperatures have little correlation to reliability even when approaching 50C. In fact it is low temperatures, below 30C, that have a connection to disk failure. Not unreasonable evidence when you think about the thermal dynamics of spinning metal disks; metals wears less at higher temperatures...bearings, motors, etc.
I understand SSD's are entirely different physics and there is no ideal operating temperature, or rather it is a significantly wider range, but really the only temperature concern with NAND is during cold storage where 20-25C is substantially more ideal than above 30C.
BrokenCrayons - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
The skin temp of the Netac case was 46C. By the time heat reaches the exterior and is measured by an IR camera, it's dispersed from the sources that are creating it. This implies the internal temps experienced by the flash storage inside is higher. The good news is the Netac isn't throttling due to temperature as is made clear by the review. The temps measured were under atypically high demand too so day-to-day file copies wouldn't likely create that situation. However, since Ganesh has pointed out the company is aware of the thermal performance as a shortcoming, I think being dismissive of thermal concerns might be a mistake.Samus - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
It's true using thermal pads to mate the controllers to the chassis will improve thermals, but if the drive isn't throttling, it is within design specifications, which means according to the manufacture reliability wont be sacrificed. So Netac concerning themselves with the thermals is superficial, and anything they do to improve them is a solution looking for a problem.I don't like my gadgets hot anymore than the next guy, but sometimes that's just how they are designed.
LordConrad - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
"ASMedia's custom drivers for ASM1142 are no longer needed, given that Windows 10 bundles a Microsoft USB 3.1 xHCI driver."You should not assume that everyone is using Windows 10.
Samus - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
Why aren't you using Windows 10? It was free for a whole year. Free!KingofL337 - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
Would you really be willing to trust your data to some fly by night company? I can understand it's fast bust still.ganeshts - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
I would hardly call Netac a 'fly by night' company given their background.Btw, if we even have a little bit of inkling / doubt that some vendor is a 'fly by night' operation, we would definitely NOT be reviewing their wares.
KingofL337 - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
Maybe, 'fly by night' if the wrong wording how about 'unproven'.it looks like they took a reference design for the SM2246EN and slapped or will slap a set of the cheapest mSATA drives to the board. They aren't using their flash or Dram. They aren't available in the US except Amazon and they sell mostly cheap USB drives, uSD cards and a few HDDs with almost no reviews. Googling them basically shows their page, Amazon and this review.
These comments sure makes me feel warm inside.
Never been reviewed before or almost anyone else.
Prior to going into the specifics of the Netac Z5, a few words about Netac are in order, as none of their products have been reviewed by us before.
Not their own Flash, Dram or Controller
They use the Silicon Motion SM2246EN controller with Nanya DRAM and Micron NAND flash. Based on the package markings, it appears that the mSATA SSDs are using Micron MLC flash.
No Trim on a SSD, so this things is going to slow to a crawl.
TRIM support is shown in the information view, but, it is not possible to activate it behind the bridge chip.
No attempt at a thermal solution
In terms of actual thermal design, we were quite surprised to find that neither the SSD controllers nor the flash packages had any sort of thermal pad to aid in transferring the generated heat to the metal body.
Also these Chinese companies are adding no R&D effort slapping together or borrowing the design of these drives and marking them down a little and selling them. We put our data on them and they fail and so does all our data. We would never by a spinning disc made by a company like this.
ganeshts - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
Other than Samsung, SanDisk and Micron / Crucial - who makes their own flash, DRAM or controller?So, if a company well-established in the Chinese market wants to get a presence / enter into the US market, does one immediately dismiss them because they haven't been reviewed by anyone in the US / EU press circles?
Btw, many of the flash devices that people buy in the US / EU are just the OEM designs developed by companies like Netac so that 'well-known' companies can just slap their labels on it and distribute with minimal QA work. That is how OEM designing works in the current day.
FWIW, the company is targeting distributors in the US market (not end buyers directly) with the Z5. So, someone who wants to distribute / slap their label on the Z5 can make Netac put in an improved thermal solution and/or improve firmware aspects before placing the bulk order.
name99 - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
8W draw and no power brick? AND A USB-C to A cable. So they EXPECT you to run this on USB3 where the max guaranteed power supply is 4.5W?At the very least AnandTech should have run all tests under that scenario to see what happens. Does the box gratefully degrade, or does it just randomly disconnect when the power draw goes too high?
ganeshts - Tuesday, August 9, 2016 - link
We have been through this discussion on the USB 3.1 Gen 2 SanDisk Extreme 900 review also,At the outset - the usecase for this device is specifically with USB 3.1 Gen 2 ports.
Second, with USB 2.0 or USB 3.0 ports - it works without disconnects but performance is very limited, not crossing 400 MBps even in artificial workloads. I don't have a setup to measure power consumption with non-Type-C / USB 3.0 / USB 2.0 ports. So, I can't provide power numbers for those cases.
name99 - Wednesday, August 10, 2016 - link
Slower speed is fine, what I would expect.But you need to state these facts upfront for every drive. It's nice that your experience has been that "of course it works properly when connected to older ports" but you've been extremely lucky. Most CE equipment is utter garbage when it comes to how it handles power demand, and part of the value of a review is both praising the few companies that get this right and warning us against the MANY companies that get this wrong. (And this is not theoretical. I've been burned in just the last month by a PoS travel router from Hootoo that is essentially useless because of it's incompetent power design. )
AnTech - Thursday, December 8, 2016 - link
RAID 0 is the best way to lose data if any SSD or the controller fails (more than 2x-fold increase in failure rate).