Benchmarks: File Copy Test
For our 6GB ISO test we take a single large file and duplicate it on the disk measuring the time it takes using a stopwatch. The test is run three times and the average result is recorded, more often than not the three runs are very much the same. The above graphs show both transfer time in seconds and throughput in MB/s.
The Samsung 470 Series 256GB performance was remarkable matching our best record ever set by the Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB. This means both drives were faster than the OCZ Vertex 2 Pro 100GB, which uses the SandForce controller, by a convincing 37 seconds.
The program copy test is made up of many small non-compressed files. This is where SSDs typically struggle and in the past cheaper drives have proven to be slower than traditional hard drives. Our reference Samsung 3.5" desktop hard drive managed to complete the test in 28 seconds making it a fraction faster than the Seagate Momentus XT 500GB. Furthermore this made these mechanical drives faster than a number of cheap SSDs.
The Samsung 470 Series 256GB on the other hand can be found at the head of the chart with a convincing lead over the next fastest drive, the Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB. The Samsung 470 Series 256GB took 11.6 seconds to complete this test with a throughput of 121.5MB/s. This was exactly 18MB/s faster than the Crucial RealSSD C300 and 47.8MB/s faster than the OCZ Vertex 2 Pro 100GB in this test.
The game copy evaluation is comprised of a mixture of small and large files. Most of the drives are quicker than they were in the program test with the Samsung 470 Series 256GB reaching a throughput of 137.3MB/s taking just 10.1 seconds to complete the test.