AMD Radeon R7 SSD (240GB) Review
by Kristian Vättö on August 28, 2014 6:00 AM ESTFinal Words
To be frank, the R7 does not bring anything new to the table. Performance and feature wise it provides something in between the ARC 100 and Vector 150, but there's nothing earthshaking that would separate it from the masses. Sure, a four-year warranty is unique but with Samsung and SanDisk offering 10-year warranties in their high-end SSDs, the buyers who value a long warranty will likely choose something other than the R7.
| NewEgg Price Comparison (8/24/2014) | ||||
| 120/128GB | 240/256GB | 480/512GB | ||
| AMD Radeon R7 | $100 | $160 | $290 | |
| OCZ Vector 150 | $85 | $140 | $280 | |
| OCZ Vertex 460 | $90 | $140 | $245 | |
| OCZ ARC 100 | $75 | $120 | $240 | |
| Samsung SSD 850 Pro | $130 | $200 | $400 | |
| Samsung SSD 840 EVO | $90 | $140 | $250 | |
| SanDisk Extreme Pro | - | $200 | $380 | |
| SanDisk Extreme II | $70 | $140 | $295 | |
| Crucial MX100 | $80 | $123 | $220 | |
| Plextor M6S | $80 | $135 | $280 | |
| Intel SSD 730 | - | $190 | $340 | |
| Intel SSD 530 | $90 | $140 | $250 | |
The pricing does not make the R7 any better. Right now it is more expensive than the Vector 150, which provides higher performance and a longer warranty along with a higher endurance rating. The R7 must come down in price to make any sense, although even then the R7 will fall into the infamous middle-class. As I have said before, I only see two segments in the client market: the mainstream/value and the high-end market. In other words, the average Joe should just buy the SSD that provides the best value and frankly the MX100 has been dominating that market for the past couple of months. The high-end market, on the other hand, values absolute performance and features, and the R7 cannot compete with the 850 Pro and Extreme Pro there.
It is quite obvious that AMD is going after novice users with the R7 SSD. For someone with very little or no understanding of computers, the AMD branding can provide a peace of mind since AMD is fairly large and visible brand in the industry, but anyone who understands what they are buying should look elsewhere. To put it simply, there are better SSDs available for less money.
Ultimately AMD's biggest opportunity with the R7 SSD is bundles. I would not mind seeing the R7 as a part of an AMD component bundle because there is nothing wrong with the drive, but the pricing must be much more competitive than what the standalone drive currently is. If the total bundle price can put the cost of the SSD roughly in line with other value drives like the MX100, it provides good performance overall; it's just not worth the current price premium when purchased on its own.
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blackmagnum - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
AMD and her antics of renaming/ re-branding a product once again. Everything's as usual, enthusiasts please move along (to someone else's).Wolfpup - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
I've got zero problem with this. If they're only dealing with quality products, I think it can be a boost to both companies images, and kind of an easy way for someone who wants quality components but doesn't want to think much about it to grab it and know they're getting something okay.I'd be MUCH more inclined to get OCZ now that it's owned by Toshiba, though Crucial and Intel remain my go-to brands (and I'd probably look at the hard drive companies seriously too).
kaesden - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
if they wanted to deal with quality products, OCZ would be near the very bottom of their list. They are apparently just going for dirt cheap, to hell with reliability. OCZ products fail like clockwork.PEJUman - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
Products fail like clockwork? How many ocz products have failed on you? I personally owns/owned 14 of their old time ddr2 sticks and 7 of their ssds, youngest one is 3 years old. Haven't failed one yet.willis936 - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
Their ssd track record early on (mind you early on means less than five years ago) was actually horrifying.patssle - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
What? Their early SSD drives (Vertex/Agility) changed everything - they were the first SSDs that worked well and were reliable. I know because I bought an SSD as soon as there was one on the market that didn't have the write delay issue. Their quality went down over time but early on OCZ was THE SSD company.Guspaz - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
It was the Vertex and Agility drives that *gave* them their terrible reputation. They were only "the" SSD company early on because they were cheap and nobody had realized WHY they were so cheap yet (because they sacrificed reliability for performance).Samus - Thursday, August 28, 2014 - link
Agility drives were terrible. OCZ knew it and quickly replaced the Agility line with Agility 2 (literally in a matter of months) and even fulfilled RMA's for Agility with Agility 2's (my personal experience) but I still have an Agility 2 240GB running for 3 years without issue. But this isn't the norm, most of these drives eventually just stop detecting in the BIOS. Some of their SSD failures I've attributed to "freakout" when they are too full - a typical Sandforce problem when there is not enough space to do garbage collection.But its pretty obvious, even for Sandforce-based drives, OCZ SSD's were the most unreliable out there, probably due to low-quality NAND, poor or over-aggressive firmware tuning, or just bad design.
I'm glad Toshiba bailed them out because I am a huge Barefoot fan. The controller is just incredibly consistent.
ummduh - Friday, August 29, 2014 - link
Yup. My first Agility lasted about 3 months. The second another 6 months. The third I've had for a long time now (in ocz SSD terms) but that's only because it sits all by itself as a "install whatever OS you want to play around with this time for a week or so until you get bored and leave it for another 6 months" drive.bronan - Monday, November 9, 2015 - link
Well i know they made at one time a serie of bad drives, but i NEVER had any issues ever.OCZ ssd's still am pretty good drives, but the ever lasting whining from people about that flawed series keeps coming up. All my ocz vertex drives still going strong and my vertex 2 runs like it is brand new. So stop the whining and focus on the products they make now. I do not see you people whine about intels massive mistakes do you, or the fails of others brands.