KitGuru KitGuru.net – Tech News | Hardware News | Hardware Reviews | IOS | Mobile | Gaming | Graphics Cards
Corsair's new Force 3 120GB SSD delivers what we would expect from the new Sandforce powered range of drives – class leading performance. We have reviewed many 240GB drives in recent weeks and this is the first 120GB unit we have analysed in our labs. The 120GB size will probably be one of the most popular, thanks to a very competitive retail price.
The latest Sandforce drives are easily the fastest on the market and have no real weaknesses. Sequential performance from the controller is great and the 4k results highlight the difference between this generation and the last.
The main talking point apart from performance, will be the price point, and we think this will sell very well for Corsair. Scan are already taking preorders at £180 inc vat which is going to suit a wider field of enthusiast user. For those with deeper pockets, they are also releasing a 240GB Force 3, but be prepared for a more substantial outlay.
Corsair will also be releasing a new series of drives called the Force GT which will use ONFI synchronous NAND (not async NAND) delivering even greater levels of performance, but with a higher cost overhead.
Pros:
- strong all round performance
- excellent pricing
- ideal for raid 0 – maintaining a sub £400 cost
Cons:
- none we can think of
Kitguru says: One of the best 120GB SSD's on the market.
Edit June 2011: KitGuru were one of the first publications to get access to these drives. Since the review went live our unit developed an intermittent fault and we reported it to Corsair. The problems were not isolated and Corsair issued this statement. We are confident if they fix the stability issues that the results we achieved in this review will be accurate.
excellent, under £200 is really good IMO
These drives are all coming really soon. OCZ were out first, have they a special deal with Sandforce or something?
Sandforce are brilliant. One of these will be my next purchase, but i might go for vertex 3. undecided……. wont be going for 240gb however, thats too much cash. my wife would kill me.
Very impressive. I love their PSU;s too
Been waiting on a review of one of these for a while now. lives up to what I expected. count me in. (heads to scan).
I love corsair products, quality company.
In this case id just go with whatever one gives the best deal, whether its OCZ or ADATA or whoeever. all the same controller at the end of the day
Got mine disk in my mail soon.
Ill be ordering two when they are available for my new system.
preordered one too
There seems to be a good bit of room for tuning with the sandforce controller. all of the drives perform slightly differently.
Makes it more interesting. I still that max IOPS unit is spectacular from OCZ
so which one OCZ Vertex 3 120 gb or Corsair Force 3 Series 120 gb??
Id go for whichever is cheapest. Same controller with slightly different tweaks.
Totally bogus review. The drives in question have been verified as fully defective and cannot operate inside the specs. All drives fail soonb after install – Corsair has acknowledged this. They came out with a fix that is also bogus. Stay clear of these drives. They are crap.
The review is not bogus – the results came from the drive we have – the drive I still have here – there are many screenshots in the review after all. After I reviewed the product, we noticed it started developing an intermittent fault and I helped Corsair by reporting the issues. The statement regarding the fault we posted front page. One of the first sites on the net to post it actually.
It is actually a problem with the Sandforce controller on specific drives as I have another drive from another OEM with the same issue. If they can fix the problem, the results in this review are valid. The conclusion of the review was appended to reflect the documented issues.
Hint to the people who conducted these tests:
User Alt+Print Screen instead of just Print Screen
what about power consumption?