Kioxia Exceria Pro 2TB drive test for PCIe 4.0×4. This is the first such efficient manufacturer’s disc

Kioxia has finally unveiled its first consumer PCIe 4.0 drive, which we’ll cover below. So I invite you to the test of the Kioxia Exceria Pro 2 TB drive, where we check both the raw performance of the carrier and the practical one … and more.

Kioxia Exceria Pro 2 TB under the magnifying glass

Getting straight to the point, you can buy the Kioxia Exceria Pro drive in two capacitive versions, 1- and 2-TB, of which in the latter case you can count on a maximum of about 1.81 TB of usable capacity. Regardless of the variant you choose, you will receive a model with the layouts placed on one side under the sticker, which is to limit the thickness to 2.23 mm and solve the problem with cooling the memory chip. However, you have to take care of the appropriate system yourself, because the manufacturer did not provide cooling in the set to ensure a lower price and more impressive com

Also read: Plextor M9P Plus 1 TB test, i.e. a PCIe 3 × 4 drive

Kioxia Exceria Pro is an example of a traditional M.2 disk on PCIe 4.0 supporting the NVMe 1.4 protocol without unnecessary frills, which has the same number and size of chips regardless of the capacity version. The 2 TB version is about an undefined Kioxia controller, 2 GB DDR4 SK Hynix H5ANAG6NCMR-XNI cache and four 512 GB TLC BiCS 5 memory chips with 112 layers.

Below you can take a look at a useful companion application, and if you are interested in theoretical possibilities, on paper Kioxia Exceria Pro is to offer 7300 MB / s sequential and 6400 MB / s write. On the random operation side, you can count on 900,000 and 1,300,000 IOPS for read and write sequentially.

Methodology and test platform

All tests were performed on a 64-bit Windows 10 Pro operating system and NTFS file system with an allocation unit of 4096 bytes. The results shown are the mean of three results performed interchangeably (lest the buffer “learn” to do the same) and after lowering the temperature to the optimal level (if required).

Do not be fooled by the gaps in some cases shown in the charts and take a look at the scale imposed and the accompanying commentary before jumping to conclusions.

• Synthetic test software:
  • Crystal Disk Mark 6.0.2
  • Anvil’s Storage Utilities 1.1
• Another:
  • WinRAR 16.09.09
  • 7-Zip 16.04
  • Gimp 2.8
• Files / programs for real tests
  • 1747 JPG files weighing 3.36 GB
  • 507 MP3 files weighing 3.0 GB
  • Civilization V on Steam
  • The Witcher 3 game files weighing 54.7 GB
  • CS: GO game files weighing 17.7 GB
  • ISO file weighing 26.5 GB
  • Steam directory with 59,492 files weighing 109 GB
  • Graphics weighing 903 MB

Synthetic Tests

Before you, a series of tests in two of the most popular testing applications that you probably know by heart. Their operation boils down to the same – saving and reading your samples to throw away simple numbers to compare the performance of the carriers. The higher the bar, the better, of course.

Despite promising “golden mountains” in synthetic tests, the Exceria Pro does not fare particularly well. He gets a glimpse of splendor mainly when reading and writing sequentially, depending on the software used. In other cases, it often loses even with PCIe 3.0 disks.

Also read: GoodRam IRDM Pro 1 TB second generation test on SATA III

Anvil’s Storage Utilities 1.1

Crystal Disk Mark 6.0.2

Also read: XPG Gammix S50 Lite 1TB Drive to PCIe 4.0 Test

File operations

The situation is different here, because in the test with the participation of typical actions on files, what matters is how quickly the disk can handle the tasks assigned to it. In other words, the smaller the bar, the better.

Performance in games and programs

And finally, six tasks that are supposed to represent the most frequently performed activities on the PC, i.e. archiving, installing programs and loading games.

Although it looked bad, the Exceria Pro 2 drive went from initially unusually low results in synthetic tests to much better results in practice. In our tests it showed a class especially in archiving and copying a single “large” ISO file.

A multitasking test

This test in turn shows disk performance in the most common situation, that is, while operating on at least two types of files and tasks. In fact, this is the main use of our disk when we use it as an operating system disk.

In general, the Exceria Pro does not perform too badly, because it allows you to save about 22 seconds of life, but it would be best if the process was not 454, but about 430 seconds – then the drive could be considered really great in terms of multitasking.

Filling test

After filling 90% of the Exceria Pro’s capacity, the performance drops only slightly, i.e. by about a few percent with larger file packages and marginally with smaller ones. This is confirmed by the charts showing the transfer of individual files.

Kioxia Exceria Pro disc test – summary

Kioxia Exceria Pro 2 TB is expected to cost about $ 299 in Poland, which suggests a level of about PLN 1500-1600, if VAT and store margins are involved. So it will fit into the segment of traditionally priced media at this price, which means that if you need an SSD with one of the highest performance (especially when copying single large files), great workmanship and an impressive TBW level, and in addition, you do not mind the lack of cooling and hardware encryption, then start hunting Kioxia Exceria Pro, because this model will only enter the Polish market and then we will verify its price. However, it is difficult not to mark it off with the command: