Test – Toshiba HG6 256Go : Specs | CPU | Hashrate | Review | Config

Hi everyone!

Today I am going to present to you an actor little known to the general public in the world of SSDs, Toshiba! Indeed, Toshiba memory chips are widely used in SSDs from other brands (Plextor, OCZ which was bought by Toshiba, Corsair etc.) but Toshiba was not really in the race itself. It’s done with the latest range, the HG6! The maximum theoretical speeds are 510 MB / s in reading and 460 MB / s in writing, therefore in the average of the products found on the market today.
Offered at a price of around 150 € and accompanied by a 3-year warranty, it will have a lot to face with cheaper competition, let’s see what it has in its belly!

As we can see the Toshiba HG6 256GB is in a very classic 2.5 ″ format for a thickness of 7mm, it is very light with its 53 grams which is explained by the use of aluminum in the shell. The Sata 3.0 6Gb / s is of course part of the game with a maximum throughput of 510 MB / s in reading and 460 MB / s in writing, of course these are theoretical throughputs here and it will be necessary to verify these statements in practice. The integrated controller is a homemade by Toshiba, the TC358790XBG, supported by MLC A19nm chips (still from Toshiba) which are starting to be well known now. The operating temperatures range from 0 ° to 70 ° which should not be a problem for almost the entire population, unless you have your PC outside in the snow!
The cache memory is itself very different from the usual SSDs because the controller manages a small part of the MLC memory like the SLC which has the effect of accelerating the random writes, so there will certainly be a gain during benchmarks or when used in a professional environment subject to this type of load, but in a gamer configuration the gain will be non-existent.
Toshiba gives an MTBF of 1.5 million hours (171 hours) and a 3-year warranty, which seems a bit light considering the price of the beast, too bad.

The Toshiba HG6 256GB was delivered to me unworked from the factory so without any bundle or even box, so I would spare you the unpacking of the shipping box 😀

Here is the beast! As we can see the carcass is made of aluminum, no label on the top (which should definitely be there when buying commercially), only a label below showing the capacity of the SSD, the version of the Firmware, model and serial number. The build quality is very good, although the look is not as attractive as the SSDs that we are used to seeing from consumer SSDs.

Inside we find the SSD PCB, with on each chip a thick thermal pad connected directly to the casing for the evacuation of any heat generated. The memory chips are therefore Toshiba A19nm of 32GB each accompanied by the TC358790XBG controller from the same brand.
At the back there is a blank printed circuit of any component, not much to see!

The test setup

The configuration used during the tests is as follows:

• Processor: Intel Core i4670K @ 4 Ghz
• Ventirad Processor: Noctua NH-D15
• Motherboard: Gigabyte Z87-UD5 TH
• Graphic card: XFX 7870 Black edition
• Ventirad Graphics Card: Accelero S1 rev B + 2 Noctua NF-F12
• Memory: Kingston Beast 4 x 8 Go 1866Mhz
• SSD: Intel Postville X25-M 80Go (OS)
• Food: be quiet! E9 580CM
• Operating system: Windows 8.1 64bits

The Toshiba HG6 256 GB will be tested against the SSDs I have at my disposal, i.e. a Samsung 830 128 GB, an AMD R7 240 GB (tested here), Plextor M6S 256 GB (tested here), Plextor M6e 128 GB (tested here) and the Plextor M6 Pro 256 GB (tested here)!

The software used is as follows:

• ATTO Disk Benchmark (downloadable here)
• AS SSD Benchmark (downloadable here)
• CrystalDiskMark (downloadable here)
• HD Tune Pro (downloadable here)
• Futuremark PCMark 8 (downloadable here)

ATTO Disk Benchmark

Under ATTO in reading the results are good for the HG6, apart from the reading of very small files which is dominated by the Plextor M6 Pro the other results are at the level of all the other SSDs in the comparison. The Toshiba HG6 is particularly fond of 4 and 8 KB files where it buries the competition. The maximum speed reached is 550 MB / s, there is plenty to do.

The writing seems to be the strong point of the Toshiba HG6, indeed it quite simply obtains the best results of the comparison, after the AMD R7 240. The Toshiba is however more versatile than the AMD thanks to its speeds on small files under 8KB. The maximum throughput here is 518MB / s.

AS SSD

Under AS SSD the Toshiba is once again very good, in reading it is on par with the others, except for reading small files where it is once again overtaken by the Plextor M6 Pro. In writing, on the other hand, it is still as fast with 484 MB / s which is almost on par with the AMD R7 240, once again writing small files is the strong point of the HG6 with 102.29, the only SSD which crosses the symbolic barrier of 100 MB / s in this comparison.

CrystalDiskMark

Same fight under CrystalDiskMark the results are very good in reading with a maximum of 519 MB / s, it is a little fishy when reading small files. In writing, it’s still just as good, especially when it comes to writing small files where it takes first place in the comparison with 113 MB / s ahead of the Plextor M6 Pro and its 105 MB / s.

HD Tune Pro

The results of the Toshiba HG6 under HD Tune Pro are not the most formidable in reading, indeed the graphics are sawtooth compared to the other SSDs of the comparison which keep a constant flow throughout the benchmark. With an average of 307.5 MB / s it is at the level of the AMD R7 240 GB, which is not a bad performance either.
In HD writing Tune Pro shows a Toshiba HG6 at the same level as the excellent M6 Pro 256 GB with an average of 338.9 MB / s, just behind the AMD R7 240 GB and its 365 MB / s.

Futuremark PCMark8

As we can see the results of the 6 SSDs are very close, the Toshiba HG6 256 GB comes in first position, ahead of the M6e which, I remind you, uses a PCIe 2x interface! The Toshiba HG6 comes first in all sub-benchmarks, by a few tenths of a second, but first nonetheless. PCMark8 tries to simulate everyday actions, we can see here that any SSD (from the comparison) is capable of very good performance.

Practical tests

Let’s move on to the practice tests now! For this I will use 2 scenarios, a copy of a 14.1 GB directory made up of 88 Folders and 12,647 files of various sizes and a copy of a single 15.3 GB file.
The source files are first copied to a RAMDisk (more information here) and then sent to the different SSDs, in this way there will logically be no clamping at the source level.

Again, benchmarks are fine but what about copying files, like what might happen every day (for desktop PC use, not in a professional environment)? Well all the SSDs are very close, the Toshiba obviously obtains very good performances and ends up at the level of the Plextor M6 Pro, which is not nothing!
I would like to point out that in everyday use, unless you have the stopwatch in hand when launching a program or copying a directory, it will be really impossible to separate a good SSD from another.

Here we are at the end of this test, what about the Toshiba HG6 256GB?
Toshiba is unfortunately very little known in the world of consumer SSDs, it’s a shame because they are able to manufacture very good products, the HG6 is a perfect example of the brand’s know-how with memory chips and an in-house controller. . The performance is very good in reading and excellent in writing, it hangs a bit when reading small files but excels in writing those same small files (thanks to the SLC hybrid cache system).
For current use or “gaming” there will not be really big differences with a mid-range SSD (like the Plextor M6S 256GB, tested here), at best a few seconds of savings which will only be noted with a stopwatch in hand.
Offered at around 150 € in its 256 GB version, it is certainly not intended for everyone, especially since at this price there are SSDs with a 5-year warranty, but if you are interested for a reason or for another by an SSD which offers excellent performance in writing small files then the Toshiba HG6 is clearly a very good product. For other “gamers” and “normal” users there are much less expensive solutions that will fulfill their function perfectly.

Many thanks to Toshiba for allowing me to do this test.

Where to find the Toshiba HG6 256 GB?

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