Lexar Play 2280 SE assessment: A pretty, quick SSD—however not on PS5

Finest Costs As we speak: Lexar Play 2280 SE

There’s little doubt that the presently Costco-exclusive Lexar Play 2280 SE, which I assume stands for “Particular Version,” is a looker. The included stylized heatsink undoubtedly renders it a lower above the norm in look. Nonetheless, whereas it’s a great real-world performer for host reminiscence buffer (HMB) PCIe 4.0, it’s slower with random operations than the older (and pricier) Lexar Play 2280 that’s accessible elsewhere.

And that’s in a PC. The Play 2280 SE will work within the PlayStation 5 that it’s marketed for, however that gaming console doesn’t help host reminiscence buffer, which implies you’re working off of secondary cache on a regular basis.

In different phrases, it received’t carry out in addition to a DRAM design in Sony’s {hardware}. The identical is true for all HMB designs, however Lexar is among the solely firms I do know of that markets its HMB as if it’s specifically suited to the PlayStation. Come on now…

Learn on to study extra, then see our roundup of the perfect PCIe 4.0 SSDs for comparability.

What are the Lexar Play 2280 SE’s options?

Created within the frequent 2280 (22mm large, 80mm lengthy) type issue, the Play 2280 SE is a PCIe 4.0 x4, M.2, NVMe SSD sporting an Innogrit IG5236 controller, and layered QLC (Quad-Stage Cell/4-Bit) NAND. The older Play 2280 makes use of a Maxio MAP1602A controller and TLC (Triple-Stage Cell/3-bit) NAND — it’s not the identical drive.

Just like the Play 2280, the Play 2280 SE is a number reminiscence buffer design, i.e. it makes use of your system’s reminiscence for main caching duties, versus devoted reminiscence on the SSD itself. HMB designs typically carry out on par or higher than DRAM designs in Home windows Explorer giant file transfers, or sustained throughput, however lag in small file, random operations. The latter was very true within the Play 2280 SE’s case.

The guarantee for the Play 2280 SE is 5 years.

How a lot is the Lexar Play 2280 SE?

On the time of this writing, the Play 2280 SE was solely accessible in a 4TB capability, solely at Costco, and priced at $225, together with the heatsink. On Amazon, the older 4TB Play 2280 is simply over $250 on the time of this writing, and in addition accessible in 2TB capability for $188.

The SE’s $225 is an efficient value, however I’ve seen WD’s glorious SN7100 on sale for lower than both the Play 2280 SE or Play 2280, albeit with no heatsink. A heatsink is usually a $10 to $15 add on.

Once more, the Play 2280 SE is presently a Costco unique product so that you seemingly received’t discover it on sale for some time. Lexar did intimate that the drive may finally be accessible from different distributors.

How does the Lexar Play 2280 SE carry out?

Whereas not the quickest PCIe 4.0 host reminiscence buffer design I’ve examined, the 4TB Lexar Play 2280 SE will not be far off general. That stated, it was mysteriously gradual at single-queue reads in CrystalDiskMark 8 — even in comparison with the older Play 2280. AS SSD and ATTO didn’t agree, although the latter had the 2280 SE pegged as a slower author with its 2MB and 48MB information units than any of the opposite dimension information units.

You may see the story within the charts beneath.

There was additionally a curious and distinct drop-off in random efficiency with a number of queues in comparison with the older 2280 Play.

The 48GB switch occasions had been basically a draw, although the WD Black SN7100 simply edged out the Play 2280 SE general.

Once more, there’s not a lot to differentiate one in all these PCIe 4.0 HMB SSDs from the opposite within the 450GB write check. However once more, that is in a Home windows PC with help for host reminiscence buffer. The Ps 5 doesn’t have that help.

Regardless of the distinction in NAND varieties (QLC vs. TLC) the Play 2280 SE didn’t hunch horribly in comparison with the Play 2280 when secondary cache was exhausted throughout a 950GB write. The SE dropped at across the 650GB mark to the 300MBps to 500MBps vary — roughly SATA SSD speeds. The plain Play 2280 averages about 200MBps quicker.

Regardless, 500MBps isn’t tragic and a testomony to only how far QLC has come within the final couple years. As soon as upon a time we noticed 50- to 75MBps native writing. Yuck.

Word that you will note this drop-off sooner with lower-capacity Play 2280 SEs as they’ve much less NAND to deal with as secondary cache (writing the NAND as single bit SLC).

One other caveat: The Play 2280 SE didn’t like our Highpoint 7604A PCIe 5.0 card in any respect, delivering a slightly haphazard efficiency in CrystalDiskMark 8. Be sure it’s blissful in your system throughout the merchandise return interval. CrystalDiskMark 8, AS SSD 2, ATTO 4 are all good measuring sticks.

As to the Ps. Sure, the 2280 SE will work in that system, and also you’ll seemingly be proud of it. NVMe is extraordinarily quick, even when it’s counting on secondary cache. However DRAM designs will work higher in a Ps, albeit for extra money.

Do you have to purchase the Lexar Play 2280 SE?

Although not the perfect performer in its class, the Play 2280 SE is sweet in real-world sustained throughput — and I just like the seems. It’s additionally aggressive price-wise. What I don’t like is it being marketed for a system that it’s not ideally suited to. To your PC — 4 stars. For the PlayStation — 3.5 stars.

How we check

Drive assessments presently make the most of Home windows 11 24H2, 64-bit working off of a PCIe 4.0 Samsung 990 Professional in an Asus Z890-Creator WiFi (PCIe 4.0/5.0) motherboard. The CPU is a Core Extremely i5 225 feeding/fed by two Kingston Fury 32GB DDR5 4800MHz modules (64GB of reminiscence complete). Each 20Gbps USB and Thunderbolt 5 are built-in and Intel CPU/GPU graphics are used. PCIe 5.0 SSDs concerned in testing are mounted in a Asus ROG PCIe 5.0 M.2 adapter card and a HighPoint 7604A 16x PCIe 5.0 4-port M.2 adapter card.

We run the CrystalDiskMark 8 (and 9), AS SSD 2, and ATTO 4 artificial benchmarks (to maintain article size down, we solely report one) to search out the storage system’s potential efficiency, then a sequence of 48GB and 450GB transfers assessments utilizing Home windows Explorer drag and drop to point out what you’ll see below Window, in addition to the far quicker Xcopy and FastCopy to point out what’s potential.

A 25GBps two-SSD RAID 0 array on the aforementioned Highpoint 7604A is used because the second drive in our switch assessments. Previously the 48GB assessments had been performed with a RAM disk.

Every check is carried out on a NTFS-formatted and newly TRIM’d drive so the outcomes are optimum. Word that in regular use, as a drive fills up, efficiency could lower on account of much less NAND for secondary caching, in addition to different elements. This situation has abated somewher with the present crop of SSDs with extra mature controllers and much quicker late-generation NAND.

Caveat: The efficiency numbers proven apply solely to the drive we had been shipped and to the capability examined. SSD efficiency can and can fluctuate by capability on account of extra or fewer chips to shotgun reads/writes throughout and the quantity of NAND accessible for secondary caching. Distributors additionally often swap elements. When you ever discover a big discrepancy between the efficiency you expertise and that which we report, by all means, tell us.