Layout, Design and Features …
On the following image one can see the front of the 2.5″ Crucial BX100 1TB SSD:
On the back you can see a label of the Crucial BX100 2.5″ SSD with some technical data and the pre-installed firmware version. The SATA3 connectors for power supply and data you can see in the picture on the left. The SSD connector is identical to conventional SATA hard drives and a SATA3 SSD can be operated with a lower speed at an SATA2 interface:
Because Crucial no longer has provided the BX100 SSD enclosure with screws, it would be necessary to use force opening the BX100 in contrast to the also screw-less MX200. So we decided to summarize only some facts and show exceptionally not the PCB of the BX100. Inside of the SSD enclosure are equal to the 500 GB MX200 SSD and the BX100 500GB SSD MT29F512G08CKCCBH7-10 16nm Micron NAND modules. As controller the significantly cheaper Silicon Motion SM2246EN controller is used in this BX100 SSD in contrast to the MX200 SSD. It also supports TRIM and Active Garbage Collection, but no 256-bit AES hardware encryption. The MT41K256M16HA-125 M 512MB DDR3 module is used as cache. So, technically this Silicon Motion Controller offers less features.
BX100 SSD is like the MX100/MX200 build in a lower 7mm construction height and no more 9.5 mm like for example the Crucial m4 SSD. Crucial includes a 7 mm to 9.5 mm adapter frame which can be sticked on the SSD, if it is necessary to stay compatible with the height of 9.5 mm.
SSD firmware update …
At review date, Crucial offered only the firmware download of the already installed MU01 firmware for the BX100 SSD. With the new Crucial storage Executive tool, you can upgrade the firmware of the SSD relatively easily, but you should always backup important data before updating the firmware. The Crucial storage Executive tool BTW. has in our tests the peculiarity to update all SSDs of the same type with the new firmware, even if you select only one particular SSD.
Crucial BX100 1 TB Benchmark values and test results …