Crucial MX500 2TB SSD Review

Benchmark values and test results …

Let us now turn to the benchmark results. The test results for SATA3 drives will be compared with an ASRock 890GX Extreme3 motherboard and the test results for mSATA and M.2 modules will be done with an ASRock Z270 Taichi motherboard. Microsoft Windows 7 Ultimate Edition and Windows 10 Enterprise Edition 64-bit are currently used as operating systems.

The SSD drive speed was examined and compared with the following benchmark software:
AS SSD BenchmarkDownload
ATTO Disk BenchmarkDownload
CrystalDiskMarkDownload
HD TachDownload
SiSoftware SandraDownload

AS SSD benchmark results

The AS SSD benchmark values provide a very good indication of the maximum possible read and write speed, the speed for smaller files and their respective access time. By the way, 4K means that small 4K blocks are read or written and with 4K 64Thrd this is distributed to 64 threads at the same time. For example, the benchmark program simulates a typical program start.

With the 2000GB Crucial drive a high sequential read and write speed could be achieved in the AHCI.

The usable capacity of the Crucial MX500 is 1863.01 GB. With the Crucial Storage Executive Tool you can adjust the over provisioning area as mentioned before and thus determine yourself how high you want to set the SSD durability vs. performance.

The overall score of 871 points is pleasantly high, at least for the somewhat older AMD test system, which we have been using since the beginning of our SATA SSD tests to be able to provide a 100% comparison of the SATA SSDs. The Crucial BX200 480GB SSD was only 731 points on the same test system, but the Crucial MX500 1TB SSD was slightly higher at 888 points.

For a better comparison with the previous Samsung SSD 860 Pro and Samsung SSD 860 Evo SSDs that didn’t run properly with the AMD test system, we also tested the Crucial MX500 2TB again with the Intel test system. The Crucial MX500 2TB achieves 1167 points, which however is just below the 1206 points of the Samsung SSD 860 Evo and the 1203 points of the Samsung SSD 860 Pro on the Intel test system.

Here is a screenshot of the AS SSD benchmark values (Crucial MX500 2TB AHCI Intel test system):

And here is another screenshot of the AS SSD iops results (Crucial MX500 2TB AHCI Intel test system):

Here is a screenshot of the AS SSD benchmark values (Crucial MX500 2TB AHCI AMD test setup):

And here is another screenshot of the AS SSD iops results (Crucial MX500 2TB AHCI AMD test setup):

Here is a screenshot of the AS SSD copy benchmark results (Crucial MX500 2TB AHCI AMD test setup):

The comparison of the AS SSD benchmark results is extended with each new HDD/SSD test. You can already see some SSDs compared to the Crucial MX500 2TB SSD, whereby the graphics is updated regularly with new SSD drives. At the time of testing, the Samsung 960 Pro 1TB M.2 NMVe SSD leads the AS SSD total score, followed by some more SSDs and before the MX200 1TB SSD the new MX500 SSD with 2TB capacity joins the rank.

Here is a comparison of the AS SSD benchmark values, which are getting updated with new drives:

And here is an excerpt of the latest AS SSD benchmark results. For better overview, they will be gradually replaced with latest drives:

ATTO disk benchmark results

The ATTO disk benchmark values gives a very good overview about the write and read rate on different file sizes. These values are maximum ratings, which are different to the previously continuous transfer rate benchmarks, as this benchmark can be higher even with SSDs with a slower overall performance.

With the Crucial MX500 2TB SSD, the reading speed (green) is already above the writing speed (red) from a transfer size of approx. 0.5KB and reaches the maximum reading values of 550375KB with a transfer size of 128KB.

Here is a screenshot of the ATTO Disk benchmark values (SATA3 AHCI):

These ATTO Disk benchmark values are now compared with a small transfer of 32KB and a large transfer of 8192KB. The bar chart already contains a comparison to some SSDs and hard disks, where the Crucial MX500 2TB SSD is relatively low for ATTO.

Here is a comparison of the ATTO disk benchmark values, which are getting updated with soon coming drives:

And here is an excerpt of the latest ATTO disk benchmark values for a better overview will be gradually replaced with latest drives:

CrystalDiskMark results

CrystalDiskMark also provides a balanced measurement of performance with different transfer sizes.

Here, the MX500 2000GB achieves very good sequential read values of 523.6 MB/s and write values of 462.4 MB/s, as before in addition to the 4K-64Threads values, and is almost on a par with the Crucial MX500 1TB.

Here is a screenshot of the CrystalDiskMark values (SATA3 AHCI):

The following diagram shows the CrystalDiskMark results again in comparison to the other SSDs and hard drives, which will be expanded step by step. In the CrystalDiskMark comparison one can see significant differences between the to-date tested of the Solid State Drives and Hard Disk Drives.

Here is a comparison of the CrystalDiskMark values, which are getting updated with soon coming drives:

And here is an excerpt of the latest CrystalDiskMark values, which is gradually replaced with the latest drives:

HD Tach results

With HD Tach one can measure the gradient of the performance, but the SSD transfer is not comparable with a conventional HDD. New logical NAND cell access of the SSD controller results like some other equal designed SSDs in varying values with the latest HD Tach Version 3.0.4.0 version, which is designed for hard disk drives.

HD Tach shows with the Crucial MX500 2000GB SSD in AHCI mode a continuous transfer image with the lowest displayed access time of 0.0ms. There are also very even transfer rates with a few peaks during the write operations.

For comparison. you can move the mouse pointer over the following drives to see their respective benchmark results:
Crucial MX500 2TB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial MX500 1TB M.2 2.5″ SSD, Crucial MX500 1TB 2.5″ SSD, ADATA S511 120GB SSD, ADATA S511 120GB SSD, Crucial BX300 480GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial BX200 960GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial BX200 480GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial BX100 1TB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial BX100 500GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial MX100 512GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial MX200 1TB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial MX200 500GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial MX200 500GB M.2 SSD, Crucial MX200 500GB mSATA SSD, Crucial MX200 250GB 2.5″ SSD, 2x Crucial MX200 250GB 2.5″ SSDs RAID0, 3x Crucial MX200 250GB 2.5″ SSDs RAID0, 4x Crucial MX200 250GB 2.5″ SSDs RAID0, Crucial MX300 750GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial MX300 525GB M.2 SSD an SATA3 AHCI, Crucial MX300 2050GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial M500 480GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial M550 512GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial M550 512GB M.2 SSD, Crucial M550 512GB mSATA SSD, 2x Crucial m4 128GB 2.5″ SSD an SATA3 RAID, Crucial m4 128GB 2.5″ SSD, Crucial m4 128GB 2.5″ SSD an SATA3, Crucial m4 256GB 2.5″ SSD FW 000F, Crucial m4 256GB 2.5″ SSD FW 0309, Crucial m4 256GB 2.5″ SSD FW 0002, Crucial m4 256GB SSD FW 0309 an SATA3 IDE, Crucial m4 256GB 2.5″ SSD FW 0002 an SATA3, Crucial C300 64GB 1.8″ SSD an SATA3, Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB 2.5″ SSD an SATA3, Crucial RealSSD C300 256GB 2.5″ SSD an SATA2, Crucial P1 1TB in Orico PCM2-C3-GY USB 3.1 Gen2 case, Hitachi 7K1000.C 1TB HDD, Intel SSD 750 1200GB PCIe Karte Gen3 x4, Intel 600p 512GB M.2 NVMe SSD an SATA3 AHCI, MX-DS Fusion 60GB SSD SATA3 IDE, MX-DS Fusion 60GB SSD SATA3 IDE, MX-DS Turbo 120GB SSD, OCZ Agility 128GB SSD, OCZ Vector 180 480GB 2.5″ SSD, Plextor M8SeGN 512GB M.2 NVMe SSD, Plextor M6e 256GB M.2 SSD PCIe AHCI, 2x Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB 2.5″ SSD an SATA3 RAID0, Plextor M5 Pro Xtreme 256GB 2.5″ SSD, Plextor M5M 128GB mSATA SSD, Samsung 960 Evo 500GB M.2 PCIe NVMe Gen3 x4 SSD, Samsung 960 Pro 1TB M.2 PCIe NVMe Gen3 x4 SSD, Samsung SSD 860 Pro 512 GB SSD an Intel SATA3 AHCI, Samsung SSD 860 Evo 500 GB SSD an Intel SATA3 AHCI, Samsung Series470 128GB SSD AHCI, Samsung 470 128GB SSD Legacy IDE, Samsung 850 Pro 128GB 2.5″ SSD, Samsung T5 Portable 500GB USB 3.1 SSD, Seagate Constellation.2 1TB 2.5″ HDD an SATA3, Seagate ST2000DX001 2TB 3.5″ SSHD, Toshiba MK8007GAH 1.8″ HDD.

Here is a screenshot of the HD Tach benchmark values:

To see how the new 64 Layer 3D TLC NAND Flash behaves with a larger file transfer, we have additionally executed the tedious Long Bench, which takes several hours with the 2TB SSD. In contrast to older TLC or 3D TLC SSDs, one only sees a lower performance drop at longer write rates from approx. 48GB data transfer (with the 1TB version from approx. 24GB data transfer).

Here’s a comparison of the HD Tach benchmark values that are gradually being expanded with new drives:

And here’s an excerpt of the latest HD Tach benchmark values, which will be gradually replaced with the latest drives:

SiSoftware Sandra benchmark results

Of course, SiSoftware Sandra benchmark should not be missing in this test series. SiSoftware offers with their SiSoft Sandra program a very comprehensive tool, which contains a lot of tools to get very reliable test results of all hardware components.

The average access time of the Crucial MX500 2TB SSD was extremely low for SiSoftware Sandra with 22us and the drive index of 541.17 MB/s is an excellent value for a SATA SSD, which is clearly above the MX500 1TB (478.86 MB/s).

Here is a screenshot of the SiSoftware Sandra benchmark read values (SATA3 AHCI):

With the SiSoftware Sandra write performance measurement, the average access time of the Crucial MX500 2TB SSD was also extremely low at 25us and the drive index reaches a good 470.76 MB/s, which is just above the MX500 1TB (466.22 MB/s).

Here is a screenshot of the SiSoftware Sandra benchmark write values (SATA3 AHCI):

Here is a comparison of the SiSoftware Sandra benchmark values, which are getting updated with soon coming drives:

And here’s an extract of the latest SiSoftware Sandra benchmark values, which will gradually be replaced with the latest drives:

Crucial MX500 2TB Result and general impression …