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Hi, I'm Dustin Abbott. If you're here
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watching this video in 2026, then you
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probably already know the bad news. The
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price of media and storage has
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skyrocketed due to global demand from AI
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data centers. Early in 2025, I did a
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review of Samsung's premium 9100 Pro
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with heat sink SSD drive. And when I
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went back to look at my video, I saw
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that the price the day of that I did the
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review that I had put a screenshot into
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at B&H Photo, it was 549 USD on sale for
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a 4 terbte drive. Fast forward to today
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when I checked the price for the exact
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same drive using the link that I shared
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in that video. Today's price was nearly
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for the same drive. And so the price has
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nearly tripled over that course of time.
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Now, when I did that review, there were
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a number of people in the comments that
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said it's overkill. You don't need a
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drive that fast. And in fact, when I was
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doing my benchmark testing, having
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installed it into my own major
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workstation that I use for editing my
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photos and videos, I found that in fact
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the bottleneck was not the drive speed,
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but rather was the limitations of the
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bus speed of my motherboard at that
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point. And so I wasn't getting the full
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capacity out of the drive itself. That
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could be the case for you as well. And
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so I wanted to come back with a new
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review this year looking at a less
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expensive uh drive option. Now,
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unfortunately, less expensive is still
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expensive because the price of these has
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gone all the way up, but Samsung is
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coming out with a new basic 990 uh
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drive, and it has some positive things
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going for it. It's not necessarily a
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jump ahead relative to things that I
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have had reviewed before. However, it is
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a lower priced option, and
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unfortunately, that may be where you're
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at having to look at lower price option.
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And so, the new Samsung 990 will come in
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a variety of var variations. There's the
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basic one that I'm going to review
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today. Then there is a pro version and
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and so the basic version is available in
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sizes of 1 to two terabytes whereas the
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pro version can be had up to 4
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terabytes. So this is a PCIe 4.0 not 5.0
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like the 9100 Pro that I reviewed last
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year. So a little bit slower bus speed
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but again if your bus speed is a
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limitation you don't need the faster
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drive. And so this is an NVMe M.2 SSD
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drive. Now, one of the things that they
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are touting about this relative to the
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990 Pro version is that this is not only
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a lowerc cost version, it is a more
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efficient version. It has improved power
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efficiency and they say that it is 38%
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more efficient, making it a good option
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for laptops, for example. Now, as far as
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the stated sequential read speed, it is
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up to 7,250 megabytes per second,
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whereas the right speed is up to 6,450
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megabytes per second. It comes with a
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three-year warranty, and in 2026 prices
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right now, it is 529 USD. That's the
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MSRP. Often, it is available for cheaper
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than that, but the MSRP is 529
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USD for the two TBTE version that I'm
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looking at today. here in Canada, it's
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right under $700 for that same drive.
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Now, because this is actually slower
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than the drives that I've currently got
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in my main workstation, I decided to
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take a look at it from a different
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perspective. So, I wanted to see how it
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would operate if I put it into an
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inexpensive enclosure using it as a
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portable drive. And obviously, the
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benefit here is that, you know, I've got
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two terabytes in what is a relatively
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compact form factor. And I still have
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the versatility that I can pop it out of
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here in minutes and pocket pop it out of
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this in seconds and install it into an
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actual, you know, computer, laptop or uh
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desk desktop, you know, in minutes
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probably depending upon the
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configuration and how hard it is to get
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into that laptop. And so I wanted to do
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some benchmarking under using this kind
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of scenario and just to kind of give you
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a sense of how, you know, this kind of
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drive is going to compare in terms of
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speed as an external drive compared to
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the older drives. And so this is rated
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at lower right speeds than the 9100 Pro
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that I reviewed last year. So we're not
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looking at exceeding that, but rather
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seeing how it's going to perform in this
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kind of application. And so I decided
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that I was going to run benchmarking.
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And so I I benchmarked four different
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levels here. I benchmark an old 4
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terbyte um Western Digital My Book that
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I've used for storage in the past via a
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USB 3.0. Obviously, this requires an
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external power supply. Then I also did a
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Western Digital My Passport, also 4 TB
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USB 3.0. And then I did the 990 um using
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this enclosure and USBC. And then I did
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this laptop that I'm using right here
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actually has an internal M.2 to SSD
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though in this case it's a smaller 2242
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also but PCI IE or PCIe 4.0 O and so and
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when I benchmarked these I found that
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using the this drive it was painful. Now
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I did both a smaller file size um in
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this case it was 4 GB and then also a
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larger 64 GB size. Well when I ran the
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big ones it got really really painful
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really fast. And so with the Old Western
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Digital after 10 minutes I gave up. And
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uh at that point it had only done about
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17% of the right test and it had dropped
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down to where it was averaging at just
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19 megabytes per second. So painfully
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slow. When I moved to the Western
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Digital My Passport, it was a little bit
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better after 10 minutes. I still gave
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up, but it was up to 53% of the right
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test and it was averaging at that point
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58 megabytes per second. using the 990
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that we're looking at today via USBC, it
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took 2 minutes and 20 seconds to do 100%
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of the test. And so it averaged out um
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again externally uh averaged out at 939
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megabytes per second right speed and
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then surprisingly a little bit lower for
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the read speed 935 megab megabytes per
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second read speed. Now, interestingly, I
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got very consistent speeds whether I was
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doing the small file test for uh
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gigabyte versus the 64 GBTE transfer and
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so very very consistent across that. So,
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limitation there is going to be probably
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USBC in terms of going back and forth
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and what I can communicate across that.
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Now, when I use the internal M.2 to
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drive here. I was able to do the test in
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slightly less time, 2 minutes and 6
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seconds to get to 100% of both read and
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write. But what was interesting is that
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while it started really fast and it was
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really, really fast when doing the small
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file size when I was transferring big
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files, it actually dropped down to an
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average of just 699 megabytes per second
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while it still read really fast at 2216
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megabytes per second. And so what stood
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out to me is the consistency of using
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this drive um you know even in that
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external kind of application. So my
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takeaway from that is that if you are
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you needing to do big file transfer and
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so this could include if you're working
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with large you know video files um you
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know I'm coming at it kind of from the
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the video and photo editing side of
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things. If you're transferring large
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files, obviously you're going to benefit
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from that more consistent write speed
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and the efficiency of the drive. If
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you're wanting to do gaming um off of,
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you know, Steam or using this in an
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application um maybe with a gaming
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console, then obviously it's going to be
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useful there. So, what's my conclusion?
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Well, it is what it is at this point.
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The price of all of these is just so
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much higher, and it's kind of
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unfortunate to be reviewing a newer
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product that has lower specifications
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than what I reviewed a year and a half
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ago. And so I'm getting, you know, less
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performance, less storage for basically
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the same money as what what I reviewed a
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year and a half ago. But it is what it
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is. That's a reality of what we're
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living with at this point. I would
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recommend buying the 990 if you're
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looking to save some money versus the
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higherend lines. Maybe you don't
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actually need the faster, you know, read
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and write speed because you have a
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bottleneck, you know, as I did last year
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with my the bus speed of the computer
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itself. So you don't need to spend more
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if you're not actually going to get the
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additional performance. I would also say
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it's worth buying if for your laptop if
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you want higher efficiency. So you're
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using less battery power. You just want
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to make sure that it's going to fit.
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This laptop, for example, uses a 2242
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sized M.2 wire, whereas this is a 2280
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and so it's longer. And so make sure
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that you can actually fit a 2280 in
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there. The other reason I would consider
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the 990 over some of the others is that
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it has no incorporated heat sink. Last
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year I did install a drive with a heat
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sink, but we had to do some modification
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inside my tower actually to make it fit.
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And so I would if you know I could have
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just dropped this right in there. And so
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if you're in a you know you have a
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configuration where space is tight and
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you don't need the heat sink, then this
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is a good option there. Don't buy this
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drive for a PS5 unless you plan to
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install a third-party heat sink because
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PS5s do require uh SSDs that are
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installed into them to have a heat sink.
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I've been using Samsung SSDs, Samsung do
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some M.2 SSDs for years at this point,
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probably about 5 years, and I've had
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nothing but reliable performance out of
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them. And so I have no problem
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recommending them on that front. If you
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want more information, I have from links
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in the description where you can either
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go shop or do a little bit more research
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there. As always, thanks for watching.
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Have a great day and let the light in.
