Western Digital SN850 PCIe 4.0 SSD

Although there's no hardware encryption and the heatsink is an expensive extra, the SN850 is an affordable a speedy PCIe 4.0 NVMe for those wanting the latest SSD tech.

Priced at $230 for the tested 1 TB version, the WD Black SN850 is expensive. For that amount of money, you can get a pretty decent 2 TB M.2 NVMe SSD (PCIe Gen 3)—just not one that's as fast as the SN850. The two strongest competitors to the WD Black SN850 are the Corsair MP600 Pro and Samsung 980 Pro, which cost exactly the same—is anyone surprised? If I had to pick between these three drives, I would opt for the WD Black SN850 every time.

The WD SN850 is the fastest PCIe 4.0 SSD you can buy. Incredible sequential and random throughput makes for a drive that's way ahead of the pack.

WD’s Black SN850 is a high-performance PCIe 4.0 x4 M.2 NVMe SSD that was built from the ground up as the company’s fastest SSD for gamers and prosumers. Trading blows with Samsung’s best, it marks a dramatic improvement over its predecessor, ranking it as one of the best SSDs on the market.

Arriving seemingly from left field, WD’s entry into the PCIe Gen 4 market segment, with the Black SN850, has somewhat stolen the show.

A straight 100% rating pretty much says it all!