Product Listing

Kingmax SATA III SSD SMP35 Client (240GB) - An Affordable SandForce Drive

By Kenny Yeo - 8 May 2012
Launch SRP: S$429

Introduction

An Introduction to Kingmax

Solid state drives (SSDs) have become pretty affordable of late, and mainstream users and enthusiasts alike have been snapping them up like hot cakes all in the name of boosting their system’s performance.

If you have never heard of Kingmax, it is because they are a relatively new player to the storage industry. Although they were established in 1989, it was only in the late 90s that they started manufacturing their own storage and memory solutions. Now the company makes flash drives, external hard disks, memory cards, memory modules and also SSDs. With a significant presence in Taiwan, Hong Kong and China, Kingmax is now hoping to expand its businesses abroad.

One of the latest products from Kingmax is the SATA III SSD SMP35 Client (it’s a mouthful so we are just going to call it the SMP35 Client from now on). It’s an SSD drive that uses the latest SATA 6Gbps interface and comes in 60GB, 120GB, 240GB and 480GB variants. It also uses the very popular SandForce SF-2281 controller. This puts it right in the sights of other popular SSDs such as Kingston’s HyperX and the recently reviewed Intel SSD 520 series.

The Drive

The Kingmax SMP35 Client drive itself looks just like any other drive with the exception of the Kingmax sticker that’s plastered on it which details information such as model and serial number and so on. Here’s a quick look at the drive.

The Kingmax SMP35 Client looks just like any other 2.5-inch SSD drive.

The drive also comes with the usual accessories - installation bracket, SATA power and data cables.

Peeling open the cover reveals the memory chips. These are Kingmax's very own 32GB chips.

These are Kingmax's own 32GB chips with the part number KIC32G-ACAMMA.

The SandForce SF-2281 controller, which is also used on many other SSD drives today.

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7.5
  • Performance 7
  • Features 7
  • Value 8.5
The Good
Stellar performance on PCMark Vantage
Considerably more affordable than the competition
The Bad
Poor performance on AS SSD, CrystalDiskMark + erratic performance at times
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