Product Listing

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

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

Conclusion

Aggressive Pricing, More Choices for Consumers

On the performance front, the Kingmax SMP35 Client is no slouch but its performance is a bit of a mixed bag. This is because while performance on HD Tune, PCMark7 and Iometer was solid and its scores on PCMark Vantage were the highest we’ve seen yet, it was considerably slower than the competition on AS SSD and CrystalDiskMark. Although we could not pinpoint to reasons as to why, we think it’s likely because of its higher capacity chips - 32GB as opposed to 16GB ones used on most other drives - and also probably an inherent problem with the chips disagreeing with the two benchmarks. But more than the latter, firmware plays a large part of it performance capabilities as the original firmware that the drive came with had much lower performance results than the updated firmware used to garner the results shown in this review. As such, we feel that there's still room for improvement with the right tweaks made to best utilize its hardware components.

The Kingmax SMP35 Client doesn't really set new standards for performance (because of its erratic results), but it is much more affordable than the competition and offers decent to slightly better than average performance.

However, where it truly redeems itself is its price. At S$429 for the 240GB variant, it is considerably more affordable than its competitors with similar capacities - $100 less than the Intel SSD 520 series and a whopping $200 less than the Kingston HyperX. Considering the difference in price here, we think this makes the Kingmax SMP35 Client pretty good value for money even if it's a little inconsistent in terms of performance.

All in all, the Kingmax SMP35 Client won’t upset the present leaders in the high-end consumer SSD category, but its aggressive pricing and decent performance does give consumers looking for an SSD to speed up their rig more to choose from. And that can only be a good thing.

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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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