Zalman N Series 128GB SandForce SF-1222 SSD Review

Zalman N Series 128GB SSD

It seems like every week another company joins the SSD fray with a drive of their own. Granted, there’s still a lot of users that still haven’t made the leap from the trusty old platter hard drive but that number is rapidly dwindling. Does Zalman, a company best known for their cooling and cases, have what it takes to get a piece of the SSD pie? They’re making an effort with their launch of two different SSD lines. One, the S Series, carries the JMicron controller and the second, the N Series, sports the popular SandForce controller. We’ll have a look at the N Series to see if it stacks up with the other SandForce drives already on the market.

The N Series drives are their enthusiast level offering and have a retail price of $289 for the 128GB drive, $169 for the 64GB drive and should be available at the time of this writing. The S Series are more value oriented with drives of capacities of 32GB, 64GB, and 128GB at an MSRP of $99, $149 and $249 respectively.

EDITORS UPDATE: These are finally hitting retailers and the N128GB and N64GB are selling for $249 and $155 respectively.

Let’s have a look at the features and specifications as listed by Zalman.

Zalman N Series Features:

• Optimized for AHCI Mode
• Support WIN7 Trim Command
• SandForce Technology Inside
• Ultra fast start-up and access speed
• Reliable
• Silent and low power operation

Zalman N Series Performance Specifications:

Model #	Size	Sequential Read	Write Performance
SSD0064N1	64GB	Up to 280MB/S	Up to 270MB/S
SSD0128N1	128GB	Up to 280MB/S	Up to 270MB/S

In the box is simply the drive and a small brochure with specifications and instructions. The drive itself is black with a brushed texture and the familiar SATA II data and power connectors.

Let’s see if there are any surprises on the inside.