MAINGEAR Vybe Gaming PC Review – Intel Core i7-6700K & NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Ti

By Steven Kean

USB 3.1, SATA Storage Speed Test

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We will be using CrystalDiskMark 5.0.2 x64 to gauge how well the MSI Z170A KRAIT motherboard handles several storage types. We will begin by connecting a Sandisk Ultra II 480GB SSD directly to the motherboard’s onboard SATA 6Gb/s connector. For USB 3.0 and 3.1 testing, we will be using a Thermaltake 5G USB 3.0 dock to test the USB connections. In addition, we will use a Kingston DataTraveler microDuo 3C USB 3.1 flash drive on the USB 3.1 port.

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Connecting the Sandisk Ultra II 480GB SSD to the SATA 6Gb/s on the motherboard we received a 539.6MB/s Sequential Read and 502.3MB/s Sequential Write speed. This compares to Sandisk’s rated speed of up to 550MB/s Read and 500MB/s Write.

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CrystalDiskMark shows the Sandisk Ultra II SSD receiving 426.0MB/s Read and 407.9MB/s Write speeds in the Sequential tests.

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There really isn’t much use in testing USB 3.1 as there are no drives that take advantage of the potential speed boost of USB 3.1. We used the same docking station and Sandisk SSD we used in the previous tests, but connected it to the USB 3.1 Type A connector on the motherboard. As you can see, the results don’t show any performance increase, but nothing to get excited over. We received 424.9MB/s Sequential Read and 414.0MB/s Sequential Write speeds. As drives are designed to take advantage of USB 3.1 we will see this change.

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While no drives take advantage of the increased bandwith, Kingston has provided us one of their latest DataTraveler microDuo 3C flash drives which is designed for USB 3.1 Type A and Type C. Connected to the USB 3.1 port on the motherboard, it performed slightly faster than Kingston rates the drive for (100MB/s and 15MB/s). CrystalDiskMark gave it a 124.6MB/s Read and 37.12MB/s Write speed in the sequential test.