Stefan Mileschin

The Crucial MX500 is the next generation SATA SSD from Micron's consumer division. As the latest MX series drive, the MX500 is positioned to be a mainstream product with solid performance but without much of a premium over entry-level SSDs. Since Micron has not yet released a consumer NVMe SSD, the Crucial MX500 will also serve as their flagship consumer drive and the showcase for their new 64-layer 3D NAND flash memory.

Micron is one of several NAND flash manufacturers to introduce 64L 3D NAND this year. They're a bit late to the party considering that their NAND manufacturing partner Intel introduced started shipping their 64L 3D TLC in a retail drive six months ago, but Micron hasn't missed their chance. All of the major NAND flash manufacturers except SK Hynix are still in the early phases of rolling out their 64L 3D NAND. In a major change from the state of the industry for the past several years, there's no clear leader: Intel and Micron, Toshiba and Western Digital/SanDisk, and Samsung are all putting out products with competitive performance and pricing. The market is up for grabs, and the SATA segment that still makes up the bulk of consumer SSD sales is where the competition is fiercest.

To prepare for this next round of competition, the Crucial MX500 brings major hardware changes to what has been a slowly evolving product line stretching back to the first 6Gbps SATA SSD.

https://www.anandtech.com/show/12165...1tb-ssd-review