Leven 256GB SSD with DRAM Cache Review

Last Updated on September 25, 2022 4:52 am

Posted 25 Sep 2022 12:45AM ET

I previously reviewed the 2TB and 128GB Leven 2.5″ SSD’s (without any DRAM cache – see here: https://htwingnut.com/2022/03/06/review-leven-2tb-2-5-sata-ssd/) and apparently they now offer SSD’s with DRAM cache. I only saw drives up to 512GB, however, but did pick up a 256GB drive to review. They call it JS-600 Pro or JSD600 (assuming the “D” stands for “DRAM”). Considering the non DRAM cache versions did not perform well with sustained write performance, the hope was that the DRAM cache might help a bit.

The major selling point for these SSD’s are cost. I picked up this 256GB SSD for about $22US from Amazon.

See my YouTube review here: https://youtu.be/D9-eM8Q0R74

First, if you look at the internal components of the SSD’s you notice that the DRAM cache PCB is full size compared with the non DRAM cache versions. Also as noted in the other review the 2TB has a single NAND flash chip whereas the 128GB and 256GB versions are each populated with four NAND chips. Leven claims all these SSD’s are TLC NAND, and considering the pricing of TLC NAND chips lately being cheaper than QLC, I wouldn’t doubt it.

There is a single module of DRAM cache on the PCB on the opposite side of the NAND flash chips, but it looks like there’s room for a second DRAM module if they so chose to add additional cache. Unfortunately there are no markings on the DRAM chip so there’s no way to tell anything about it; manufacturer, capacity, speed, etc.

The SSD shell is made of metal and the only way to disassemble it is by prying the edges apart. The PCB itself is secured with four philips head screws, otherwise nothing else. There are four more open pads that look like are available to add additional NAND chips, but whether or not LEVEN just used an off the shelf PCB and plan to make use of it or not is yet to be seen.

I ran two tests on the SSD, first was CrystalDiskMark and results were pretty promising. Running 5 samples of 4GB each resulted in over 560 MB/sec sequential Read performance and just over 500MB/sec sequential Write performance. 4K Random with Queue depth of 1 resulted in about 33 MB/sec Read and 92MB/sec write.

Following the CrystalDiskMark test, I ran a self made powershell script which basically uses a file copy command from another SSD to write 1GB files filled with random data across the entirety of the disk. This is where the non-DRAM cache versions failed miserably. This DRAM cache version of the SSD didn’t fare much better. It maintained about 375MB/sec for the first 60-70 GB of the disk then dropped down to about 120MB/sec for the remainder of the test through the end of full capacity of the SSD.

However, to test if the DRAM cache was really doing its job, I ran the same script writing 1GB files across the entirety of the disk, but paused the script for ten minutes every 20GB written. This should give the DRAM cache enough time to finish evacuating its contents onto the NAND flash. By doing this, the write performance was maintained across the entirety of the SSD, averaging about 375MB/sec.

1GB file read performance was actually pretty good at a consistent 470-480 MB/sec across the entirety of the disk.

So conclusion? Even at $22 for a 256GB SSD, there is still lots of competition in that price range. I would not choose one of the Leven SSD’s without DRAM cache, but with the cache it seems a viable budget solution. Problem is so far they only offer up to 512GB SSD with DRAM cache. There’s nothing special about these SSD’s other than price. I mainly picked this up because I was able to snag a 2TB without DRAM cache for cheap which was featured in the previous review. But since it didn’t fare so well, I figured it was worth seeing if their SSD’s were worth it with DRAM cache at least.