Introduction
Addlink is a brand you may not have heard of in the US, though it has existed since 2014. Addlink Technology Corp. was established in Taipei and runs its own factory for development of storage solutions such as memory storage, gaming DRAM, M.2 PCIe SSD, 2.5″ SATA III SSD, NAS SSD, Portable SSD, Professional Memory Cards, and USB Drives.
Under addlink’s banner of products, it offers M.2 PCIe SSDs, SATA III SSDs, External SSDs, and NAS SSDs. Today we will be reviewing one of its M.2 PCIe SSDs in its lineup. Addlink offers three levels of M.2 PCIe SSDs, in its “Gaming” lineup there is the A95 at the top, A90 Lite, and X70, all come with aluminum heatsinks. Right under the “Gaming” tier is the “Creator” tier, and this is where the S95 and S90 Lite live. These SSDs do not have aluminum heatsinks, but rather a small heat spreader, otherwise, they share the same specifications. Under that tier is the “Compute” tier where S70 Lite and S68 live, these are PCIe Gen3 whereas the S95 and S90 Lite and A95 and A90 Lite are PCIe Gen4 SSDs.
In today’s review, we will be focusing on the addlink S95 GEN4x4 NVMe 1.4 SSD (ad2TBS95M2P) which provides PCIe Gen4 x4 NVMe performance at 7200MB/s read and 6500MB/s write performance on a TLC 3D NAND flash-based SSD with a DRAM cache to offer value and great performance. This SSD shares exactly the same specs as the addlink A95, except it does not come with the aluminum heatsink, to reduce cost. Addlink bills the S95 as an M.2 PCIe SSD without a heatsink rated for top speed and offers faster performance than the budget S90 Lite.
addlink S95 SSD
The addlink S95 2TB PCIe 4.0 NVMe M.2 2280 SSD (ad2TBS95M2P) has four different capacities offered, a 1TB model, a 2TB model, a 4TB model, and even an 8TB model. It is rare to see an SSD this fast with an 8TB capacity option, but the addlink S95 offers this configuration for those that need maximum storage capacity with performance. We will be reviewing the 2TB model. The addlink S95 2TB SSD is a 2280 M.2 SSD and runs on the NVMe 1.4 PCIe Gen4 x4 interface. This SSD is based on Micron 176-Layer 3D TLC NAND Flash and does have a DRAM cache of 2GB of DDR4 at 2666MT/s.
The addlink S95 will run at these specifications for sequential read/write based on capacity: 1TB: 7200MB/s read and 6000MB/s write, 2TB: 7200MB/s read and 6500MB/s write, 4TB: 7200MB/s read and 6500 write, 8TB: 7000MB/s read and 6000MB/s write. The endurance of the 2TB model we are reviewing is 1400 TBW.
Features include: Advanced Wear Leveling, Bad Block Management, TRIM, SMART, Over-Provision, End-to-end data path protection, Thermal throttling, SmartECC, SmartRefresh, and Drive log. They all have an MTBF of 1.8 million hours, which is above average, and a 5-year warranty.
The addlink S95 is based on the popular Phison E18 controller. We’ve seen this controller in several modern SSDs. The Phison E18 controller is manufactured on the TSMC 12nm manufacturing process. It supports a maximum capacity of 8TB and a max of 8 channels and supports the NVMe 1.4 protocol and Gen4x4 M.2 interface. It can run up to 1600MT/s per channel and supports DDR4. It runs a 32-bit ARM Cortex R5 (three CPUs) CoXProcessor Technology CPU. It supports dynamic SLC cache, 4th gen LDPC, end-to-end data path protection, SMartECC, internal SRAM ECC/parity, AES 128/256 bit, SHA 160/256/512, RSA 4096, TCG & Opal 2.0, Pyrite, Sanitize, and Crypto Erase.
SSD Pictures
The addlink S95 PCIe Gen4x4 NVMe SSD is packed in a good-looking box, and it clearly shows what the SSD will look like so you know what you are getting. The capacity is clearly shown, and the read-and-write performance is described on the backside. Inside the box is an installation manual, but no inclusion of M.2 screws.
The addlink S95 does not come with a heatsink, for that you need the addlink A95 model. What it does have is a thin reflective sticky applied to the top side, but this doesn’t add to cooling performance in any meaningful way, it is practically a bare SSD. There are chip components on both sides of this SSD, even on the 2TB model. The top side has two NAND Flash chips, the controller, and one DRAM chip. On the back side are four NAND Flash chips and a second DRAM chip.
The controller and DRAM components are right in the middle of the SSD on both sides, with the two NAND Flash chips on either side. This means cooling can be concentrated centrally. However, with no heatsink or heat spreader, the S95 has no form of cooling, but this does allow it to remain very thin in this form factor and fit well into devices such as laptops, the PS5, and desktops.
When we take a closer look at the components, we can see the Phison E18 controller labeled PS5018-E18-41 central on the SSD. DRAM is handled by SK hynix H5AN8G6NDJ 1TB (x2) 2666MT/s modules. Finally, the current addlink S95 is using the better Phison E18 + Micron 176-Layer 3D TLC NAND Flash labeled IA7BG94AYA combo. In its initial release, the addlink S95 utilized an older Micron 96-Layer 3D TLC NAND Flash, but the SSD has been updated to run the newer Micron 176L 3D TLC NAND Flash, and this combo has proven to be a very powerful and fast combination for SSDs.