CONCLUSION

   Our charts clearly show that the SSDnow UV400 480GB may not be the fastest SSD in the market today but it holds its own against many of the latest models. Certainly after using up all 8GB of the pseudo SLC cache write performance drops quite a bit (average write in HD Tune Pro dropped down to 105.3MB/s) but on one hand that’s the case with quite a few SSDs in the market today while on the other not many people write over 8GB at a time on an SSD. The main problem lies with the rather low IOPS results we recorded all across the board (especially in our SNIA tests) but unless you want an SSD for professional use this shouldn’t really worry you. Of course I don’t know why Kingston decided to disable the power save mode of the drive (DevSleep) but I’m sure they had their reasons (besides it’s not like SSDs use much power as is).

   So what about price? How much is Kingston currently asking for the SSDnow UV400 480GB SSD? Well right now the standalone version of the UV400 480GB model (the above picture showcases the slightly more expensive upgrade bundle) retails for just USD110.99 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and for just 115Euros inside the EU (Amazon.co.uk) a price tag which puts right next to the Ultra II model by SanDisk and slightly beneath the OCZ Trion 150 480GB and Crucial MX300 525GB models. With that in mind we don’t think Kingston asks for much for the SSDnow UV400 480GB and although it’s really not suited for serious professional use (as far as performance goes) it’s a very good option for regular consumers and that’s why it gets our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality (Toshiba 15nm NAND Flash/Marvell Controller)
- Very Good Overall Performance
- 3 Years Warranty / 1 Million Hours MTBF
- Design (New For A Kingston Drive)
- Price (For Some)

CONS

- IOmeter SNIA Performance