CONCLUSION

   As you can all easily tell from our charts the MX500 500GB M.2 variant performs more or less the same as its SATA brother (they actually exchange punches a lot with the M.2 variant coming up ontop in most tests). Still much like most M.2 drives out there (at least the ones without heat spreaders on them) the performance of the MX500 gets throttled down when it reaches high temperatures. Even in our Z170 test rig which has a total of 11 system fans installed this is quite evident in the IOMeter SNIA 12 hour endurance test. Of course we don’t expect that to be much of an issue for like 90% of the user base out there (if not more) and it can always be resolved by using an M.2 heatsink (like the one offered by our friends over at EKWB) but still it’s something we did encounter during our tests.

   Just like its SATA brother the M.2 version of the MX500 also hits the sweet spot between price and performance and so the 500GB model which we have here retails for just USD109.99 inside the USA (Amazon.com) and for 113Euros inside the EU (Amazon.co.uk). Now as expected in a market that already counts many M.2 NVMe drives the M.2 variant of the MX500 may seem a bit “weak” but it should be more than just enough for the majority of users out there and since it delivers on everything Crucial promises it gets our Golden Award.

PROS

- Build Quality / Durability (180TB TBW / 1.8 Million Hours MTBF)
- Very Good Performance
- Features (NANDXtend / Static Data Refresh / SLC Caching / DevSleep/ eDrive Support)
- Crucial Storage Executive Software
- 5 Year Warranty
- Price

CONS

- Small Performance Increase Compared To The BX300 Line
- High Temperatures (Performance Throttling)
- Performance (Compared To NVMe Drives)