OCZ ARC 100 240GB Solid State Drive Review

Performance Summary: OCZ's new ARX 100 240GB solid state drive didn't lead the pack in any particular performance category, but the drive did offer consistently strong performance throughout our testing. Large sequential transfers, small file transfers at high queue depths, and low access times were the ARC 100’s strong suits, though even in the tests where it trailed some competing drives, the deltas separating them were somewhat small. The ARC 100 did well in our IOMeter tests, and offered strong read performance, though it trailed the pack by a small margin in the trace-based PCMark 7 storage benchmark.

OCZ ARC 100 Solid State Drives, Find Them At Amazon.Com

OCZ has labeled the ARC 100 series SSDs as value-oriented options, targeting budget-conscious, mainstream users. While performance was good overall, the ARC 100 is not a barn-burner like some higher-end, more expensive solid state drives.

When you see the ARC 100's suggested pricing, however, the drive's slightly lower performance probably won't seem like much of an issue.  OCZ is pricing the 120GB drive at only $74.99, the 240GB drive at $119.99, and the 480GB drive at 239.99, or roughly $0.63, $0.50, and $0.50 per gigabyte, respectively. At those prices, the OCZ ARC 100 series falls somewhere near the lower-end of the current price spectrum, which will surely appeal to many of you.

The above image illustrates where OCZ sees the ARC 100 in its current product stack. Pricing and performance is lower than the other product families, but the warranty is similar in length to the Vertex 460. The ARC 100, however, comes with OCZ's brand0new “ShieldPlus Warranty”. OCZ's ShieldPlus Warranty is meant to eliminate the hassle surrounding support and warranty claims. According to OCZ, with no original proof of purchase required, end-users can simply provide their ARC serial number in the event of a problem, and a dedicated OCZ customer service representative will try to help troubleshoot and offer support. In the event that the product is determined to be defective, a brand-new ARC SSD of the same capacity will be advance shipped to the customer. When the replacement is received, end-users will find a pre-paid return label and need only to place their original drive in the box for a free return to OCZ. The ShieldPlus Warranty will be offered to customers in North America and EMEA at first, but other regions will follow. That's one heck of a nice perk should you be worried about warranty service on a new SSD.

Decent Performance Great Warranty Competitive Pricing	Middling Overall Performance No Accessory Bundle