SSD by stefan @ 2018-03-19
Bolt B10 was thought as a very compact, light storage device which can accompany you everywhere, while providing quite a bit of storage space. Wear Leveling helps extend the SSD life span, while the LDPC Error Correction mechanisms are in place for protecting against data corruption. The drive is compatible with the latest USB standards, but backwards compatibility is also enabled for USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 devices.
We would like to thank at first Silicon Power for supplying a sample of their Bolt B10 USB 3.1 External SSD for testing and reviewing.
"Founded in 2003 by a group of enthusiastic data storage industry experts, Silicon Power is committed to delivering outstanding product and service quality. Headquartered and with our own state-of-the-art production site in Taipei, we have become a leading manufacturer of flash memory cards, USB flash drives, portable hard drives, solid state drives, DRAM modules and industrial-grade products. As an international player with four branch offices around the globe, we continuously strive to offer the perfect data storage solution for all requirements of modern digitalized life. With a strong focus on combining innovative technology and award-winning design, we live up to our brand promise to reliably preserve and protect your most valuable data.
Because memory is personal."
Your Best Buddy on Your Commute – A True Space and Time Saver
Like to get some work done on your daily commute? Let the B10 boost your productivity on the go by unburdening your laptop from storage devouring data or speedily saving all your projects. For smooth and efficient work processes and hassle-free data backups. And even if the train is super crowded, you will always find some space for your slim and compact buddy Bolt B10.
Fly Weight Champion
Always on the move? Want to travel light? Weighing only 25g the B10 will never be a burden. Not much bigger than a business card, it comfortably fits in any pocket without forming ugly bulges. A fly weight champion for big plans and large projects in the palm of your hand.
Heavy Performer
You have big ideas, large files to handle, and a need for speed? The B10 will not disappoint you. With transfer speeds of up to 400MB/s and storage capacities of up to 512GB, it stores even massive files in seconds and lets you free up valuable space on your laptop.
...And Reliable
The B10 supports LDPC (Low-Density Parity Check) coding (an extremely effective ECC function) to ensure data integrity and protection against data corruption. Wear Leveling technology helps to extend the B10's life span.
We have recently received in our test labs another portable SSD from Silicon Power, and to be more exact, the Bolt B10 model; the product is advertised as operating on the USB 3.1 Gen1 bus, being about 4x faster than portable HDDs but also on the top packaging layer the manufacturer has listed the total available capacity of the sample (in our case, 256GB):
The manufacturer reminds us that we are dealing with a pocket-sized storage device, which is equipped with a micro-B 3.0 port:
The back side of the packaging does show a small product description, the list of technical specifications, package contents but also some details on the SP Worldwide Service Center:
Inside the box, we will get an User Manual, along with the data transfer cable and the main product itself, all sitting inside a transparent plastic mold:
The User Manual is multi-language and explains the installation procedure (which is mostly straight-forward):
Placed near the data transfer cable, you can see that the unit does feature a compact chassis, which is very light:
Speaking about the weight, it is only 25 grams and its dimensions are 80 x 49.5 x 9.4 (mm); the top plastic cover does house a Silicon Power logo, along with the data transfer LED:
On the frame, we will also spot the micro-B 3.0 port:
On the opposite side, we will get to see the total drive capacity, along with some certification logos:
The small red LED does blink when data is transferred to/from the Bolt B10:
CPU: Intel I5 4690K Retail @ 4.6GHz
CPU Cooler: Corsair H100i GTX
Motherboard: BIOSTAR Z97X Gaming
RAM: GeIL Black Dragon 4x4GB DDR2133 (@1600)
Video: HIS RX 460 Slim-iCooler OC 2GB
Power Supply: Cooler Master 850W
SSDs: OCZ Vertex 3 240GB + OCZ Vertex 460
Case: Cooler Master ATCS 840
The drive has arrived formatted FAT32, but we will convert it to NTFS before the tests. Here is the total free space reported by Windows:
With the help of AIDA64, we could extract more information regarding the drive:
Blank SSD
Blank SSD
Blank SSD
Blank SSD
Blank SSD
Blank SSD
Blank SSD
Filled SSD
Filled SSD
Filled SSD
Filled SSD
Filled SSD
Filled SSD
Filled SSD
Bolt B10 was thought as a very compact, light storage device which can accompany you everywhere, while providing quite a bit of storage space. Wear Leveling helps extend the SSD life span, while the LDPC Error Correction mechanisms are in place for protecting against data corruption. The drive is compatible with the latest USB standards, but backwards compatibility is also enabled for USB 3.0 and USB 2.0 devices.
Since the drive does pack TLC NAND, it is expected for the write speed to get slower, after the SLC buffer has been filled; this usually happens when lots of data is transferred at once:
This behavior is better seen when running the Write test of the HD Tune Pro utility:
The 256GB model of the Bolt B10 can be found online for about 93 Euros; we do also have available a 128GB model for about 60 Euros, while the 512GB model can be bought for about 163 Euros.
We would like to thank again to Silicon Power for making this review possible!