Western Digital SN850X

Capacities up to 4TB ; Available with or without heatsink ; Exceeded both its sequential read and write speed ratings ; Aced PCMark and 3DMark storage tests

Lacks 256-bit AES hardware-based encryption

The WD Black SN850X takes the company's flagship PCIe 4.0 gaming SSD and makes it even better, offering higher capacity and improved test results (including a new PC Labs record in the 3DMark Storage benchmark). About all it lacks is hardware-based...

Really fast reading and writing speed ; Has up to 4TB capacity option ; The 1TB and 2TB models can have heatsink as a purchase option ; The ones with heatsink are PS5 compatible

A really fast NVMe SSD for both reading and writing, with consistent gaming performance

Excellent read/write speeds ; Up to 4TB capacity ; Heatsink option

No hardware encryption ; Can get warm without ventilation ; No heatsink on 4TB drive

A notable performance improvement over the WD Black SN850 with the added bonus of fitting inside a PlayStation 5. WD still isn’t including hardware encryption, and the 4TB model has no heatsink option, but in other respects, this is a good upgrade.

Stunning performance.

Couldn't hit the maximum 4K figures under testing.

WD's Black SN850 drive was already a very good flagship drive but with an upgrade from 96-layer to 112-layer NAND and improvements to the firmware, the SN850X takes over that mantle with great effect. But the price could do with some tweaking.