Conclusion

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With the Synapse, OCZ has a 64 Gigabyte cahing SSD in its portfolio that is very easy to install. The fact that the drive has been equipped with a SandForce SF-2281 controller already suggests that it might be fast. At the end of the day you get 70'000 IOPS when doing 4k reads and 52'000 IOPS when performing 4k writes. Therefore the Synapse really is a quick drive.

A closer look at the sequential thoughput rates reveals that the asynchronous NAND flash has an impact. Regarding sequential reads we se a maximum value of 441 Megabyte per second. Concerning sequential writes the drive tops out at 487 Megabyte per seconds. These values really aren't bad, but it's not wat the manufacturer promises in the specifications.

The most important thing about a caching drive is, that it's easy to install. Once you plugged it to your computer you'll just have to download and install the Dataplex caching software. After a reboot everything worked perfectly and you get a really significant performance boost over the old hard drive. There is only one thing we found that wasn't very good: if you should have a power outage it can take the software up to six hours to recover all data.

Last but not least there is the price: the 64 Gigabyte Synapse Caching costs about CHF 115.- (est EUR 96.-). The fact that this drive is very easy to install we can even recommend it to unexperienced users.

The OCZ Synapse 64 GB SSD receives good four out of five stars.

• OCZ Synapse 64 GB Caching SSD at Brack Electronics AG kaufen
• OCZ Synapse 64 GB Caching SSD at Digitec kaufen