Okay, so I’ve been meaning to upgrade my PC’s storage for a while now. I do a lot of video editing and gaming, and my old SSD was starting to feel a little sluggish. After doing some research, I narrowed it down to the Samsung 980 Pro and the 990 Pro. Both are super popular, high-performance NVMe drives, but I needed to figure out which one was the best fit for my needs (and my wallet!).
First, I gathered all the info I could find. I watched a bunch of YouTube reviews, read articles, and compared the specs sheets side-by-side. I learned the basics: both drives use PCIe Gen 4, which is blazing fast. The 990 Pro is the newer model, boasting slightly better speeds and improved power efficiency, but the 980 Pro is still remarkably fast, often at a slightly lower price point.
Digging into the Specs
So, after gathering basic data, I created a simple comparison table to organize my thoughts:
- Sequential Read/Write: The 990 Pro claims up to 7,450/6,900 MB/s, while the 980 Pro lists up to 7,000/5,000 MB/s. Noticeable, but would I really feel it in day-to-day use?
- Random Read/Write (IOPS): This is where things get interesting for my workload. Higher IOPS generally means snappier performance for things like loading games and editing large video files. The 990 Pro advertised improvements in this area.
- Power Efficiency:The 990 pro is better than 980 pro.
- Price: The 980 Pro was consistently a bit cheaper, especially for the 1TB capacity I was looking at.
The Real-World Test
I decided the best way to settle this was to get my hands on both drives. Luckily, a friend had a 980 Pro I could borrow. I already bought a 990 Pro online. So, I installed both drives into my system (one at a time, of course!) and ran some real-world tests.
I copied some large video files, loaded up a few of my favorite games, and timed how long it took to launch my video editing software. I even did some basic editing tasks, like scrubbing through timelines and applying effects.
My Findings
Honestly, in most everyday tasks, the difference was barely noticeable. Both drives were incredibly fast. Where I did see a slight edge for the 990 Pro was in those random read/write scenarios. Loading large game levels felt a tiny bit snappier, and scrubbing through 4K video timelines in my editing software was a little smoother.
But here’s the thing: the 980 Pro was still incredibly fast. Unless I was really pushing my system with huge files and demanding tasks, I probably wouldn’t notice the difference in a blind test.
The Verdict
So, which one did I choose? It is difficult to choose, finally I chose 990 pro for my using, and 980 pro can be my backup. For my needs, that small performance bump, especially in random read/writes, was worth the extra cost. But if you’re on a tighter budget, or your workload isn’t as demanding, the 980 Pro is still an amazing drive that will absolutely blow you away. You really can’t go wrong with either one!