Question Question about Firecuda 520 vs 530 in a PCIE Gen3 system

[QueBert]

I have an Asus Zenbook UM325 laptop and I want to put a new M.2 in it. In a Gen3 system would there be any real difference? I don't want to be cheap here, but I don't want to drop $60 more on a 2tb 530 over the 520. But if I can get a little more performance it might be worth it. I'm guessing since my system isn't Gen4 I wouldn't notice any difference, right? I was looking at Gen3 drives but the deal I found on either a 520 or 530 Firecudas are really good.

 

[UsandThem]

Both of those drives are faster than PCIe 3.0 can provide, so you won't notice any difference between the two.

If the newer 530 was a small premium over the 520 (like $10 - $15 tops), I'd say go with the newest drive. But $60 more isn't anywhere near worth it.

Even if you had a PCIe 4.0 slot, the only time you would see a difference would be in benchmark utilities. There would be practically zero real-world difference for the vast majority of users.

 

[Shmee]

I agree with UsandThem that both drives will be bottlenecked slightly, so the performance difference you won't notice. Since you are on a laptop, you may also want to look into power consumption and efficiency of different drives. Keep in mind that any power ratings for PCIe gen 4 drives may be a tad bit higher than what you will get, due to expecting a gen 4 bus for higher data transfer rates.

 

[coercitiv]

The 530 does better in terms of 4K Read/Write performance. If you were to use this in a desktop environment, this speed advantage might be worth discussing. As it stands though, when used in a laptop that balances energy saving with performance, I doubt the gains are going to be there. (I think the CPU will limit performance before the drive does)

The 520 comes with a better write endurance rating, so that's another marginal advantage in favor of the cheaper option.

My 2 cents, save the $60 and use it for something that noticeably improves your computing experience. The Firecuda 520 is plenty fast for that ultrabook.