Thanks in no small part to Intel and their Z97 motherboards, the new M.2 storage form factor is quickly gaining attention. There are a number of reasons for this surge in popularity like the diminutive size of these SSDs being perfect for small form factor systems and the actual performance being brought to the table. Despite what may seem like an oddball interface, these are PCI-E based drives so throughput is typically quite impressive. Kingston has seen an opportunity in this niche and have created the 2280 in an effort to capitalize on what will likely be a growing segment.

Past its obvious size and performance advantages, M.2 actually has a lot of different modes that an attached drive can use. For the purposes of this review the main three are: NVMe which will be used by future drives, PCIe mode that SSDs like the Plextor M6e series use and a final Legacy SATA mode. The M.2 2280 120GB drive makes use of the latter and Kingston hopes it is also a great example of what SATA M.2 drives have to offer consumers: low cost, high value, and acceptable performance.