Samsung is at the ready with a brand new family of mainstream solid state drives, targeting the market segment previously occupied by its popular SSD 840 EVO series. The new Samsung SSD 850 EVO series is the follow-up to the company's current flagship SSD 850 PRO, but the new EVO is Samsung's first to pack 32-layer 3D V?NAND 3-bit MLC flash memory. The move to 32-layer 3D V-NAND 3-bit MLC flash (a.k.a. TLC) brings costs down, but doesn't adversely affect endurance because the cell structure doesn't suffer from the same inherent limitations of planar NAND, since the cells are stacked vertically with the 3D V-NAND.

We?ve got a 500GB Samsung SSD 850 EVO on the test bench and have compared it to the 840 EVO as well as the higher-end 850 PRO, and a few other enthusiast-class drives for good measure...