Packaging

You will receive:

• The SSD
• Documentation
• 7 mm to 9.5 mm adapter

The Drive

The drive conforms to the dimensions set forth by the 2.5" form factor. It is made of metal, which improves its durability. Its height is only 7 mm, which makes it compatible with Intel's Ultrabook specification. Crucial includes a 9.5 mm adapter in the package, so the SSD will also fit into notebooks that require that form factor.


Like most recent SSDs, the Crucial M500 uses the SATA 6 Gbps interface. It is compatible with any older SATA standard, but will, in such a case, work at reduced performance.


You will find the SSD controller and 16 flash chips on the PCB. A DRAM chip next to the flash controller provides operating memory for the controller.


Crucial uses a Marvell 88SS9187-BLD2 controller. It is an updated version of the one we saw on the m4 SSD.


The sixteen flash chips are produced by Micron on a 20 nanometer process and are the first to feature a 128 Gbit die.


A DRAM chip is also installed on the PCB to provide RAM for the SSD controller.