Micron’s latest PCI Express 4.0 high-performance solid-state drive is the Crucial P310, a versatile SSD offered in both a full-size 80mm variant for laptop and desktop PC upgrades, as well as an exceptionally compact 30mm version designed to fit handheld gaming consoles such as the Steam Deck. Despite its focus on gaming, the P310 (starts at $64.99; $94.99 for 1TB as tested) delivers acceptable albeit average gaming performance and only slightly better general-storage performance, according to our tests. Although it’s a capable drive, this DRAM-less SSD with QLC memory is a good deal only if you can get it for considerably below its list price. If not, check out our Editors’ Choice pick for a budget gaming-centric PCIe 4.0 SSD, the Addlink AddGame A93, or a slightly upmarket gaming champ, the SK Hynix Platinum P41.Design: DRAM-Less Architecture and QLC NANDThe P310 is a PCI Express 4×4 drive, and the version we tested is manufactured on an M.2 Type-2280 (80mm long) “gumstick” printed circuit board. Crucial also offers a shorter M.2 Type-2230 (30mm long) variant. The P310 employs the NVMe protocol over its PCIe 4.0 bus and includes Micron’s own 232-layer QLC NAND flash.
Since 1982, PCMag has tested and rated thousands of products to help you make better buying decisions. See how we test.
Thanks to the drive’s Phison PS5027-E27T controller, which we first saw on the Corsair MP600 Elite, Micron eschews a dynamic random-access memory (DRAM) cache in the P310, instead enlisting your PC’s main memory as a host memory buffer (HMB). (Check out our glossary of SSD terms if some of this jargon is new to you.)The P310 2280 is currently available in 500GB, 1TB, and 2TB capacities; according to Micron, a version with a compact heatsink, small enough to fit into a PS5’s spare M.2 slot, is in the works. The P310 2230 is currently available in 1TB and 2TB capacities, both without heatsinks.
Solid-state drives based on QLC NAND flash memory tend to be less durable for heavy write activity than either TLC or MLC drives, as indicated by lower terabytes written (TBW) ratings. TBW refers to how much data can be written to a drive before its individual cells begin to fail. That doesn’t mean the entire drive will stop functioning, but that cells will be taken out of service, making less storage available as time goes on. QLC-based drives are best for read-intensive tasks in which new data is not constantly being written to the drive. Typical customers include everyday users, students, office workers, casual gamers, and entry-level designers.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
The P310’s durability ratings align with those of other QLC-based SSDs we’ve seen. For example, the Sabrent Rocket Q4 is rated at 200TBW for its 1TB model, 400TBW for 2TB, and 800TBW for 4TB, while the Corsair MP600 Core XT’s ratings are 250TBW for 1TB, 450TBW for 2TB, and 900TBW for 4TB. (A 4TB capacity is not available for the P310.) Again, durability ratings for TLC drives are much higher; the ADATA Legend 850, for instance, is rated at 1,000TBW (1TB) and 2,000TBW (2TB).The P310’s five-year warranty is valid as long as you don’t exceed its TBW rating in that time. In reality, unless you regularly write and overwrite large amounts of data (more than typical for consumer PC use), you’re unlikely to exceed even a QLC drive’s TBW maximum before the warranty runs out. Testing the Crucial P310: Solid PCIe 4.0 SpeedWe test PCIe 4.0 internal SSDs using a desktop testbed with an MSI X570 motherboard and AMD Ryzen CPU, 16GB of Corsair Dominator DDR4 memory clocked to 3,600MHz, and a discrete Nvidia GeForce graphics card. We put the P310 through our usual suite of solid-state drive benchmarks, comprising Crystal DiskMark 6.0, PCMark 10 Storage, and 3DMark Storage. We compared its performance with a group of fast PCI Express 4.0 SSDs.Crystal DiskMark’s sequential speed tests provide a traditional measure of drive throughput, simulating best-case, straight-line transfers of large files. These throughput-speed tests largely serve to test the veracity of manufacturers’ speed ratings, and the P310 slightly exceeded Micron’s claimed read and write speeds.Crystal DiskMark’s 4K read test measures how long it takes to access a group of files in 4K cluster sizes. While the P310’s 4K read score was in the middle of our group of comparison drives, its 4K write score was the second highest, trailing only the WD Black SN850X and landing slightly above a large group of drives with similar scores. Good 4K write performance is especially important for an SSD used as a boot drive, though we test them as secondary drives.
The PCMark 10 Overall Storage test measures a drive’s speed in performing various routine tasks such as launching Windows, loading games and creative apps, and copying both small and large files, aggregating its scores at these various tasks. The P310 did well in the Overall Storage test, in a small group of elite-scoring drives slightly lagging only the Crucial T500 and TeamGroup MP44.
While the PCMark 10 Overall Storage score aggregates the results of multiple tasks, you can also see the scores for some of the P310’s individual trace-based tests. Its results in these traces were largely middling; its best was a top-three performance in the small-file copy trace, a shade behind the Crucial T500 and the heatsink-equipped version of the Samsung SSD 990 Pro.In the 3DMark Storage benchmark, which aggregates a drive’s performance on various gaming-related tasks, the P310’s results were in the middle of a narrow range of scores turned in by most of our comparison drives.Verdict: A Capable SSD With Room for ImprovementThe Crucial P310 is a capable internal SSD with QLC NAND flash memory and no internal DRAM, both of which typically tend to keep an SSD’s price down. Micron leverages these characteristics nicely in the Editors’ Choice-winning Crucial P3, one of our favorite PCI Express 3.0 SSDs. It’s too early to get a feel for the P310’s retail pricing, but based on its list pricing and comparing it with other PCIe 4.0 speedsters, it is no great bargain. With QLC memory, it is easy to scale to higher capacities, but although the P3 and many of the other drives mentioned above—whether QLC or TLC based—offer 4TB models, the P310 maxes out at 2TB. The Crucial P3 Plus, a DRAM-less PCI Express 4.0 SSD with QLC memory, also comes in capacities up to 4TB, but it has much slower throughput speeds than the P310.
(Credit: Joseph Maldonado)
The P310’s DRAM-less architecture provides power savings over SSDs whose controllers include a DRAM cache. A documented downside of DRAM-less drives, in general, is possible performance degradation under very large file transfers, so bear that in mind if you tend to move tens or hundreds of gigabytes around at a time, or deal with extremely large media. As the full-size version of the Crucial P310 2230, which is small enough to fit handheld gaming devices, Micron touts the P310 2280’s gaming capabilities. In both the gaming-centric 3DMark Storage benchmark and the gaming-related traces from PCMark 10 testing, the P310 2280 proves itself capable, with average results among the PCI Express 4.0 speedsters we compared it with. That is true in all of our benchmarking: It isn’t at the top of the scoreboard, but neither did it turn in any notably low scores.Our Editors’ Choice pick for a budget gaming-centric PCIe 4.0 SSD, the Addlink AddGame A93, is a DRAM-less SSD with TLC NAND that performs a bit better. It’s also cheaper, available in a 4TB capacity, and includes a PS5-compatible heatsink. Our mainstream gaming SSD pick for an M.2 PCIe 4.0 drive remains the SK Hynix Platinum P41. That said, the Crucial P310 is a solid and capable SSD for either gaming or general-purpose storage in its own right. We would advise you, though, to keep an eye on its pricing, and see if you can get it for much below list pricing before pulling the trigger. And we would like Micron to introduce a 4TB P310 down the line, in the Type-2280-length model.
Like What You’re Reading?
Sign up for Lab Report to get the latest reviews and top product advice delivered right to your inbox.
This newsletter may contain advertising, deals, or affiliate links. Subscribing to a newsletter indicates your consent to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. You may unsubscribe from the newsletters at any time.
About Tony Hoffman
Senior Analyst, Hardware
Since 2004, I have worked on PCMag’s hardware team, covering at various times printers, scanners, projectors, storage, and monitors. I currently focus my testing efforts on 3D printers, pro and productivity displays, and drives and SSDs of all sorts. Over the years, I have reviewed iPad and iPhone science apps, plus the occasional camera, laptop, keyboard, and mouse. I’ve also written a host of articles about astronomy, space science, travel photography, and astrophotography for PCMag and its past and present sibling publications (among them, Mashable and ExtremeTech), as well as for the PCMag Digital Edition.
Read Tony’s full bio
Read the latest from Tony Hoffman
