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Category: Computers and Stuff

Published: Monday, 23 July 2018 15:58

The Crucial MX500 is a 2.5 inch SSD designed to be installed inside a notebook computer. We tested it by upgrading the hard drive in a Dell Precision 7720.

The internal style of SSD has a smaller profile than an SSD you might install inside a desktop computer. It can be used in both but is designed for tighter installations than you typically see with a desktop computer. That's why the MX500 includes a 7mm to 9.5mm spacer. By making the SSD profile smaller and including the spacer this SSD allows for more installation options. We did not need the spacer for installation in the Dell Precision 7720, but we did use it for a better fit.

Crucial includes a download link optimization software and Acronis for easy imaging of existing drives you'll be replacing.

It took less than 10 minutes to replace the Hitachi HDD in the Dell Precision 7720. Simply remove 4 screws to release the HDD bracket from inside the computer and another 4 screws to remove the existing HDD from the bracket. Replace the HDD with the Crucial MX500, put everything back together and your ready to format.

We originally had an SSD for Windows 10 and our Apps and a 1TB 7200RPM Hitachi HDD for our data. This is a pretty typical setup for many users that want a fast boot time and maybe don't have the need to move large amounts of data. For us, our laptop is often used for video production and media management so speed is a priority.

Moving files to and from the internal 7200 HDD was too slow for our needs. For example, we recently tested copying 84GB of media files, 472 total files, from the internal SSD to the internal HDD and took 11:48. After replacing the HDD with the Crucial MX500 into our system we were able to move that same batch of data in 3:06 about a 4X improvement. The 420 MB/s speed was a welcome improvement over the 125MB/s we were getting with the mechanical HDD.

Check out the full lineup of Crucial 2.5 SSDs here