First Look: Corsair Force F100

Keeping pace with their growing product line of storage products, Corsair has introduced the Force F100 and F200 SSDs. Benchmark Reviews is testing the Corsair F100 for this article, which is expected to reach speeds of 285 MB/s for sequential reads and
275 MB/s sequential writes. The Corsair CSSD-F100GB2-BRKT kit offers a 3.5-2.5" adapter tray inside the package, in addition to the SSD. Inside, the SSD is built from the SandForce SF-1200 controller; outside, the Corsair Force F100 shows off a simple black painted finish on the metal casing that gives the drive a total weight of 80g.

Best suited for notebook and desktop computer installations, the 100GB Corsair Force F100 SSD could also be utilized for mission-critical backups or high-abuse data systems. Corsair Force-series Solid State Drives have been designed with a focus on high-performance operational and data transfer speeds, and includes encrypted data protection and improved NAND wear-leveling through the SandForce controller. Although Corsair Force SSDs do not offer any integrated USB Mini-B port, there are several new 2.5" SATA enclosures that utilize SuperSpeed USB-3.0 standard for high-performance portable file transfers.

Standard 2.5" drive bay mounting points are pre-drilled and threaded into the Corsair Force SSD, which allows for quick upgrade or addition into any existing notebook or desktop system. The mounting positions matched up to the drive bracket on my notebook computer, and after only a few minutes of drive cloning I was quickly loading the Microsoft Windows-7 O/S without a hitch.

Unlike most Hard Disk Drive (HDD) storage products, SSDs are nearly impervious to impact damage and do not require (or benefit from) any kind of special vibration dampening or shock-proof enclosures. Corsair utilizes a familiar two-piece metal enclosure for their Force models, which reveals the internal components after removing four small counter-sunk Phillips-head screws located at the bottom of this SSD. Corsair Force F100/F200 SSDs have two 'warranty-void' stickers covering the screws, and removing the enclosure cover will remove consumer protection with it. Benchmark Reviews will reveal all of the internal components on our next section anyway, so just be patient and save your product warranty.

Thanks to the SandForce SF-1200 SSD controller architecture (detailed in the next section), the Corsair Force F100 Solid State Drive suggests transfer speeds around 285/275 MBps read/write for high-performance enthusiasts. Now that you're acquainted with the basic exterior features for the Corsair Force-series SSD, it's time to peek inside the metal enclosure and inspect the internal components...

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