Last November, we reviewed the Netgear NV+ v2 and came away quite satisfied with the price to performance ratio. However, we had some reservations about the absence of NFS and iSCSI (which happen to be staple features in offerings from other vendors in this particular segment of the market). The maturity of the platform was also a concern (since this was Netgear's first attempt at introducing a NAS based on an ARM chipset).

Netgear recently updated the firmware for the NV+ v2 and Duo v2 units. RAIDiator 5.3.5 added support for a number of new share management protocols including NFS. It also brought along a number of fixes. In the meanwhile, LaCie also contacted us about a firmware update improving RAID-1 performance in the 2big NAS that we reveiewd a couple of months back. Keeping these updates in mind, it is time to take another look at the 2-bay NAS units in our labs. Read on to find out whether the Netgear NV+ v2 has improved, and also a refresh of the benchmark figures for the LaCie 2big NAS.

Plextor is one of those OEMs who have quietly been making their way into the SSD market. They haven't been aggressive with marketing. Their drives are not featured on NewEgg's front page or advertised on most technology sites. 

Prominence in marketing, or a lack thereof, doesn't mean Plextor's drives are something to be ashamed of. We were quite pleased with the M3 and M3 Pro SSDs, and today we are looking at their new M5S SSD. While it's still equipped with the same Marvell 88SS9174 controller, Plextor has switched from Toggle-Mode NAND to ONFi NAND. The M5S is also using a brand new firmware which promises some improvements. So, to find out how the M5S performs in our tests, read on for the full review!

If you are an active reader, you might remember our Plextor M3 review from a few months back. As I noted in the review, I wasn't expecting much when I received the SSD; a Marvell based SSD from a relatively unknown brand when it comes to the SSD market isn't all that promising. We had not reviewed any Plextor SSDs before the M3, so I had no idea what to expect. Obviously, I prepared for the worst.

Luckily, my expectations turned out to be very wrong. Plextor's M3 came out as one of the highest performing drives we have tested. Today we are back with M3's big brother: the M3 Pro. Based on the same Marvell 88SS9174 controller and 24nm Toshiba Toggle-Mode MLC NAND, the M3 Pro offers even higher performance according to Plextor. The differences lie exclusively in the firmware, as hardware wise the M3 and M3 Pro are exactly the same. Just how much more performance can Plextor squeeze out of the Marvell controller? Read on and find out!

SandForce sets aside more NAND capacity than most controllers for spare area. While Intel, Marvell, Samsung and others default to ~7% of total NAND capacity for spare area, SandForce is almost double that. The difference boils down to RAISE, SandForce's NAND redundancy algorithm that requires the consumption of a full NAND die. The original idea was that RAISE and SandForce's DuraWrite technology could allow SSD vendors to use cheaper, less reliable NAND without any impact to the end user. It seems as though no one was willing to risk using anything but the best NAND, so we never really saw this feature exploited. A bit over a month ago, ADATA released their XPG SX900 series. It utilizes the oh-so-common SF-2281 controller but unlike other SandForce SSDs, RAISE is disabled - giving the end user more usable space.

Read on for our review!