Pros: These newer drives from OCZ have transitioned to Toshiba's latest advanced 19nm NAND (or A19 NAND for short), which brings them up to the same level as most of their competitors.

Performance wise, I'm simply blown away by what I'm achieving with the Vector 180. I get the advertised speeds when benching the drive with all the most trusted benchmarks. But what really got me stoked is the performance I'm getting with two of these drives in a RAID 0 config. I'm using a Gigabyte Z97X-UD5H motherboard and I configured two Vector 180's in RAID 0 using the built in RAID controller. I didn't expect to double my performance, considering the overhead involved coupled with the fact that I'm utilizing an integrated RAID controller. However, I was blown away when I benched the RAID array and achieved almost exactly double the performance compared to a single drive! The RAID 0 array achieved a sequential read speed of 1110 MB/s and a sequential write speed of 882 MB/s! Even the random read and random write speeds nearly doubled as well, which was shocking to me. The only anomaly was my 4K random read speed, which didn't improve at all. My guess is that this has to do with the stripe size I chose when building the array (I chose 64K). Perhaps tweaking this value could help to increase the 4K random read performance. Strangely, 4K random write performance was much better, which leads me to think that perhaps the bad 4K random read performance I saw was a fluke with the benchmarking software I was using.

I installed Windows 10 fresh onto the 240GB RAID array and the real-world performance is incredible. Mind you, I was moving from a 2TB WD Black mechanical drive, so the difference is night and day. 120GB is a little light for a system drive IMO, which is why I'm using two of these in RAID 0 for my OS. Two of these drives format to 223GB and it's quite easy to make this work for your OS. I even have room to install one or two of the current games I'm playing on it. I did tweak the size of the page file and also reduced the amount of storage used for system restore, but those are the ONLY tweaks I made and there is more than enough capacity. I have a few 2TB mechanical drives for backups, media, and other games. Steam allows you to install to different drives by default now, so it's easy to backup a game and re-install it onto the main SSD if you want the faster load times. All in all, it works great with Windows 10.

The drive itself is sturdy due to the metal chassis. Build quality is very good. Inside, OCZ uses it's own Barefoot M00 controller featuring an ARM Cortex core with the Aragon co-processor. Their lower tier drives use the slower M10 version of this controller, so it's nice to see OCZ didn't skimp with the Vector 180 series.

OCZ's new feature called PFM+ is definitely noteworthy. It provides a basic level of power loss protection via FW logic and caps on the PCB. It won't protect active data, but is designed to safeguard any data at rest to ensure the drive will not brick during power loss. This is obviously a very useful feature and I'm really glad to see it being utilized here.

I did test OCZ's SSD Guru software (downloaded from their website) and I have to say that it's a nice piece of software. It offers everything from manual Trim functions to overall system info. You can use it to monitor SMART status or leave it running in the background to detect any issues that may occur. Keep in mind Trim should work automatically, but it's nice to have the option to perform it manually in a nice GUI. The tuning and maintenance features are nice to have and this utility will check online for the latest FW updates, so you don't have to bother with searching yourself.

OCZ offers a 5-year warranty for this model, which covers 50GB per day of writes. That's a pretty darn solid rating according to my current research. Seems OCZ is confident with their new design, both in terms of hardware and Firmware.

Cons: In some respects, the Barefoot 3 does lag behind the competition. There is no low power state support and no encryption beyond the standard AES-256, which is less secure than the TGC Opal standards most other drives have moved to. This is important for modern laptops where data security and protection is an absolute priority. Something to take note of for sure.

Obviously 120GB is just not enough space... You can use this as an OS drive but you have to make some serious tweaks to keep the capacity out of the red. In my honest opinion, 120GB just isn't enough for a 64-bit OS installation (hence my using two in RAID 0), however with some tweaking you COULD make it work. But with newer games like GTA V taking up a whopping 65 GB on their own, getting by with only 120GB on your system drive becomes fairly impractical. Assuming you're a gamer of course.

OCZ's SSD Guru software will not work with these drives when they are in a RAID 0 config. I was let down when I found this out. The software simply does not detect the drives at all. Now, OCZ's drives have their own form of garbage collection so any performance degradation over times shouldn't be noticeable. Worse case scenario, you could just image the RAID array over to another drive, delete it, then wipe each drive to restore factory level performance. Then it's just a matter of rebuilding the array and copying your image back over. It's unclear whether TRIM is working automatically in the RAID 0 config. All I know is that SSD Guru cannot manually perform it in this case, but technically it should be working automatically. That said, OCZ's built in garbage collection is always working and as I said above, you can restore performance manually if you ever need to.

Other Thoughts: So to summarize, this is a great drive overall and the Vector series is very impressive with all the offerings OCZ is providing. Speed is excellent as is the reliability. The build quality is also exceptional and so is the warranty. OCZ does include a key for a version of Acronis to clone your old hard drive over to the new drive. OCZ values this Acronis software at $50, but I can't comment on it as I already have Acronis True Image 2015 installed. Either way this drive is a win. The only reason I didn't give it a 5 egg rating is for the lack of newer encryption support and the ultra-low capacity. It's also a bit pricey considering it's size. But I still recommend any of the models as they are a great buy. The 960GB model looks to be amazing and I would love to test it out as well. But after using two of these in RAID 0, I really would recommend that route as you're going to get phenomenal performance at a rock bottom price. It's a really good bang for your buck!!

Pros: A 5 year warranty on any HD or SSD is pretty good and shows that the company stands behind their products.

Solid build with no exposed electronics.

Stays extremely cool, very light weight, comes with a 3.5" tray if needed.
Very low energy consumption.

Decent benchmark results but not the fastest I've used. Interesting thing is that I tried installing an app on both the OCZ and my Samsung EVO 840 250GB and I don't notice a difference in load times. Similar results whether it's in a DELL laptop or a Gaming rig.

Generic Benchmark Results:

OCZ Vector 180
Seq Reads: 558 Seq Writes: 449
Random Reads: 80970 Random Writes: 66359

Samsung 840
Seq Reads: 4407 Seq Writes: 3726
Random Reads: 117673 Random Writes: 78844

Application Load Times as best I could do:

Adobe Photoshop CS6 64bit with some plugins:
OCZ Vector 180 (6.7 seconds)
Samsung Evo (6.4 seconds)

Blender 2.74
OCZ Vector 180 (3.8 seconds)
Samsung Evo (3.7 seconds)

Then I tried some STEAM games. These are a bit more difficult to move around so I took them off a mechanical drive:

Ark Evolution Evolved
OCZ Vector 180 (4.5 seconds)
Samsung Evo (4.1 seconds)

Cons: Just the storage capacity is small but that's about it.

Other Thoughts: I decided to move games off steam that take a while to load and now loving it.

Using it for additional app storage as well with no issues and enjoying the extra load speeds.

SLC, MLC, and TLC may make a difference in the long run but I have yet to have an SSD fail or even show signs of failure. Will update if anything changes.

Pros: Good build quality and presentation. Nice frame and packaging.

It has not given any issues..... yet

Cons: This drive cost too much. Flat out I can buy a better drive with twice the capacity for the same price today. Why would i want this thing? Performance is average at best.
The 120GB model struggles to reach 350MB/sec read and 400MB/sec write speeds in a Rampage IV Extreme system with i7 3930K @ 4GHz and 32GB RAM.
For $10 more I purchase 250GB 850 EVOs. Why would anyone purchase this drive?!?!?!?

Other Thoughts: I stopped buying OCZ drives because they were unreliable. 4 of 10 OCZ drives I purchased have failed. It is impossible to know until 6 to 18 months down the road whether or not these are OK drives. Why would I purchase another one after being stuck with dead drives. I would not.

Manufacturer Response:

Hello Thomas,

My name is Benjamin L. and I monitor the customer feedback here at Newegg.com. I am sorry to hear that you are having issues with your drive's performance. Based on the scores you are getting, the drive may be connected to the ASMedia SATA controller which won't perform as well as the Native Intel SATA controller. We can assist you with troubleshooting this problem if you would like. Please contact us at your earliest convenience and we will take care of you.

You can contact me directly at neweggsupport@ocz.com
You can also create a support ticket on our website at https://support.ocz.com/customer/portal/emails/new
Please add "Newegg Support" to the title of your ticket.

On behalf of OCZ, I apologize for the inconvenience.

Best Regards,

Benjamin
OCZ Storage Solutions
www.ocz.com

Pros: This drive is fast and a solid performer for all the testing I have done with it. Speed is as advertised and can't wait to get another one to set up a raid array for even better performance. Comes with Acronis data migration software which I've used in the past and has always been easy and reliable to use. 5 year warranty says a lot about this OCZ product.

Cons: 120 GB is really not a lot of space for a heavy user. Price isn't too bad but for a little more money you can get twice the storage.

Other Thoughts: I have been using SSDs for many years and my first drives were Intel 80 GB that I paid 256.00 each for 2 just solely for the purpose of raid 0. I use them 6 months by themselves before I set up the raid 0. I was blown away by the increase (basically double) the speed so I still have continued to set them up in raid 0 as long as the motherboard bus keeps up with the I/O. The drives are getting so fast now that it's easy for the motherboard to become the bottleneck.

Pros: This SSD is MLC, while many low and mid-end SSD are moving to TLC. This is a big plug.
It is as fast as other SSD in this range. (similar size and price).
Following is result of CrystalDiskMark.
Read Write
Seq: 206.7 MB/s 218.1 MB/s
512K: 127.1 MB/s 215.1 MB/s
4K: 20.60 MB/s 59.71 MB/s
4K : 23.03 MB/s 65.53 MB/s
QD32

Resulting speed is good, but not faster than other brands. Much faster than HDD.
Bigger size SSD will be faster (about twice on sequential read/write).

Cons: Price on newegg at the time of reviewing is $79.99. While this price is not much more expensive than other brands, I would go for higher end model from more reputable brand for little more or lower end model for less.
Crucial BX100 120GB MLC is priced $64 and 250GB is priced $85. Performance of BX100 120GB compared to Vector 180 120GB is slower. However for little more BX100 250GB model will out perform Vector 180 120GB and double the storage.

Other Thoughts: With OCZ's bad reputation from older models, I think OCZ should have priced this SSD lower.
I had issue with their Vector 2 model many years ago (SSD becomes unrecognizable) and OCZ replace it twice and ended up getting a full refund from OCZ. As far as I know their current models work fine, but many people are still with sour taste.
Nevertheless, OCZ had very good customer service.

Pros: Read and Write speeds are as advertised.
Useful software
Good looks

Cons: High price as compared to competing SSD drives

Other Thoughts: I bought this drive because it is from a reputable company and it matched the color theme of the system I was buying it for. I also wanted to test out this new series of SSD from OCZ and have not been disappointed with the purchase at all. The software it comes with monitors the drive life, it's temp, and firmware for updates as well as other advanced information most users will not need but can be helpful. It also offers a secure erase feature that can be used to permanently wipe data from the drive which could be handy if you obtain a virus and need to do a reinstall of a o/s and want to make sure to eliminate the threat as well as other reasons you may want to wipe a drive such as reselling it in the future if you upgrade ect...If you can pick it up on sale, or if you just have to have this color theme it is definitely a drive worth taking a look at.

Pros: -Packaging is pretty nice except the specifications for the 120GB is not listed on the back.
-Includes 3.5" Desktop SSD Adaptor
-Includes Acronis True Image HD Product Key
-Trim Support
-No need to update firmware
-5yr. Warranty
-Metal Construction

Cons: -Power usage is 0.85W idle and 3.7W active compared to Samsung 850 Evo 120GB which is .50W idle and 2.1W active- does not make this ideal for Laptops if you want MAX battery life.
-Actual Sequential Read and write are lower than advertised.
-HIGH PRICE!!!!

Other Thoughts: OCZ while great for memory hasn't quite made their name in the SSD technology. Suffered by poor SSD products in the past, their reputation has been tarnished in recent years. Although this product works great, it is not something I would spend extra money on and considering the Samsung 850 EVO 120GB cost $67 - this is insanely priced at $90 for 120GB. The Samsung 850EVO beats it in just about every performance category.

Installation was a breeze on a Mac Mini 2012. Using Black Magic Speed Test I get about ~460MB/s Read and ~430MB/s Write. I haven't had any issues with the mac going to sleep and trim is supported and works great using the Trim Enabler App.

Overall, this product works great but is expensive and doesn't quite offer any advantages over its competitors.

Pros: Other reviewers have spoken very well already as to the performance of this unit. I'll just add here what is most important beyond that and that is price for performance and not just price per GB which is often overlooked in the enthusiast segment for SSDs. These drives are excellent under both criteria and a great choice in the 120GB segment for BOTH price and performance. Speeds are awesome! If you are looking to do a budget build with a speedy OS Drive and a lower cost bulk data mechanical hard drive then this is a perfect unit for such a build. In practicality, I've come to use it as a mobile USB flash drive by purchasing a standalone adapter, in this particular situation I used a case. I can recommend the Silverstone TS10 which converts to USB 3.0 in an slim aluminum chassis for $22.99.

Cons: None whatsoever.

Other Thoughts: Comes with a license key for Acronis cloning software, you'll have to download the software from Acronis directly which is not large at all.......for those who wish to clone their existing OS on a current HDD to this slick little SSD.

Pros: Very study drive, metal case

Comes with 3.5" drive adapter (also metal)

Performance seems good so far

Cons: None for me

Other Thoughts: I am by no means a SSD expert. For most of what I do, a cheap SSD is way faster than any mechanical drive and fast enough for what I need, so a higher end faster model is not a big deal to me. The thing that interests me about this drive is it's longevity.
I decided to use this as a boot drive for my home server (WHS 2011). As it worked out, my old boot drive (A WD green 640 gb drive) died on me after 7+ years of continuous 24/7 use. Since I was having to reload the OS anyway, I figured why not use this drive. Again, the speed of this drive is not a real issue, this system gets rebooted every few months and most of the workload is on the other storage drives in the system. Having a 5 year warranty is a nice deal. Although my total read/writes will be low on this drive once I get it all set as I want, it will be on 24/7.
Install went just fine and the server boot times are very fast, but otherwise my biggest test will be time, so hard to review that at this time.

Just some quick numbers though, I ran CrystalDiskMark and these are the results:
3 passes of 1Gb

Seq Q32T1 read- 277.9 MB/s write- 252 MB/s
4K Q32T1 read - 166.7 MB/S write- 128.2 MB/s
Seq read - 261.5 MB/s write - 245.6 MB/s
4k read - 22.5 MB/s write - 52.7 MB/s

This is with the drive 40% full
Gigiabyte MA785GMT-UDH2 board
AMD Athlon II X2 210e CPU
8 Gigs G. Skill Sniper 1866 DDR3

A little better speed overall than my trusty Crucial M4 in my main PC, so seems decent to me.

Pros: OCZ has put great effort into improving their SSDs. PFM+ is definitely a plus and a welcomed addition considering that a lot of their previous drives failed due to power loss. PFM+ aims to prevent a bricked drive. I did force a power reset while downloading Windows updates to the drive and it booted back up with no problems.

This drive boasts a 50GB/day 5 year endurance rating, but honestly, under normal work conditions of even a more enthusiast type of workload, I don't think anyone would ever hit that limit in a 5 year period, especially if you go for a smaller drive capacity.

The Vector 180 is definitely faster than my old Crucial M4 and my Samsung 830. Windows 7 boots in a snap, I don't even see the Windows 7 logo finish loading before I am presented with the login screen.

Some quick benchmarks...

Sequential Read: 463.8 MB/s
Sequential Write: 430.5 MB/s

512K Read: 401.8 MB/s
512K Write: 423.7 MB/s

4K Read: 31.02 MB/s
4K Write: 136.4 MB/s

This SSD uses the Toshiba Advanced 19nm Toggle 2.0 MLC. I am still a big fan of MLC over TLC NAND. Glad to see that OCZ didn't cheap out in this department like the Samsung 840 EVOs.

It is still using the Indilinx Barefoot 3 controller. This controller is tried and tested in terms of reliability. iirc, the failure rates are well below 1%. OCZ has definitely stepped up their game in this department, glad to see them sticking with something that is reliable even if it isn't the highest class in terms of performance.

A 5-year warranty! Not bad, considering that 5 years from now, this kind of tech will be completely outdated.

Came with a 3.5" SSD adapter.

Cons: PFM+ is great but it does have a minor issue. Inherent to the design of the drive, the drive will flush its buffer to prevent metadata corruption. The drive will drop in I/O for a few seconds to flush the buffer. OCZ has already spoken up about this saying:

"What is being observed is a characteristic of the design of the drive itself and is a result of the firmware performing updates to its metadata mapping table and flushing the entire table out of DRAM and onto the NAND flash, during which I/O throughput is impacted for very brief periods. Our metadata management is done on a frequent basis to prevent failure modes related to bricked drives as a result of metadata corruption, which can potentially happen on other non PFM+ enabled SSDs as a result of unexpected power loss."

This isn't a terrible con, as there was no real observable performance degradation in real world use. I even tried to hammer the drive by copying large movies and I couldn't see it suffer. The drive is already snappy as it is, but something to keep in mind and unfortunate that it does have this minor issue. Other high end SSDs from competitors don't exhibit this behavior from my knowledge.

Other Thoughts: This SSD still gets a 5/5 from me despite the minor con. SSDs are so fast nowadays that minor speed differences are barely noticeable in normal usage. I prefer something that is reliable and durable. This drive has performed admirably under my use and even through a forced power loss. Really glad to see OCZ stepping up their game.

I used CrystalDiskMark 3.0.3 for benchmark testing. Only ran one test though.

Testing rig was an H77M-ITX with a Core i5 3450 and 8GB Corsair 1600 RAM. Running Windows 7 Ultimate x64.

No additional firmware needed to be upgraded upon use. The latest firmware already comes on all drives. At least that is what the OCZ website says.