Samsung 860 QVO SSD review: Big capacity on the cheap, and fast the majority of the time

Samsung’s 860 QVO SSD is an excellent everyday performer and an outstanding bargain in its 2TB and 4TB flavors. It’s also the second quad-level cell (4-bit) SSD to pass our portals, the other being Intel’s SSD 660P.The reason I mention this competitive drive from Intel up-front is that it’s becoming clear that 4-bit NAND, while allowing greater capacity, also extracts a performance hit that vendors must work around. How well a vendor does that affects which 4-bit drive you should buy, and whether you might be better off with an MLC or TLC drive.  Note: Samsung refers to the 860 QVO as 4-bit MLC. As the acronym MLC stands for “Multi-Level Cell,” this is technically correct. However, most refer to it as quad-level cell or QLC, which is what I assume the Q in QVO stands for. To read this article in full, please click here