Specifications, Availability and Pricing

I really hate to come out of the gate with guns a'blazing, but finding information and specifications on the APOGEE SSD has been a real pain in the butt. When you click on SSD's on Chaintech's website you are presented with a single page PDF file that is about as helpful as running 3DMark Vantage on a Pentium III system. To make matters worse, our sample was a very early edition that did not come with an instruction manual.

The bar code section of the box was also all white, so it maybe a little while before we see these drives actually available for sale. I was told by a Walton Chaintech representative that the target MSRP for the 64GB drive we are reviewing today is 160 USD. The 128GB and 32GB are supposed to be introduced at 80 and 290 USD. These prices put them in direct competition with the G.Skill MLC SSD we reviewed here just recently.

One specification that we were able to see on the PDF document is the maximum read speed. The APOGEE document claims a read speed of 129MB/s. For the most part we have found that the manufacturer's numbers are based on optimal conditions and our real world results are usually slower.

The drive does come with a neat USB feature that allows you to connect the APOGEE to a USB 2.0 port. Transfer speed is reduced by a large margin since it has to downgrade to USB 2.0 speeds, but with SSDs resistance to shock it is just like having a 64GB thumb drive that is a little larger than your typical thumb drive.