GoKawiilSSD prices are out of control, but the Acer Predator GM7 is near its pre-shortage price right now on a Prime Day sale. The 4TB model is available for $469.99, which is 23% off its $609 MSRP. Although that’s the listed MSRP, the drive has actually sold for well above $700 throughout most of this year.
This is a PCIe 4.0 drive, so don’t expect the fastest speeds on the market. Still, for most applications, PCIe 4.0 offers plenty of speed. Based on testing in our Acer Predator GM7 review , the drive can rival other popular PCIe 4.0 drives like the WD Black SN850X and Samsung 980 Pro. Further, the drive maintained excellent efficiency throughout our testing.
Although we’ve seen much lower SSD prices in the past, this is a good deal considering the supply crisis the market is in. This drive is down to pre-shortage prices, which is about as much as we can ask right now. At the current price, the drive is about $0.12 per gigabyte, while most drives are selling for north of $0.15 per gigabyte.
The GM7 uses China-fabbed flash from YMTC, along with a Maxio MAP1602A controller. Although the GM7 is an Acer-branded drive, it's made by Biwin. Given the controller, you shouldn't expect the best performance out of the 2TB model, but that's not surprising considering the class of this drive.
Image 1 of 3 (Image credit: Tom's Hardware) (Image credit: Tom's Hardware) (Image credit: Tom's Hardware)
In our tests of the 1TB drive, the GM7 managed to outclass the Samsung 980 Pro and Crucial P5 (RIP) in our 3DMark tests, which focuses particularly on SSD performance in games. The fastest PCIe 4.0 drives like the Samsung 990 Pro offer better performance, but they're also much more expensive. The GM7 will still put any PCIe 3.0 drive to shame, and it can hang with popular PCIe 4.0 options.
Image 1 of 3 (Image credit: Tom's Hardware) (Image credit: Tom's Hardware) (Image credit: Tom's Hardware)
In a more intensive, sustained scenario, the GM7 still holds up. Although the P5 and 980 Pro squeeze out a small edge in a small 6.5GB file transfer, the GM7 maintains higher performance when transferring a large 50GB folder, perhaps due to the drive's excellent efficiency.
You can pick up the Acer Predator GM7 4TB at Amazon now.
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