Exceptional fake SSD clone of Samsung 990 Pro is almost impossible to spot — near-identical performance blurs the line between real and fake as AI crunch drives knock-off market

They say Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and since the Samsung 990 Pro is one of the best SSDs, it's easy to see why there are so many clones of the PCIe 4.0 drive on the market. Japanese news outlet Akiba PC Hotline! Recently examined one of the latest fake Samsung 990 Pro drives, and the quality behind the clone is both impressive and frightening at the same time.

The box is the very first thing that catches your eye when you buy any product, and SSD counterfeiters are aware of this. They have poured more time and resources into perfecting the package to deceive even the most experienced customers. As highlighted in the Japanese publication, the box for the counterfeit SDD can be almost indistinguishable from that of the genuine drive. One subtle giveaway was that the fake box includes a header for hanging on display racks, a detail the original lacks. It’s a small detail that's easy to miss unless you’ve seen the authentic packaging before.

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The fake Samsung 990 Pro features a sticker that closely mimics the original. This is where the technical know-how comes into play. The drive may look authentic on the surface, but a closer inspection reveals drastic discrepancies. For starters, the Samsung 990 Pro leverages the brand's proprietary Pascal SSD controller. The fake uses the Maxio MAP1602 SSD controller, which has a different design and is smaller than the Pascal controller. Tellingly, the rear of the counterfeit SSD even openly states the Maxio model number.

Another key distinction lies in DRAM and NAND. The Samsung 990 Pro features LPDDR4 memory, a component absent from the fake due to the DRAM-less nature of the Maxio MAP1602 SSD controller. As for the NAND, the original uses Samsung’s 176-Layer V-NAND TLC flash, while the type in the counterfeit remains uncertain. It’s likely QLC, though, since counterfeiters won't spend extra on TLC for a product whose primary purpose is to bamboozle the buyer.

Fake Samsung 990 Pro SSD Benchmarks

Typical Samsung 990 Pro lookalikes fall flat when you benchmark them. Some fakes are slower than a USB 2.0 pendrive, while others perform similarly to a PCIe 3.0 SSD. However, the one that Akiba PC Hotline! Had in its possession exhibited a solid, very convincing performance. The drive delivered sequential read and write speeds of up to 7,255 MB/s and 6,090 MB/s, respectively, just a bit shy of the Samsung 990 Pro 1TB's rated speeds of 7,450 MB/s and 6,900 MB/s.

If you compare the specifications between the Maxio MAP1602 and the Samsung Pascal, it's evident that the former isn't too far behind in sequential performance. That's likely the reason why counterfeiters specifically choose the Maxio MAP1602. They know that the typical user is unlikely to look beyond the sequential performance numbers. However, the random performance is more pronounced if you look closely, specifically in the random 4K test using 32 queues and 16 threads, where the Maxio MAP1602 delivered just over half the performance of the Samsung Pascal.

Akiba PC Hotline! Submitted the Samsung 990 Pro 1TB clone to the H2testw utility and confirmed that the reported capacity was indeed 1TB. At least on paper, the drive wasn’t lying about its size. A 976.6GB write test stretched out to around two hours, with the drive only managing a sluggish 132 MB/s. In a real-world scenario, the genuine Samsung 990 Pro completed the transfer of a 397.2GB video file in just 3 minutes and 33 seconds (1,861 MB/s), while the clone crawled along, taking a staggering 25 minutes and 20 seconds (261 MB/s) to complete the same task. The real drive maintained a sustained write speed of around 1,500 MB/; once the SLC cache was full, the fake drive stuck to 100 MB/s.

The best way to weed out clones from the real ones with Samsung SSDs is to use the Samsung Magician software to authenticate the drive. Furthermore, it doesn't allow you to use the software's features, such as the diagnostic scan and performance optimization, on fake drives.

Spotting Samsung clones has become routine for every generation of Samsung SSDs. Previously, we saw many Samsung 980 Evo and Samsung 980 Pro clones. Some entrepreneurs even invented SSDs that even Samsung didn't know were in its lineup, such as the Samsung 1080 Pro. The takeaway from all this is always to purchase your Samsung SSDs from trusted, reputable retailers. Even if your new drive passes the sniff test, run Samsung Magician for that extra peace of mind, as you can see, clones are getting better by the day.

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