Pictures and Breakdown
Traditionally OCZ drives have all come in that black casing with just the sticker on the top setting the models apart. This is the most noticeable difference with the Vertex. OCZ went with a silver casing with rounded corners that is basically the opposite of what their previous models look like. On top the standard small sticker has been supersized to the entire top of the SSD. That means the Indilinx logo, OCZ logo, and Vector branding is all larger and more in your face. I love the blue styling as well, its eye catching and should look good in a lot of builds.
On the underside of the SSD we have a fairly standard looking drive other than the extra rounding on the corners. We can still see what is holding the drive together though; there are four screws, one in each corner. One of the screws does have a warranty void if removed sticker over it, but that didn’t last. We had the sticker off in no time and started pulling the drive apart.
When you pull the bottom of the drive off, you can see a small thermal pad that helps dissipate the heat from the Indilinx Barefoot 3 controller when it gets hot. The PCB is mounted to the main portion of the SSD casing still, in order to be able to remove that you will have to remove four more small screws.
With the drive opened we were able to get a better look at what makes it tick. First there are 16 NAND chips split up half and half on each side of the drive. We finally get to see a fully home grown controller with the Indilinx Barefoot 3. Before in the Vertex 4 the controller was licensed and based on Marvell controllers. This is really the heart of this drive and what makes the Vector so special. You can see that OCZ wanted to showcase their first FULLY in house design to be perfect.
Here’s what the Vector looks like next to other OCZ models, as I mentioned before this is completely different than what they have produced in the past visually. The rounded off shape and the silver finish both stand out but the branding that covers the entire top of the SSD really helps as well.
