Overall and Final Verdict
Both the Crucial X9 Pro and the X10 Pro share the same housing and shape except for their colors so it isn’t a surprise that I have a lot of the same aesthetic-focused things on both pros and cons lists. The new design that Crucial came up with is surprisingly compact, especially compared to their X8. The X6 was more compact than the X8 but both of these drives still ended up being smaller, not to mention the X6 was much slower. I like both the silver look and the black and the shape also helps make the drives feel smaller and easier to pocket, sadly the detachable cord would have to be pocketed as well. A similar design with a small attached cord could make these even more portable and that is a situation where I wouldn’t mind a short cord. Here though the cord was a little shorter than I would like, other than laptops most of my PCs still have just the Type-C connection on the back. I also liked that they did still use aluminum in the design.
For performance, both drives were close to hitting the mark on the read performance but underperformed in my tests for their write performance, especially the X10 Pro which was 300 MB/s off. That isn’t to say they were slow, performance was still solid. But given the limitations of USB 3.2 and USB 3.2x2 for the X10 Pro, you would expect them to be maxing that out the entire time. Which brings me to the main difference between the two drives, in case you were wondering. It is that USB connection, the X9 Pro uses the standard USB 3.2 Gen 2 connection whereas the X10 Pro uses a slightly harder to find USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 connection that doubles connection speed. If you don’t have a PC or laptop that supports the faster connection the X9 Pro is going to be the better option. I would still love to see a ThunderBolt 3 compatible design as well to be able to fully utilize the speeds of the drives inside.
For pricing the X9 Pro is $89.99 for the 1TB version, 159.99 for the 2TB model that I tested, and 289.99 for the larger 4TB model. The X10 Pro on the other hand is 129.99 for the 1TB model, 209.99 for the 2TB model tested, and $339.99 for the 4TB model. The X9 Pro pricing as it sits is a little high, at least for the 2TB model with the SanDisk 2TB Extreme Portable SSD selling for $110-$115 and having similar performance. The X9 Pro design however does have its much more compact size, which is worth something as well. The X10 pro is in a similar situation again with the SanDisk drive it is competing with the SanDisk 2TB Extreme Pro Portable SSD which is $174.99 for the 2TB model. The smaller size of the X10 Pro is nice, but not worth $35 more to me. Crucial is always on top of their pricing however and these are just coming out so I wouldn’t be surprised to see them competing better in pricing soon enough. Without the pricing, both new drives are and would be on my shortlist even with the slightly lower write performance.
Live Pricing: HERE
Live Pricing: HERE
