AmorphousDiskMark is basically Crystalmark For Mac

Benchmarking a MacBook Air M1's SSD.

Awhile back, I made a video about USBc and the classic Mac Pro but lamented yet ago the terrible benchmarking on macOS. The first commenter on FaceBook pointed out that we finally have a good disk benchmark utility AmorphousDiskMark. While it isn't a direct port, it's heavily inspired by the famed and loved Windows utility, CrystalDiskMark.

So why am I always complaining about BlackMagic Disk Speed Test

BlackMagic's Disk Speed Test only tests one thing, continuous throughput. This is useful but only measures one aspect of an SSD, and doesn't necessarily mimic accurately how most disk interactions occur. Random Read and Write tests are as important, if not more so, as many SSDs can deliver fast maximum continuous read and writes but much less so for random small data blocks. CrystalDiskMark tests random reads and writes both as queued requests and single requests. The default depth is pretty high for the test. Usually, an OS wouldn't have that deep of a queue, but the Q1T1 does mimic a singular request. Also, CrystalDiskMark measures IOPS (Input/Output Operations-per-second), which is similar but also a different measure of disk speed.

Better but not perfect

There's plenty of aspects that aren't covered, such as latency, burst performance, power consumed, and mixed random read/writes, but this is a massive step in the right direction for gauging SSD performance on macOS. Oh yeah, and it's free.

Let's retire BlackMagic's Disk Mark and embrance Amorphous Disk.