Samsung's new PM9E1 is the world's first 4TB Gen 5 SSD in the tiny M.2 22x42 form factor

Unveiled and showcased at CES 2026, Samsung's PM9E1 M.2 22x42 SSD is the industry's first PCIe Gen 5 SSD in this ultra-compact form factor. Described as an AI-optimized storage solution, it's built for modern, compact AI supercomputers such as NVIDIA's DGX Spark and other NVIDIA GB10-powered devices.

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Samsung says that the PM9E1 M.2 (22x42mm) SSD offers over double the performance of its predecessor while also increasing power efficiency, measured in MB/s per Watt, by an impressive 45%.

"While AI accelerators enable systems to harness the vast power of AI," Samsung writes. "Only pairing them with performance-optimized, purpose-built storage technology like the Samsung PM9E1 can provide the massive capacity and blazing access speeds to unleash that power that may lead to the development of tomorrow's killer AI apps."

• Read more: Samsung to show off its latest LPDDR6 memory and PM9E1 Gen5 SSDs and more at CES 2026

Under the hood, the Samsung PM9E1 features a dual-sided PCB design with 8th-generation 1 Tb V-NAND and DRAM, delivering Sequential Read and Write speeds of up to 14,500 MB/s and 12,600 MB/s, respectively. Throw in Random Read and Write speeds of up to 2,000K IOPS and 2,640K IOPS, and this ultra-compact SSD delivers performance on par with much larger drives.

The Samsung PM9E1 also sports the company's in-house 'Presto' controller, built on 5nm Samsung Foundry technology. Samsung notes that the controller has been specifically optimized for DGX Spark OS software and NVIDIA CUDA, making it a storage option clearly aimed at the enthusiast AI market. With impressive speeds and optimization, it sounds perfect for the large data transfers and random access required by AI workloads.

With today's announcement, Samsung has also confirmed that the Samsung PM9E1 is already "qualified and in mass production."