KIOXIA intros first EDSFF SSDs designed with next-gen PCIe 5.0 tech

KIOXIA has just unveiled the industry's first EDSFF E3.S SSD that was designed with next-gen PCIe 5.0 technology in mind, so we're looking at the new drives being optimized for 32GT/s x2 performance which saves valuable PCIe lanes.

4

The new KIOXIA CD7 series EDSFF (Enterprise & Data Center SSD Form Factor) E3.S Data Center NVMe SSDs are available in 1.92TB, 3.84TB, and 7.68TB capacities and are NVMe 1.4 specification compliant. The new drives are in the flash-optimized EDSFF E3.S 7.5mm form factor, and sport KIOXIA's proprietary controller, firmware, and BiCS FLASH 96-layer 3D TLC memory.

KIOKIA is using its 7th generation flash die failure protection on the new KIOXIA CD7 series EDSFF E3.2 SSDs, with the company promising "consistent performance and reliability in 24x7 enterprise and hyperscale environments", while the drives have been "designed for high-density storage deployments".

• Read more: KIOXIA intros PCIe 4.0 SSDs, teases world's first 24G SAS SSDs
• Read more: Phison E26 PCIe 5.0 SSD controller will power next-gen SSDs in 2022
• Read more: MSI's next-gen PCIe Gen5 M.2 Expander-Z card: SSDs up to 128GB/sec

4

The EDSFF E3.S has been designed to be used with flash memory chips, allowing more NAND placements that allow KIOXIA to open the flood gates on capacity by 4x in the E3.S 2T form factor than traditional 2.5-inch drives. There's 25W to 40W of power available on the E3.S and E3.S 2T form factors, respectively.

Another benefit of the E3.S standard is the larger surface area, which improves thermal dissipation over 2.5-inch drives, which in turn also reduces cooling costs and thermal throttling -- once the SSDs are reaching peak speeds the drive is running at its hottest -- something data centers and hyperscale environments don't want, ever.

KIOXIA adds that with the higher power and efficient cooling, it enables E3.S to have higher performance over 2.5-inch drives, while supporting the full x16 PCIe 5.0 lanes in the 4C connector, while 2.5-inch drives only support 4.

• EDSFF E3.S form factor with capacities up to 7.68TB3
• Designed to latest PCIe 5.0 specification and optimized for x2 PCIe lane performance
• Using fewer PCIe lanes increases number of PCIe devices that can be supported
• Built on KIOXIA BiCS FLASHTM 3D TLC flash memory
• Up to 6,450 MB/s read throughput and 1,050K random read IOPS
• 75μs read and 14μs write latencies, which are 17% and 60% lower latencies than previous generation PCIe 4.0 SSDs, respectively.

4

Neville Ichhaporia, vice president, SSD marketing and product management, KIOXIA America, Inc. explains: "We see EDSFF as the enterprise NVMe SSD form factor of the future. The E3 versions, optimized for the next generation of enterprise platforms, are well suited to keep technological pace with the incremental demands data-intensive applications are placing on servers and storage. This will help customers optimize performance, cooling and storage capacity in next generation servers and storage".

4

Greg Wong, founder and principal analyst, Forward Insights added: "The EDSFF E3 form factor is set to redefine the way enterprise servers and storage are designed. We expect the market to transition to EDSFF starting in 2022, with the introduction of PCIe 5.0 based systems".