Storage

Dell Technologies World 2025 will take place next week, from May 19 to May 22, at The Venetian Resort in Las Vegas, and KIOXIA will be there showcasing its innovative range of SSD and memory solutions.

As a Dell strategic supplier for over two decades, KIOXIA will demonstrate how its range of cutting-edge solutions simplifies AI adoption and enables a more efficient, scalable IT infrastructure by accelerating data-driven workloads. As the inventor of NAND flash memory, the company will highlight its next-generation SSDs built using its cutting-edge 8th-generation BiCS FLASH technology.

This includes the impressive 122.88 TB high-capacity LC9 Series and the high-performance, efficient KIOXIA CM9 Series.

KIOXIA's 8th generation BiCS FLASH memory technology is here, bringing significant improvements and advances in power efficiency, performance, and density. KIOXIA notes that it allows for doubling the capacity per flash device, making the technology perfect for modern enterprise computing, data centers, automotive systems, and the AI era.

8th Gen BiCS FLASH incorporates CBA (CMOS directly Bonded to Array) technology, which KIOXIA notes is the architectural innovation that delivers these advances. Today, KIOXIA is announcing that the first enterprise PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSDs with 8th Gen BiCS FLASH, the new KIOXIA CM9 Series, are now in the prototype demonstration phase of their development and will be showcased at Dell Technologies World, which is taking place from May 19 to May 22 in Las Vegas.

With 2.5-inch form factor capacities up to 61.44 TB and E3.S capacities up to 30.72 TB, KIOXIA notes that its latest SSDs can deliver up to 65% more random write, 55% more random read, and 95% more sequential write performance compared to the previous generation.

A new report at The SSD Review has uncovered a potentially serious flaw with the latest Intel Core Ultra Series 200 CPUs and Z890 motherboards. According to the outlet's testing and investigation, high-speed PCIe 5.0 M.2 SDDs cannot achieve their maximum read throughput of 14GB/s or 14,0000 MB/s.

In 2025, several PCIe Gen5 SSDs are offering this speed (check out our recent review of the Samsung 9100 Pro 4TB SSD), so not being able to hit the maximum throughput means that pairing a fast PCIe Gen5 SSD with an Intel Core Ultra Series 200 CPU and Z890 motherboard means that these storage devices aren't running at their full or advertised capacity.

The SSD Review's investigation has found that these SSDs are topping out at 12GB/s or 12,000 MB/s. The outlet adds that it has been unable to find any review or record showcasing a 14GB/s capable Gen5 SSD hitting that speed on a Z890 motherboard. So then, what's going on?

The new WD_BLACK SN8100 Gen5 SSD isn't quite on the market yet, but it has been listed a little early on Amazon Germany with the 1TB Gen5 SSD variant costing around $225 and up to a blistering 14.9GB/sec read speeds.

We should expect a full unveiling of WD's new Gen5 SSDs at Computex 2025 in just a few weeks time, with a launch expected on May 30. Inside, Western Digital will use its in-house Gen5 SSD controller which uses BiCS8 218-layer 3D TLC NAND and features up to 8-channel DRAM and 4-channel non-DRAM.

The company says its new Gen5 SSD will have up to 2TB capacity and twice the performance of its Gen4 SSDs, with a 55% efficiency uplift over Gen4 SSDs. The company also showed off its new Gen5 SSDs inside of laptops (mobile workstations) at FMS 2024, with WD's new Gen5 SSDs slowly getting ready for their big reveal, it seems.

XPG, ADATA's enthusiast and gamer brand, has just launched its new MARS 980 Gen5 SSD Series - high-performance PCIe Gen5 SSDs with read speeds of up to 14,000 MB/s and an 'advanced 6nm process controller.' The flagship MARS 980 STORM looks like a tiny cryo or deep sleep chamber from a sci-fi film because it includes a hybrid liquid and active fan cooling system.

With a sequential read/write speed of 14,000/13,000MB per second, the MARS 980 STORM's performance is up there. XPG notes that its blend of liquid cooling and symmetrical dual-fan setup with copper heat pipes reduces temperatures by around 20% compared to a traditional fanless heatsink. The patented design is powered via the M.2 slot, so there's no need for additional cables, and is available in 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB capacities.

The MARS 980 STORM is an SSD built for a high-performance gaming PC, whereas the MARS 980 BLADE is designed for laptops and compact mini-PCs looking to take advantage of the faster speeds PCIe Gen5 SSDs offer. Like the STORM, the BLADE also offers a sequential read/write speed of 14,000/13,000MB per second, using a "highly efficient 6nm controller" for low power consumption and thermal efficiency. Like the STORM, it's also available in capacities of up to 4TB.

Lexar has just launched its new Gen4 and Gen5 SSDs, with its new flagship Professional NM1090 PRO PCIe 5.0 SSD delivering up to 14GB/sec reads and up to 13GB/sec writes.

The new Lexar Professional NM1090 Gen5 SSD packs a new 6nm SSD controller that the company says has optimized heat control for improved performance and customers can pair it with a new AMD Ryzen or Intel Core Ultra 9 series processor for a "next-level game experience". The Gen5 SSD features DRAM cache and SLC dynamic cache to greatly improve data transfer speeds, reduce wait times, and improve system responsiveness.

Lexar also unveiled a new Gen4 SSD with the introduction of the NQ780 M.2 2280 PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD that has been designed with "premium technologies" that deliver read and write speeds of 7GB/sec (7000MB/sec) and 6GB/sec (6000MB/sec), respectively. Lexar's new Gen4 SSD features a single-sided design with Intelligent Power Control that makes it a perfect SSD for your laptop.

Kingston has just silently launched its new Fury Renegade G5 Gen5 SSDs, with speeds of up to a blistering 14.8GB/sec reads, with the 2TB Gen5 SSD starting at $200.

The new flagship Kingston Fury Renegade G5 SSD offers up to 14.8GB/sec (14,800MB/sec) reads and up to 14GB/sec (14,000MB/sec) writes, with up to 2,200,000 IOPS performance. There will be no 512GB variant, with Kingston only releasing a 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB G5 SSD... no 8TB option in sight unfortunately.

Inside, Kingston's new Fury Renegade G5 SSDs are using the Silicon Motion SM2508 controller, which is based on a 6nm chip and uses 3D TLC NAND technology. Kingston's previous-gen Gen4 SSDs in its Fury Renegade family are getting a double up in read/write performance (for the 4TB model, anyway) with IOPS performance skyrocketing by 2.1x to 2.2x, while power consumption is lower at 9.5W for the new G5 Gen5 SSD, compared to 10.2W on the Gen4 G4 SSD.

ADATA has just launched the industry's first SD Express 8.0 compliant card, with a single 512GB capacity and blistering read and write speeds of up to 1.6GB/sec and 1.2GB/sec, respectively.

The new ADATA Premier Extreme SD 8.0 Express memory card will debut in a 512GB capacity, but we should expect higher-capacity 1TB, 2TB, and larger models in the months ahead. SD Express technology was introduced in 2018 with the SD 7.0 standard, but we're only seeing super-fast versions of those SD 7.0 cards recently, thanks mostly to the Nintendo Switch 2.

ADATA's newest Premier Extreme family is being expanded with the new SD Express 8.0 options, featuring a PCIe 3.0 x2 interface, with reads of up to 1.6GB/sec (1600MB/sec) and writes of up to 1.2GB/sec (1200MB/sec).

USB Flash Drives or USB Thumb Drives are still a go-to for many as they offer convenience and portability in a way that is hard to match. The only downside, at least usually, is that this convenience and portability come at a cost - speed. However, that's not the case with the TEAMGROUP X2 MAX USB 3.2 Gen 2x1 Portable SSD, as you're getting SSD technology and speed in the convenient size of a USB Flash Drive.

Available in sizable 1TB or 2TB capacities, the new TEAMGROUP X2 MAX offers transfer speeds of up to 1,000 MB/sec, significantly faster than the 140 MB/s you get from a standard fast USB Flash Drive. With USB Type-A and Type-C connectors, it's compatible with a broad range of devices, from Windows PCs to Macs, iOS devices, and even PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X|S consoles.

However, when it comes to current-gen games, the speed here is more for backing up games than running them natively, which still requires a dedicated M.2 solution. The TEAMGROUP X2 MAX is fast enough to store and play PlayStation 4 games on a PS5 or Xbox One games on an Xbox Series console, which is impressive.

Dell has just announced that it will be offering Solidigm's massive new 122TB SSD inside of its PowerScale systems, and is the first infrastructure provider to offer storage systems with 122TB SSDs.

Solidigm released its D5-P5336 122TB SSDs in late 2024, offering an astronomical capacity that enabled customers access to close to 6 petabytes (PBs) of storage per server node. Using far larger SSDs is a big business for servers and data centers, minimizing hardware requirements, operational expenses, and energy consumption.

Dell is the first infrastructure provider to offer a storage system with 122TB SSDs. PowerScale's recent updates address key issues related to storage capacity, cost-effectiveness, energy consumption, and system adaptability - helping businesses thrive in a data-centric environment.