Storage News - Page 2

Silicon Motion has just unveiled a new set of SSD controllers built on the PCIe 4.0 NVMe 1.4 SSD standard.

The new Silicon Motion SM2264 built for performance, the SM2267 for mainstream, and SM2267XT for value DRAM-less client SSDs. The new controllers, according to Silicon Motion, were built from the ground up with new hardware features, optimized to squeeze everything it can from the PCIe 4.0 interface.

Silicon Motion's flagship SM2264 SSD controller packs a quad-core ARM R8 processor on the 12nm node, with 4 x PCIe 4.0 lanes with 16Gb/s of bandwidth. It packs 8 NAND channels, with up to 1600MT/s per channel. We're to expect up to 7.4GB/sec (7400MB/sec) reads and up to 6.8GB/sec (6800MB/sec).

Exclusive: Phison's new E18 SSD controller is currently being stamped onto some test drives somewhere in the world, and we have an exlcusive sneak peak at some early benchmark numbers. Check this insanity out:

The Phison E18 SSD controller is pumping away here at 7.38GB/sec, with writes of 7GB/sec. We've been teased about this from Sabrent's next-gen Rocket 4 Plus SSD screaming along at 7GB/sec but now we have some real-world results from an actual Phison E18 SSD controller at past 7GB/sec up to 7.38GB/sec.

It's official: SK Hynix is buying Intel's storage business for $9 billion.

Semiconductor titan SK Hynix has purchased Intel's NAND segment in a sweeping $9 billion deal. The South Korean memory-maker will spend $7 billion upfront to acquire three parts of Intel's business: NAND SSD IP and employees, NAND components and wafers including R&D employees, and the Intel Fab 68 plant in Dalian, China. Intel will keep the Optane brand.

SK Hynix will spend the additional $2 billion once the deal closes in 2025, and Intel will continue designing manufacturing flash memory at the Dalian plant until closing.

Intel is nearing a deal to sell its flash memory segment to SK Hynix for $10 billion, sources tell The Wall Street Journal.

Intel's foray into high-performance NAND flash has been a rocky one; The company's 3D Xpoint memory created interesting applications via its Optane SSD drives, but the volatile storage market has led to inconsistent earnings for Intel. Intel's NSG branch (Non-volatile Storage memory Group) has lost money for multiple quarters in a row, and only recently returned to profitability in Q2'20, where the storage business hit all-time highs.

"Q2 was an all time record for quarterly revenue for our memory business. The business also returned to profitability this quarter, generating approximately $300 million in operating income," Intel executive VP George Davis said in a recent July earnings call.

Western Digital is expanding the high-performance WD_BLACK series of storage devices with three new ultra-fast SSD options engineered with gamers in mind. These new storage options offer NVME performance for gamers with new and old PCs alike.

"As game developers move towards creating immersive titles that require higher performance, consumers need to equip themselves with the best tools to stay up-to-speed," said Jim Welsh, senior vice president, Consumer Solutions, Western Digital. "Innovative, high-performance storage solutions are essential to keep up with this ever-changing landscape. Our latest WD_BLACK products have been purpose-built to allow gamers to meet the increasingly high standards of future games and gaming platforms. We've optimized these products to not only provide more storage for gamers but to elevate the gaming experience as a whole."

The WD_BLACK SN850 is Western Digital's new performance NVME SSD. This new drive features PICe Gen4 technology, which enables ridiculous access speeds of 7000MB/s read and 5000MB/s write. The SN850 NVME drives feature a new cache technology with improved low queue-depth performance, which Western Digital said enables smoother loading in applications and games.

Corsair today announced a new line of super fast high-capacity solid state drives. The new MP400 Gen 3 m.2 PCIe SSD series is available in capacities up to 8TB. That's a lot of room for games!

Corsair's MP400 drives boast up to 3,4000MB/sec sequential read and 3,000MB/sec sequential write speeds. These drives aren't as quick as some of the new Gen 4 SSDs that you can get these days, but they lack in blistering speed and make up in capacity. The MP400 drives come in 1TB, 2TB, 4TB, and 8TB sizes. Corsair used high-density 3D QLC NAND memory to enable such high storage capacity.

Each Corsair MP400 SSD includes a license for Corsair SSD Toolbox, which enables you to update the drive's firmware from your desktop. The software also offers a secure erase feature, which would be handy if you ever sell your drive. The drives also include a five year replacement warranty.

Sabrent blew the lid off of the storage world back in May 2020 with the introduction of the craziest NVMe SSD on the market: the Sabrent Rocket Q 8TB NVMe SSD.

The drive debuted with a price of $2000 but now you can enjoy a nice 30% off, seeing that $2000 price shaved down to $1400, a savings of $600. With that $600, you could almost get NVIDIA's kick ass new GeForce RTX 3080 -- or it is $600 towards the $1500 required for the beasty 8K ready GeForce RTX 3090 graphics card.

Sabrent provides a huge 3.4GB/sec read speeds and 3GB/sec writes on its Rocket Q 8TB SSD (read our review on the drive here), so you'll be taken care of when it comes to huge speeds. But the 8TB on a single little NVMe SSD is insanity, and perfect to pair with a new Ampere-based GeForce RTX 30 series graphics card.

You can buy Sabrents huge Rocket Q 8TB NVMe SSD here on Amazon.

I don't know about you, but the world of storage interests me just as much as GPUs and CPUs -- with Sabrent coming out and slaying everyone every couple of months with a record-breaking drive.

Their recent Sabrent Rocket 4 Plus offers a huge 7000MB/sec (7GB/sec) transfers, which are the fastest you can get from a single drive -- but now GIGABYTE has unveiled its new AORUS Gen4 AIC 2TB and 8TB SSDs.

The new AORUS Gen4 AIC 2TB SSD packs 4 x 500GB pre-installed NVMe M.2 SSDs directly to the AIC (add-in card) that detects as one single 2TB drive. The 8TB model is the same, with 4 x 2TB drives that show up as one beyond-ultra-fast 8GB SSD.

GALAX has just announced its new super-fast Hall of Fame (HOF) Extreme PCIe 4.0 SSD, which packs Phison's incredible new SSD controller that enables 7GB/sec read speeds.

The new Phison PS5018-E18 controller is powering GALAX's new HOF Extreme PCIe 4.0 SSD, which means we're looking at an ultra-fast 7000MB/sec (7GB/sec) reads and 6850MB/sec (6.85GB/sec) writes. This is at the same level as Sabrent's new Rocket 4 Plus SSD which packs the same Phison E18 controller.

We can expect GALAX to offer its new Hall of Fame Extreme PCIe 4.0 SSDs in 1TB, 2TB, and even 4TB capacities which is great to see. GALAX has just stepped up, over and beyond Samsung with its new HOF Edition PCIe 4.0 SSDs -- the same with Sabrent which has come out of nowhere and dominated the SSD market.

Phison has truly delivered the speedy SSD goods with its new E18 controller, with the new PS5018-E18 NVMe SSD controller that is now making its way into high-end SSDs from the likes of Sabrent.

The company has been teasing a new 2TB engineering sample that crushes Samsung's new 980 PRO, with a huge 7GB/sec reads and 6.9GB/sec writes... on top of that we have 74,217 IOPs which beats out the Samsung drive that can't even hit 60K.

Sabrent is using the Phison E18 SSD controller inside of its amazing new Rocket 4 Plus SSD, which you can read all about here. Sabrent is the only one offering a new 7GB/sec capable NVMe SSD in 2TB capacities too -- remember that, Samsung is only offering 250GB/500GB/1TB.