Samsung 990 Pro revealed

[Doobeedoo]

I didn't see a post about so here it is. 

 

 

In short, this is an PCIe 4.0 M.2 NVMe TLC SSD:

- with sequential r/w 7450MB/s & 6900MB/s with 1400K and 1550K IOPS with Samsung claiming random performance increase by 55%, while also using 50% less power.

- their in house controller

- 1GB cache per 1TB storage
- encryption AES 256-bit Full Disk Encryption, TCG/Opal V2.0, Encrypted Drive (IEEE1667)

- offered in 1TB/2TB/4TB models for $179/$309/TBA next year

- endurance in TBW 600TB,  1,200TB,  2,400TB

- warranty 5 years, or TBW (whichever comes first)

- there will be a heatsink versions too (regular has nickel coating on the controller)

 

 

Quotes

Quote

PCIe 4.0 speed maximized
Huge speed boost.
40% and 55% faster random read/write speeds than 980 PRO - up to 1400K/1650K IOPS,
while sequential read/write speeds up to 7450/6900 MB/s reach near max performance of PCIe® 4.0.
Fly high in gaming, video and 3D editing, data analysis, and more.

 

My thoughts

While a bit bumped not PCIe 5.0 which I expected to see, it seems their in house controller for consumer side isn't ready I take it. We don't know. Maybe they may launch it sooner after this one even who knows. Because we know they have enterprise PCIe 5.0 SSD and controller so. Now, while it's not PCIe 5.0 what is interesting to me is seeing that random I/O performance improvement by a very good margin. Really currently a good focus on, while sequential is great random is as important if not more for general use. It will still take time for DirectStorage to catch up too. Even still this is a good one.

 

Sources

Samsung 990 PRO NVMe M.2 SSD | Samsung Semiconductor Global

Samsung 990 PRO with Heatsink | Samsung Semiconductor Global

Samsung Formally Launches the 990 PRO Flagship PCIe Gen4 SSD | TechPowerUp

Samsung’s new 990 Pro M.2 SSD pushes PCIe 4.0 to the limit | KitGuru

Samsung launches their 990 PRO SSD - Promises superior power efficiency and performance | OC3D News (overclock3d.net)

Samsung's 990 Pro PCIe 4.0 SSD boasts up to 7,450 MB/s | TechSpot

The Samsung 990 PRO Is Coming - PC Perspective

https://www.tomshardware.com/news/samsung-990-pro-ssd-pcie4-launch

[StephanTW]

i guess the extra speed from PCIe 5.0 is just so niche and costs so much more that it be a bad deal.
do wonder if the heatsink on the biggest version will cause issues when installing, seeing as most m.2 slots are still underneath PCIe x16 lane 1.
supprised they still stick to 4Tb max size seeing as the prior one had that aswell, would have been nice to see a 8 Tb version seeing as they keep to PCIe 4.0

[Bitter]

So stupid question but I guess an OK place to ask, do the random read/write and IOPS improvements rely on PCIe 4.0 speeds or would they still benefit a PCIe 3.0 slot?

[Doobeedoo]

6 minutes ago, Bitter said:

So stupid question but I guess an OK place to ask, do the random read/write and IOPS improvements rely on PCIe 4.0 speeds or would they still benefit a PCIe 3.0 slot?

They should still benefit as it's more to do with better NAND and controller optimization then raw maximum bandwidth.

[porina]

An incremental update to the 980 Pro, while keeping the pricing in similar ball park. Note 980 Pro was a LOT more expensive early in life than it is now, almost halved. I know, cos I got one early life! 

 

I really wish they'd give QD1 random reads as that is to me a more interesting measure to show progress, and that'll have to wait for the reviews to hit.

 

As for (not) going PCIe 5.0 there is no consumer platform that will usefully use it right now. If memory is correct, Alder Lake is only 5.0 on x16 slot, not the M.2 connection that most will use. I don't recall if Raptor Lake is expected to change that or not. Zen 4 would be the first to offer 5.0 on the M.2 lanes if the mobo supports it - we'll hopefully find out in a few days but I saw a suggestion that CPU M.2 might be 5.0 mandatory.

[Doobeedoo]

14 minutes ago, porina said:

An incremental update to the 980 Pro, while keeping the pricing in similar ball park. Note 980 Pro was a LOT more expensive early in life than it is now, almost halved. I know, cos I got one early life! 

 

I really wish they'd give QD1 random reads as that is to me a more interesting measure to show progress, and that'll have to wait for the reviews to hit.

 

As for (not) going PCIe 5.0 there is no consumer platform that will usefully use it right now. If memory is correct, Alder Lake is only 5.0 on x16 slot, not the M.2 connection that most will use. I don't recall if Raptor Lake is expected to change that or not. Zen 4 would be the first to offer 5.0 on the M.2 lanes if the mobo supports it - we'll hopefully find out in a few days but I saw a suggestion that CPU M.2 might be 5.0 mandatory.

I'm glad they're normalizing price more for Pro lineup.

Yeah looking forward to see reviews too like QD1 for sure. Though I would still expect some decent improvements in some instances though. We'll see. 

 

I mean even we have some PCIe 5.0 SSDs announced to be released soon enough, makes sense to like future proof it per say for new platforms. I see it so it's ready on the market so when a new buyer is getting a new platform they have a new SSD too along. But yes not everything solely on max bandwidth in high QD like QD1 improvements is great to see. Who knows maybe they'll release PCIe 5.0 much sooner within half year or something. On AM5 yes it was mentioned. Doubt we'd see anyone revealing new SSDs.

 

What I wonder is do they plan to release their Z NAND SSD for consumers one day.

[Senzelian]

5 hours ago, Doobeedoo said:

1GB cache per 1TB storage

1GB DRAM to be specific.

 

The 980's SLC cache was 6 - 36GB. (there's conflicting information for the slc cache size tho)

[Salv8 (sam)]

i'm thinking about upgrading my storage soon since their warranties are about to run out and these look like mighty fine replacements.

[RoseLuck462]

Huge cache size 

[williamcll]

How does it compare to the recently released WD Black SN850X?

[Doobeedoo]

57 minutes ago, williamcll said:

How does it compare to the recently released WD Black SN850X?

While this one is not out yet, I'd expect quite better. Just based on I/O specs it's quite better.

[Dabombinable]

Yet another SSD that's capable of speeds far in excess of the RAM that's been in the majority of my computers.

[cmndr]

Not worth considering given that the next gen of PCIe 5.0 gear is out soon.

Also if you NEED extreme performance... go buy a used Intel 900p 280GB for $200ish, use that for your boot drive and programs (and temp files and thumbnail cache) and use basically any other drive for other stuff. You can even partition off a bit for caching other drives and as page file. This will cover A LOT of low queue depth use cases (where drives might stutter a little) and reduce the load on "slow" NAND SSDs that might struggle in mixed read/write situations. For consumers raw bandwidth usually doesn't matter a ton.

[porina]

56 minutes ago, cmndr said:

Not worth considering given that the next gen of PCIe 5.0 gear is out soon.

Didn't we go through similar arguments when 4.0 first came out? Early 4.0 SSDs were hardly much of an improvement over decent 3.0 drives of the time. I think we could see similar here again. Early 5.0 drives may get a bit more sequential speed out, but will likely cost more and be worse outside sequential. I think a 990 Pro, especially if the pricing is like indicated, is a worthy consideration for a while yet until 5.0 controllers mature.

 

BTW I went from 900p to 980 Pro as OS drive when I replaced gaming systems. I can't say the drive in either case is a limiting factor to my experience.

[HenrySalayne]

12 hours ago, Dabombinable said:

Yet another SSD that's capable of speeds far in excess of the RAM that's been in the majority of my computers.

There should not be a PC with PCIe 4.0 and RAM that's slower than the 990 Pro.

The most basic DDR4-2133 reaches 17 GB/s per channel. You have to go back to DDR2-800 to be under 8 GB/s (per channel) and on dual-channel systems even back to DDR-400.

[Dabombinable]

6 minutes ago, HenrySalayne said:

There should not be a PC with PCIe 4.0 and RAM that's slower than the 990 Pro.

The most basic DDR4-2133 reaches 17 GB/s per channel. You have to go back to DDR2-800 to be under 8 GB/s (per channel) and on dual-channel systems even back to DDR-400.

That's the majority of the computers I've had.

[HenrySalayne]

4 hours ago, porina said:

Didn't we go through similar arguments when 4.0 first came out? Early 4.0 SSDs were hardly much of an improvement over decent 3.0 drives of the time. I think we could see similar here again. Early 5.0 drives may get a bit more sequential speed out, but will likely cost more and be worse outside sequential. I think a 990 Pro, especially if the pricing is like indicated, is a worthy consideration for a while yet until 5.0 controllers mature.

And not even to mention the higher power draw of PCIe 5.0. PCIe 4.0 x4 allows for up to 8 GB/s and current generation drives just start to scrape that limit in best case scenarios. I think lowering the MSRP, improving the performance and adding a 4 TB option to the line-up makes this overall a pretty compelling offer.

[TVwazhere]

990? I need a 1080pro to match my 1080ti :^) 

[Arika]

5 minutes ago, TVwazhere said:

990? I need a 1080pro to match my 1080ti :^) 

1080pro with a 1080ti for that 1080p gaming

[TVwazhere]

19 minutes ago, Arika S said:

1080pro with a 1080ti for that 1080p gaming

How'd you know I'm still using my VG248QE???

[Arika]

Just now, TVwazhere said:

How'd you know I'm still using my VG248QE???

Because 1080p > all

[rcmaehl]

8 hours ago, Arika S said:

Because 1080p > all

I will fight for my right to 1440p 144hz

[NumLock21]

I don't know it it's been done yet (maybe it has), but it would be interesting to see a test comparison in terms of performance and temperature, on a real world like test bed, with case fans and everything and test the following

1. The built in heatsink that came with the SSD. I figured these might be the best when the manufacture did it themselves.
2. Naked SSD using the motherboard's M.2 heatsink (although to me they look like giant plastic dust covers, than a heatsink)
3. Naked SSD with no heatsink, (but the air flow from the front intake fans still keeps it cool)

[Doobeedoo]

57 minutes ago, NumLock21 said:

I don't know it it's been done yet (maybe it has), but it would be interesting to see a test comparison in terms of performance and temperature, on a real world like test bed, with case fans and everything and test the following

1. The built in heatsink that came with the SSD. I figured these might be the best when the manufacture did it themselves.
2. Naked SSD using the motherboard's M.2 heatsink (although to me they look like giant plastic dust covers, than a heatsink)
3. Naked SSD with no heatsink, (but the air flow from the front intake fans still keeps it cool)

In time we will see benchmarks synthetic and real use. I'd opt for one with heatsink why not. I'd expect it better than mobo covers. Also this one is much more efficient too. Especially good for laptops.

[OrdinaryPhil]

Well, at least Samsung is being honest now with their Pro line and labeling it TLC instead of the previous generations that were labaled MLC even though they weren't.

Kudos for that.