Solid-state drives just keep getting faster: Samsung has just launched its latest M.2 SSDs, the 970 PRO and 970 EVO, and they are up to 30% quicker than the previous generation of EVO and PRO drives.
This is thanks in large part to their use of cutting-edge PC hardware: the PCIe Gen 3×4 NVMe interface, the latest iteration of Samsung’s fantastically fast V-NAND memory technology, and a new Phoenix controller.
Samsung’s quoted performance numbers are very impressive:
- 970 PRO – sequential read speed of up to 3500 MB/s, and sequential write speed of up to 2700 MB/s
- 970 EVO – sequential read speed of up to 3500 MB/s, and sequential write speed of up to 2500 MB/s
5 Years or 1.2 petabytes written
Even more impressively, Samsung is offering a very generous five-year warranty on both of these solid-state drives, or up to 1.2 petabytes of data written to them. That’s 1200 terabytes or 1.2 million gigabytes, in other words – astounding numbers and a confident show of faith in the drives’ abilities by Samsung.
As memory chips get more dense, heat buildup and dissipation becomes an issue when they’re in use, but Samsung has this nipped in the bud as well, as both drives come with a feature Samsung calls “Dynamic Thermal Guard” technology that automatically maintains optimal operating temperatures.
Presumably, the new heat-spreader and “nickel-coated controller” will help with this as well.
Capacities
Despite the fact that these drives use the highly compact M.2 form factor, Samsung has brought them out in capacities of up to 2TB.
That’s right, you can now have up to 2TB of SSD-class storage in your PC in a form factor that’s barely the size of a stick of gum.
The less-impressive (but still very useful) capacities are 250GB, 500GB, and 1TB. The 970 PRO only comes in 512GB and 1TB capacities, however.
Availability and pricing
These solid-state drives will be available from the end of May 2018 from Tarsus Distribution. South African pricing has yet to be finalised, however; for now all we have is the starting dollar price offered by Samsung, which is $329.99 (+- R4120) for the PRO and $119.99 (R1500) for the EVO.
Should you wish more info on these drives, or to get your orders in early, contact Charl van den Berg on 011 531 1000 or send him an email on this address.
