Intel announces Optane SSD 900P Series, the first consumer SSD to use 3D XPoint memory
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Intel announces Optane SSD 900P Series, the first consumer SSD to use 3D XPoint memory
In July of 2015, Intel announced a revolutionary new memory it called 3D XPoint. Intel called it a breakthrough in memory technology and would offer unparalleled performance and endurance.
Earlier this year, it announced its first drive to use 3D XPoint and it was the Optane SSD DC P4800X. However, it was an enterprise SSD designed primarily for use in data centers.
Now, there's a version for consumers called the Optane SSD 900P series.
It will be available as a PCIe add-in card (PCIe 3.0 x4) and U.2 drive (2.5-inch form factor). The add-in card version will come in 280GB and 480GB capacity points, while the U.2 drive will only come in 280GB.
Intel claims sequential read and write speeds of up to 2,500MB/s and 2,000MB/s respectively.
More impressively, claimed random 4K read and write performance is claimed to be the region of 550,000 and 500,000 IOPS respectively. This is over 50% greater than the Samsung SSD 960 Pro.
In the real world, Intel claims that the Optane SSD 900P Series will offer about 20% more performance than the SSD 960 Pro from Samsung, the current leader in consumer SSD performance.
But performance aside, perhaps the most impressive thing is the rated endurance of the Optane SSD 900P Series. The 480GB version of the Optane SSD 900P Series has a claimed endurance of up to 8760TBW.
To put this number into perspective, a 512GB SSD 960 Pro has a claimed endurance of 400TBW while a 2TB SSD 960 Pro's claimed endurance is 1200TBW.
The Optane SSD 900P has a greater endurance than any consumer SSD out there right now but it pales in comparison to the enterprise-centric Optane SSD DC P4800X, which has a rated endurance of - wait for it - 12.3PB!
As you would expect, the Optane SSD 900P Series will not come cheap. Intel has priced the 280GB version at US$389 and the 480GB version at US$599, which makes them considerably more expensive than any other high-end consumer PCIe SSD in the market today. The drives will come with a 5-year long warranty.
Local availability and pricing have yet to be confirmed and we will update this article with details once we have them.
