Micron Launches 3D NAND Client SSDs
by Billy Tallis on May 31, 2016 11:00 AM EST- Posted in
- SSDs
- Micron
- 3D NAND
- Computex_2016
Today Micron is announcing their first client/OEM SSDs with 3D NAND. First mentioned at an enterprise announcement event in April, the Micron 1100 and 2100 SSDs are part of an aggressive transition strategy that has switched almost all of their flash production capacity over to 3D NAND and left only enough 16nm output to fulfill their obligations for existing product lines.
The Micron 1100 is a mainstream client SATA drive in M.2 and 2.5" form factors. It uses Marvell's 88SS1074 controller and Micron's 384Gb 32-layer TLC NAND and is the replacement for the Micron M600, which used their 16nm MLC. Micron's 3D TLC is unusual in having a capacity (48GB) that is not a power of two, but the 1100 retains the traditional drive capacity points of 256GB, 512GB and 1TB, and extends the line to 2TB. Micron hasn't yet disclosed how many dies and how much overprovisioning each model will have, but the 256GB model will probably include 6 dies giving a raw capacity of 288 GiB.
| Micron 1100 Specifications | |||||
| Capacity | 256GB | 512GB | 1TB | 2TB | |
| Controller | Marvell 88SS1074 | ||||
| NAND | Micron 384Gb 32-layer 3D TLC | ||||
| Form Factors | 2.5" 7mm, M.2 2280 single-sided | 2.5" 7mm | |||
| Sequential Read | 530MB/s | 530MB/s | 530MB/s | 530MB/s | |
| Sequential Write | 500MB/s | 500MB/s | 500MB/s | 500MB/s | |
| 4KB Random Read | 55K IOPS | 92K IOPS | 92K IOPS | 92K IOPS | |
| 4KB Random Write | 83K IOPS | 83K IOPS | 83K IOPS | 83K IOPS | |
| DevSlp Idle Power | 2mW | 2mW | 4mW | 25mW | |
| Encryption | TCG Opal | ||||
| Endurance | 120TB | 240TB | 400TB | 400TB | |
The Micron 1100 has slightly reduced performance and endurance specifications relative to the M600, but it retains the full feature set including TCG Opal encryption, partial power loss protection and SLC caching. The Marvell 88SS1074 was designed with TLC NAND in mind and thus also brings LDPC error correction support.
The Micron 2100 M.2 PCIe NVME will be Micron's first client PCIe SSD and their first PCIe SSD with 3D NAND. Micron has not yet finalized the technical specifications for the 2100, but we do know it will be available in capacities up to 1TB as a double-sided M.2 2280 card.
The Micron 1100 will begin mass production in July, followed by the 2100 by the end of summer.
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Ariknowsbest - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
Maybe it's controller related, how well it can mask it.Eden-K121D - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
why is this Nvme drive so slowZertzable - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
The specifications are for the Micron 1100 (SATA), not the Micron 2100 (PCIe/NVMe).shabby - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
The chart has it labelled as m2 not sata. Anyhoo there's an m2 850 evo and its also as slow as the sata drive, just because its m2 doesn't mean it'll read/write at 2GBps, its all in the controller.Brian_R170 - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
M.2 is the spec for the socket and SATA signals are part of the spec, so it is possible to be M.2 and SATA. M.2 SSDs can be SATA AHCI, PCIe AHCI, or PCIe NVMe.Freakie - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
And to add to that, many motherboards ONLY support PCIe M.2 drives. If you look at the pictures in this article, the connector on the drive of the first picture has two notches in it while the drive in the 2nd picture only has 1. This is how you tell PCIe and SATA M.2 drives apart. Many people have been burned buying SATA M.2 drives for motherboards that only support PCIe and vice versa.Magichands8 - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
Yet another reason why I can't fathom why anyone would buy M.2 (unless for mobile). And the 2100 is coming as a double-sided M.2 that only reaches 1TB with 3D NAND? That 1100 better be damn cheap and that 2100 better be damn fast. The article does say that the 1100 comes in 2.5" form factor but if I'm going to be limited to 2TB and such slow speed then the price for it better blow everything else out of the water. Otherwise I'd skip being the early adopter and just get something more mature and already on the market.Freakie - Tuesday, May 31, 2016 - link
Because unfortunately M.2 drives are cheaper than just straight PCIe add-in cards. And it isn't cost effective to RAID multiple SATA SSDs to try to reach the performance of PCIe NVM SSDs. If you want something that goes really fast, but don't have the money to get a top of the line PCIe add-in SSD, then M.2 drives are the way to go. I'm thinking about getting the 256GB or 512GB Samsung 950 Pro myself.Laptops are coming around to supporting the PCIe M.2 drives instead of the SATA ones which will help push prices down for PCIe drives since manufacturers can ship higher volumes which will just encourage more PCIe SSD adoption and fuel a cycle where SATA M.2 drives will be rare and that compatibility thing I mentioned will be an even smaller issue than it already is.
BurntMyBacon - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
@Freakie: "Because unfortunately M.2 drives are cheaper than just straight PCIe add-in cards."U.2 Drives would also fit this description if anyone made a consumer grade version. Intel's is enterprise grade at enterprise prices.
@Freakie: "And it isn't cost effective to RAID multiple SATA SSDs to try to reach the performance of PCIe NVM SSDs."
Even ignoring the cost of the SSDs, the RAID controllers available on consumer grade motherboards are generally incapable of matching high end NVMe drives. So yes, definitely not cost effective.
It's too bad U.2 hasn't progressed as it is the logical successor to SATA on non-portable systems. Many more U.2 connectors can be placed per motherboard than M.2 sockets. Performance is exactly the same. Perhaps when motherboards come standard with more PCIe lanes, we'll see some more pickup.
Spunjji - Wednesday, June 1, 2016 - link
"The Micron 1100 is a mainstream client SATA drive in M.2 and 2.5" form factors."