techspot Samsung's 280-layer QLC NAND hits mass production

[UltraMega]

Quote

According to initial reports from January, Samsung's new 9th-generation QLC NAND chips are 50 percent denser than competing 232-layer QLC from YMTC, setting a new standard for areal density in the flash memory industry. They also offer a maximum transfer rate of 3.2 Gbps, a significant increase from the 2.4 Gbps data rate of the previous generation. This advancement suggests that the performance of these new chips may soon rival that of older budget TLC-based drives.

https://www.techspot.com/news/104708-faster-cheaper-ssds-may-coming-samsung-280-layer.html

 

 

Sounds like a win-win. Good news on prices is rare these days. 

[Sir Beregond]

I've tended to avoid QLC for TLC drives, so would be interested to see how they stack up.

[SamsTechStuff]

Faster QLC is definitely a win!

 

I've tested a few more QLC drives lately, with HMB a lot of recent QLC drives are reasonable in terms of performance and the endurance isn't always terrible. I've found it's very unlikely that non enthusiasts / some gamers require more than ~1GBps SSDs or endurance ratings above 300TBW. I'd argue most enthusiasts / gamers probably don't need more then that either but, it is certainly welcomed when it fits in the budget. I've been thinking about re-working how I test SSDs to see what really matters in terms of value:$ 

 

 

Edited Friday at 22:22 by SamsTechStuff

[ozlay]

It's good to see lower prices for QLC ssds. hopefully it creates a pricing gap between QLC and TLC. Because i cant justify buying a QLC ssd over TLC if the price difference is 5%-10%.

 

However for my usage low capacity is fine. So i keep buying used MLC and optane ssds.

Edited Sunday at 03:37 by ozlay

[SamsTechStuff]

1 hour ago, ozlay said:

It's good to see lower prices for QLC ssds. hopefully it creates a pricing gap between QLC and TLC. Because i cant justify buying a QLC ssd over TLC if the price difference is 5%-10%.

 

However for my usage low capacity is fine. So i keep buying used MLC and optane ssds.

On the money there. When I talk to people and mention QLC you can see it on their faces, lower endurance, lower performance, and they cost too much. With the inflation everyone has seen, market changes in NAND, and the desire to manufacture things with lower and lower cost QLC really felt like a downgrade but at the prices people were paying for TLC (or more). I would not mind at all having my main system run a decently sized TLC drive with DRAM and then faster (likely the newer tech) QLC drives with HMB for bulk game storage for example to save on cost.

I look at optane drives every so often and always end up with some in my cart but never make the purchase. I definitely want at least one to test with though.