Samsung Electronics has begun mass producing the industry's first 4-bit (QLC, quad-level cell) 4-terabyte (TB) SATA solid-state drive (SSD) for consumers. Based on 1-terabit (Tb) V-NAND with performance equivalent to the company's 3-bit design, Samsung's QLC SSD is expected to bring a new level of efficiency to consumer SSDs, Samsung said. With its new 1Tb 4-bit V-NAND chip, Samsung will be able to efficiently produce a 128GB memory card for smartphones that will lead the charge toward higher capacities for high-performance memory storage. Typically, as data stored within a memory cell increases from three bits to four, the chip capacity per unit area would rise and the electrical charge (used to determine information from a sensor) would decrease by as much as 50% making it considerably more difficult to maintain a device's desired performance and speed. However, Samsung said its 4-bit 4TB QLC SATA SSD maintains its performance levels at the same level as a 3-bit SSD, by using a 3-bit SSD controller and TurboWrite technology, while increasing drive capacity through the use of 32 chips, all based on 64-layer fourth-generation 1Tb V-NAND. The 4-bit QLC SSD enables a sequential read speed of 540 MB/s and a sequential write speed of 520 MB/s, and comes with a three-year warranty. Samsung plans to introduce several 4-bit consumer SSDs later in 2018 with 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB capacities in the widely used 2.5-inch form factor.

SK Hynix has announced the company completed recently the development of enterprise SATA SSDs built using its 72-layer 512Gb 3D NAND flash chips. SK Hynix combined the 72-layer 512Gb 3D NAND flash with its in-house developed firmware and controller to provide the maximum density of 4TB, and makes the most of its 72-layer 512Gb 3D NAND chips to double the biggest density of the SSD of the same size with 256Gb NAND chips. A single 4TB SSD could contain 200 UHD (Ultra-HD) movies, each of which is generally as large as approximately 20GB, according to the vendor. The new eSSD supports sequential read and write speed of up to 560MB/s and 515MB/s, respectively, and can perform 98,000 random read IOPS (input/output operations per second) and 32,000 random write IOPS. SK Hynix also improved the esSSD read latency.

Samsung Electronics has introduced the 860 PRO and 860 EVO solid state drives (SSD), the most up-to-date additions to the company's SATA interface lineup. Building on the launch of the 850 PRO and 850 EVO - the industry's first consumer SSDs with V-NAND technology - the 860 PRO and 860 EVO achieve industry-leading performance for SATA SSDs, offering enhancements in speed, reliability, compatibility and capacity, the vendor said. The 860 PRO is available in 256GB, 512GB, 1TB, 2TB and 4TB capacities, with the 4TB memory storage holding up to 114 hours and 30 minutes of 4K Ultra HD video. The 860 PRO is available in a widely compatible 2.5-inch form factor, which is ideal for PCs, laptops, workstations and NAS, said Samsung. The 860 EVO comes in 250GB, 500GB, 1TB, 2TB and 4TB capacities, in a 2.5-inch for PCs and laptops, as well as mSATA and M.2 form factors for ultra-slim computing applications. The 860 EVO has up to six times longer sustained performance than its predecessor due to enhanced Intelligent TurboWrite technology, with read and write speeds of up to 550 MB/s and 520 MB/s, respectively, according to the company. The 860 PRO and 860 EVO SSDs are available with manufacturer's suggested retail prices starting at US$139.99 and US$94.99, respectively.