Samsung SSDs high capacity for servers
The popularity of the use of flash memory in storage and servers is growing rapidly. This is due to the dynamic development of solutions on flash memory and a decrease in its cost, an increase in the need for high speed data access. For DBMS, virtualization and VDI, the number of read / write operations (IOPS) is much more important than the speed of sequential operations with large files. And here SSD show their best qualities.
Today, many vendors already have SSD drives in their product lines with a capacity of more than 1TB. The controllers are advanced enough to control this capacity, and the NAND flash memory is reasonably inexpensive for such products to retain their price appeal. The next step is flash drives with a capacity of several terabytes. Similar devices have already appeared - models on 2TB Samsung 850 Pro and EVO.
Over the past three years, Samsung has become one of the leading players in the global SSD market. The result of its vertical integration strategy was SSD 840, the first mass SSD product based on TLC NAND flash memory, the use of which allowed Samsung to reduce the cost of devices. And today, the 840 EVO drive remains the only mass-produced SSD based on TLC NAND.
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Popularity among users has also won the line of SSD 840 Pro drives with a capacity of 128, 256 and 480 GB on MLC memory. In them, the developers used a new MDX controller. It is built on the basis of three cores Cortex-R4 and uses an eight-channel structure, as well as increased clock frequency up to 300 MHz. Its computational power allowed using some additional functions without performance loss, for example, AES encryption.
The capacity of the buffer memory of the drive 840 Pro has grown 512 MB. DDR2 memory has changed LPDDR2 memory, which has reduced power consumption.
The performance of the 840 series drives using the Samsung Magician benchmark .
The MLC flash memory from Samsung in these SSDs is made according to the norms of the 21-nm process technology and has a two-level cell structure. MLC memory is more commonly used on productive and expensive solutions, and budget models use TLC flash memory with a lower number of rewrite cycles and a slower speed.
Two years later, Samsung introduced the SSD 850 Pro on 3D NAND memory.
What is a multi-layer flash memory, what are its features? The scalability of traditional NAND flash is limited. The 20nm process has become an obstacle, overcoming of which required innovation in NAND design. In a conventional NAND flash memory, the cells in which information is stored are flat. It is easy to make such a memory, but it has a number of drawbacks - in order to increase capacity, it is necessary to reduce cell sizes, their influence on each other grows and the reliability of information storage decreases. The solution was the memory of 3D NAND or V-NAND, as Samsung calls it. The developers added a “third dimension,” placing the transistor layers on top of each other. As a result, managed to return to a more convenient 40-nm process technology.
In the architecture of Samsung 3D V-NAND cells have a cylindrical shape, eliminating their influence on each other, and an increase in capacity is achieved by arranging the cells one above the other in 32 layers without compromising the reliability of data storage and speed of work. This design allows you to create a more capacious, fast and reliable memory. Multi-layer, three-dimensional flash memory is gradually becoming increasingly difficult. Last year, engineers were able to achieve the maximum number of 36 layers, and in 2013, 24 layers were a record. Now it is 48 layers.
MLC NAND and MLC V-NAND flash memory densities in Gbit / mm2.
In July, the company introduced the PM863 and SM863, the new enterprise-class SSDs with SATA 6 Gb / s interface. Their deliveries began in August. The PM863 and SM863 drives use a Samsung Mercury controller on an ARM Cortex R4 processor.
Samsung PM863 and SM863 Enterprise SATA drives have a capacity of up to 3.84 TB and use V-NAND 3D flash memory. Detailed review of the Samsung PM863 disk review .
Samsung PM863 Specifications:
The PM863 drive was the development of the Samsung 845DC EVO line :
The use of 3D V-NAND flash memory has improved productivity by 40-50%, increased durability and storage capacity. The latter has grown to 1.92 and 3.84 TB, which makes it possible to make storage systems and servers more compact, for example, equip servers in the 1U chassis with such drives and dispense with external arrays and FC storage connected via FC.
Specifications of Samsung SM863:
If the PM863 drive became the successor to the 845DC EVO, then the SM863 is the successor to its older PRO version. In 845DC PRO, developers switched to 3D V-NAND memory, while in SM863 for efficiency they upgraded the first generation NAND with 24 layers to a 32-layer version. Therefore, the SM863 has a slightly lower performance. However, thanks to the more durable MLC V-NAND memory, the SM863 model is well-suited for intensive recording applications. PM863 is designed more for mixed loads, for example, mediastring, storage of rarely changing data, such as media files and database directories.
In connection with the growing demand for high-capacity SSDs, Samsung also released two 2TB SSD models with the new MHX controller in July. Structurally, the MHX controller is similar to the MEX controller, but for working with large-capacity flash memory, the DRAM memory capacity is increased.
For optimal performance, the NAND address table requires about 1 MB of 1 GB DRAM of NAND flash memory. From an architectural point of view, increasing the DRAM controller's capacity is not a problem, but at the same time the cost of the device grows. Therefore, it is considered that SSD with a capacity of 2 TB will occupy a relatively small niche.
The MHX controller supports up to 2 GB of LPDDR3 memory, while the former MEX controller supports only 1 GB of LPDDR2 memory. The EVO series drives with a capacity of 120, 250 and 500 MB use a lightweight version of the MEX called MGX with two processing cores instead of three, but operating at a higher clock frequency.
The 850 EVO uses the same 32-layer 128-gigabit TLC V-NAND flash memory as the 850 EVO's smaller capacity, but the 850 PRO uses a new 128-gigabit 2-bit MLC backing.
Samsung 850 Pro: outside and inside.
The specifications for the 2TB 850 Pro drive are almost identical to its fellow 1 TB capacity. The performance is exactly the same, but the power consumption in DevSleep mode is slightly higher, which is explained by the presence of additional DRAM memory, despite the greater energy efficiency of LPDDR3 compared to LPDDR2. The only fundamental change in the 850 Pro is the transition to V-NAND.
The 850 Pro has the same SATA 6 Gb / s interface and MHX controller as the 840 EVO. Samsung has so far refrained from the release of PCIe SSD - this market is relatively small. The 850 Pro firmware is adapted to the characteristics of V-NAND.
Comparison of specifications Samsung 2TB SSD:
Memory in the 850 Pro is still used 32-layer, that is, Samsung has increased capacity with the same process technology. This simplifies production and gives better performance with small containers. Samsung has brought the estimated amount of data - the resource of drives in this series - up to 300 TB, and the warranty is extended to 10 years.
Specifications models of the line of Samsung SSD 850 Pro
The performance of the 850 Pro V-NAND flash memory has a high write speed that exceeds the performance of the SATA 6 Gbps bus. Another quality is durability. For all capacities, excluding 128 GB, the warranty resource is 150 TB. With a typical load, such a resource means a long SSD service life - more than 56 years with a capacity of 1 TB.
However, the model 850 Pro is distinguished from the more expensive enterprise-level drives by the lack of protection against power failure and comprehensive data protection.
Unlike many manufacturers, Samsung independently produces all the components of its SSD-drives. In particular, it uses a home-made processor, while most vendors are content with the popular SandForce or Marvell models. The result is a high reliability, efficiency and coherence of all components of the drive.
Like the 2TB Pro version, the EVO drive has performance parameters similar to those with 1TB capacity, but the higher power consumption is due to the increased NAND and DRAM memory capacities. From 2TB Pro, this drive is distinguished by the use of TLC V-NAND memory, which is more economical in production: storing three bits in one cell instead of two gives a higher recording density. The user has access to 2000 Gbps of capacity - 48 Gbps less than in 2TB 850 Pro. Part of the NAND memory is allocated to the cache Turbo Write SLC. TLC memory also requires more storage capacity when writing to increase its durability.
Specifications of Samsung SSD 850 EVO:
Compared to the 840 EVO series, the 850 EVO drives offer a 13% higher level of performance. They also provide high sequential read and write speeds of 540 and 520 MB / s, respectively.
SSD drives of the 850 EVO series guarantee reliability and durability due to the doubling of the life cycle in comparison with the previous generation of drives of the 840 EVO series, which is confirmed by a five-year warranty on the devices. And given the average performance improvement (Sustained Performance) up to 30%, drives of this series become one of the most attractive storage solutions.
The warranty life of the 850 PRO SSDs is also twice as long as their predecessors - the 840 PRO series. Each cell of memory maintains 6 thousand cycles of rewriting. The recording resource for SSD 850 PRO with a capacity of 128-512 GB and EVO is 150 terabytes of data, that is, when writing to a 40 GB drive every day, the resource will be developed only after 10 years. And for 850 PRO drives with a capacity of 1 TB and 2 TB, it is 300 TB. To emphasize the reliability of the 850 PRO series drives, Samsung installs a 10-year warranty on the models of this series.
By the way, the exhaustion of the SSD resource does not mean a loss of warranty. Samsung conducted internal testing of the 128GB 850 PRO drive - it withstood the recording of 8 TB of data and continued to work. As shown by independent tests , the real “vitality” of the 1TB 850 PRO drive also exceeds expectations. Testers recorded 6 PbT of data on this SSD, and it worked fine. 3111 sectors failed and were redistributed. This is 53% of the pool, 47% is left, so the drive is quite lively. 9-day data storage with power off showed that everything is fine.
The development of SSD is considered a very promising direction. Currently, an active process is underway to optimize the functions and reduce the price of solid-state drives in order to make the use of SSDs massive. Their capacity is growing.
In August, at the Flash Memory Summit conference in California, Samsung introduced the most capacious SSD drive in the world. The 2.5-inch form factor can store 16 terabytes of data. And this is despite the fact that the capacity of traditional HDD hard drives now does not exceed 10 TB. Samsung was able to achieve this capacity thanks to the 256-gigabit V-NAND 3D flash memory with 48 three-bit TLC layers.
Gartner analysts predict a gradual convergence of the cost of storage (dollar / GB) SSD drives and HDD. By 2017, they are almost equal.
If the progress in the development of SSD-drives will continue at this pace, then after a few years hard HDDs are unlikely to be able to compete with them. True, for this you need to significantly reduce the price of SSD. According to analysts, there are two years to wait.
Today, many vendors already have SSD drives in their product lines with a capacity of more than 1TB. The controllers are advanced enough to control this capacity, and the NAND flash memory is reasonably inexpensive for such products to retain their price appeal. The next step is flash drives with a capacity of several terabytes. Similar devices have already appeared - models on 2TB Samsung 850 Pro and EVO.
Third Dimension: 3D V-NAND
Over the past three years, Samsung has become one of the leading players in the global SSD market. The result of its vertical integration strategy was SSD 840, the first mass SSD product based on TLC NAND flash memory, the use of which allowed Samsung to reduce the cost of devices. And today, the 840 EVO drive remains the only mass-produced SSD based on TLC NAND.
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Popularity among users has also won the line of SSD 840 Pro drives with a capacity of 128, 256 and 480 GB on MLC memory. In them, the developers used a new MDX controller. It is built on the basis of three cores Cortex-R4 and uses an eight-channel structure, as well as increased clock frequency up to 300 MHz. Its computational power allowed using some additional functions without performance loss, for example, AES encryption.
The capacity of the buffer memory of the drive 840 Pro has grown 512 MB. DDR2 memory has changed LPDDR2 memory, which has reduced power consumption.
The performance of the 840 series drives using the Samsung Magician benchmark .
The MLC flash memory from Samsung in these SSDs is made according to the norms of the 21-nm process technology and has a two-level cell structure. MLC memory is more commonly used on productive and expensive solutions, and budget models use TLC flash memory with a lower number of rewrite cycles and a slower speed.
Two years later, Samsung introduced the SSD 850 Pro on 3D NAND memory.
What is a multi-layer flash memory, what are its features? The scalability of traditional NAND flash is limited. The 20nm process has become an obstacle, overcoming of which required innovation in NAND design. In a conventional NAND flash memory, the cells in which information is stored are flat. It is easy to make such a memory, but it has a number of drawbacks - in order to increase capacity, it is necessary to reduce cell sizes, their influence on each other grows and the reliability of information storage decreases. The solution was the memory of 3D NAND or V-NAND, as Samsung calls it. The developers added a “third dimension,” placing the transistor layers on top of each other. As a result, managed to return to a more convenient 40-nm process technology.
In the architecture of Samsung 3D V-NAND cells have a cylindrical shape, eliminating their influence on each other, and an increase in capacity is achieved by arranging the cells one above the other in 32 layers without compromising the reliability of data storage and speed of work. This design allows you to create a more capacious, fast and reliable memory. Multi-layer, three-dimensional flash memory is gradually becoming increasingly difficult. Last year, engineers were able to achieve the maximum number of 36 layers, and in 2013, 24 layers were a record. Now it is 48 layers.
MLC NAND and MLC V-NAND flash memory densities in Gbit / mm2.
Samsung PM863 and SM863 Drives
In July, the company introduced the PM863 and SM863, the new enterprise-class SSDs with SATA 6 Gb / s interface. Their deliveries began in August. The PM863 and SM863 drives use a Samsung Mercury controller on an ARM Cortex R4 processor.
Samsung PM863 and SM863 Enterprise SATA drives have a capacity of up to 3.84 TB and use V-NAND 3D flash memory. Detailed review of the Samsung PM863 disk review .
Samsung PM863 Specifications:
| Capacity | 120 GB | 240 GB | 480 GB | 960 GB | 1.92 TB | 3.84 TB |
| Controller | Samsung Mercury | |||||
| NAND | 32-layer 128-gigabit Samsung TLC V-NAND flash memory | |||||
| Sequential reading | 380 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 525 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 510 MB / s | 540 MB / s |
| Sequential write | 125 MB / s | 245 MB / s | 460 MB / s | 475 MB / s | 475 MB / s | 480 MB / s |
| Arbitrary reading in blocks of 4 Kb | 86K IOPS | 99K IOPS | 99K IOPS | 99K IOPS | 99K IOPS | 99K IOPS |
| Random recording in blocks of 4KB | 5K IOPS | 10K IOPS | 17K IOPS | 18K IOPS | 18K IOPS | 18K IOPS |
| Reading power consumption | 2.4 W | 2.7 W | 2.9 W | 2.9 W | 3.0 W | 3.0 W |
| Write power consumption | 2.1 W | 2.7 W | 3.8 W | 3.8 W | 4.0 W | 4.1 W |
| Resource | 170 TB | 350 TB | 700 TB | 1.4 PB | 2.8 PB | 5.6 pbytes |
| Price | $ 125 | $ 160 | $ 290 | $ 550 | $ 1,100 | $ 2,200 |
| Warranty | Three years | |||||
The PM863 drive was the development of the Samsung 845DC EVO line :
| Characteristics of drives Samsung 845DC EVO | 240 GB | 480 GB | 960 GB |
| Interface | SATA 6 Gb / s | SATA 6 Gb / s | SATA 6 Gb / s |
| Form factor | 2.5 inches, 7 mm | 2.5 inches, 7 mm | 2.5 inches, 7 mm |
| Sequential read speed, MB / s | 530 | 530 | 530 |
| Sequential write speed, MB / s | 270 | 410 | 410 |
| Random read rate in 4 KB blocks, IOPS | 87000 | 87000 | 87000 |
| Random write speed in 4 KB blocks, IOPS | 12,000 | 14,000 | 14,000 |
| Maximum power consumption | 3.8 W | 3.8 W | 3.8 W |
| Resource | 150 TB | 300 TB | 600 TB |
| MTBF (reliability) | 2 million hours | 2 million hours | 2 million hours |
| Warranty | 5 years | 5 years | 5 years |
The use of 3D V-NAND flash memory has improved productivity by 40-50%, increased durability and storage capacity. The latter has grown to 1.92 and 3.84 TB, which makes it possible to make storage systems and servers more compact, for example, equip servers in the 1U chassis with such drives and dispense with external arrays and FC storage connected via FC.
Specifications of Samsung SM863:
| Capacity | 120 GB | 240 GB | 480 GB | 960 GB | 1.92 TB |
| Controller | Samsung Mercury | ||||
| NAND | 32-layer memory Samsung MLC V-NAND | ||||
| Sequential reading | 500 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s |
| Sequential write | 460 MB / s | 485 MB / s | 485 MB / s | 485 MB / s | 485 MB / s |
| Arbitrary reading in blocks of 4 Kb | 97K IOPS | 97K IOPS | 97K IOPS | 97K IOPS | 97K IOPS |
| Random recording in blocks of 4KB | 12K IOPS | 20K IOPS | 26K IOPS | 28K IOPS | 29K IOPS |
| Reading power consumption | 2.2 W | 2.2 W | 2.2 W | 2.2 W | 2.4 W |
| Write power consumption | 2.5 W | 2.7 W | 2.8 W | 2.9 W | 3.1 W |
| Resource | 770 TB | 1,540 TB | 3,080 TB | 6.160 TB | 12,320 TB |
| Price | $ 140 | $ 180 | $ 330 | $ 870 | $ 1260 |
| Warranty | Five years | ||||
If the PM863 drive became the successor to the 845DC EVO, then the SM863 is the successor to its older PRO version. In 845DC PRO, developers switched to 3D V-NAND memory, while in SM863 for efficiency they upgraded the first generation NAND with 24 layers to a 32-layer version. Therefore, the SM863 has a slightly lower performance. However, thanks to the more durable MLC V-NAND memory, the SM863 model is well-suited for intensive recording applications. PM863 is designed more for mixed loads, for example, mediastring, storage of rarely changing data, such as media files and database directories.
Samsung 850 Pro and EVO Drives
In connection with the growing demand for high-capacity SSDs, Samsung also released two 2TB SSD models with the new MHX controller in July. Structurally, the MHX controller is similar to the MEX controller, but for working with large-capacity flash memory, the DRAM memory capacity is increased.
| Comparison of Samsung SSD Controllers | ||||
| Mdx | MEX (850 Pro + 850 EVO 1Tb) | MGX (850 EVO) | MHX (850 Pro + EVO 2Tb) | |
| Core architecture | ARM Cortex R4 | |||
| # of Cores | 3 | 3 | 2 | 3 |
| Core frequency | 300MHz | 400MHz | 550MHz | 400MHz |
| Max DRAM | 1GB | 1GB | 512MB (?) | 2GB |
| DRAM Type | LPDDR2 | LPDDR2 | LPDDR2 | LPDDR3 |
For optimal performance, the NAND address table requires about 1 MB of 1 GB DRAM of NAND flash memory. From an architectural point of view, increasing the DRAM controller's capacity is not a problem, but at the same time the cost of the device grows. Therefore, it is considered that SSD with a capacity of 2 TB will occupy a relatively small niche.
The MHX controller supports up to 2 GB of LPDDR3 memory, while the former MEX controller supports only 1 GB of LPDDR2 memory. The EVO series drives with a capacity of 120, 250 and 500 MB use a lightweight version of the MEX called MGX with two processing cores instead of three, but operating at a higher clock frequency.
The 850 EVO uses the same 32-layer 128-gigabit TLC V-NAND flash memory as the 850 EVO's smaller capacity, but the 850 PRO uses a new 128-gigabit 2-bit MLC backing.
Samsung 850 Pro: outside and inside.
The specifications for the 2TB 850 Pro drive are almost identical to its fellow 1 TB capacity. The performance is exactly the same, but the power consumption in DevSleep mode is slightly higher, which is explained by the presence of additional DRAM memory, despite the greater energy efficiency of LPDDR3 compared to LPDDR2. The only fundamental change in the 850 Pro is the transition to V-NAND.
The 850 Pro has the same SATA 6 Gb / s interface and MHX controller as the 840 EVO. Samsung has so far refrained from the release of PCIe SSD - this market is relatively small. The 850 Pro firmware is adapted to the characteristics of V-NAND.
Comparison of specifications Samsung 2TB SSD:
| Model | 850 PRO | 850 EVO |
| Controller | Samsung MHX | |
| NAND | Samsung 128 Gbps 40 nm MLC V-NAND | Samsung 128 Gbps 40 nm TLC V-NAND 32-layer |
| DRAM (LPDDR3) | 2 GB | |
| Sequential reading | 550 MB / s | 540 MB / s |
| Sequential write | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s |
| Arbitrary reading in blocks of 4 Kb | 100K IOPS | 98K IOPS |
| Random recording in blocks of 4KB | 90K IOPS | 90K IOPS |
| Nutrition | 5 mW (DevSLP) / 3.3 W (read) / 3.4 W (write) | 5 mW (DevSLP) / 3.7 W (read) / 4.7 W (write) |
| Encryption | AES-256, TCG Opal 2.0 & IEEE-1667 (eDrive supported) | |
| Warranty life | 300 TB | 150 TB |
| Warranty | 10 years | 5 years |
| Price | $ 1000 | $ 800 |
Memory in the 850 Pro is still used 32-layer, that is, Samsung has increased capacity with the same process technology. This simplifies production and gives better performance with small containers. Samsung has brought the estimated amount of data - the resource of drives in this series - up to 300 TB, and the warranty is extended to 10 years.
Specifications models of the line of Samsung SSD 850 Pro
| Capacity | 128 GB | 256 GB | 512 GB | 1 TB | 2 TB |
| Controller | MEX | Mhx | |||
| NAND | 32-layer memory Samsung MLC V-NAND | ||||
| NAND layer capacity | 86 Gbps | 128 Gbps | |||
| DRAM | 256 MB | 512 MB | 512 MB | 1 GB | 2 GB |
| Sequential reading | 550 MB / s | 550 MB / s | 550 MB / s | 550 MB / s | 550 MB / s |
| Sequential write | 470 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s |
| Arbitrary reading in blocks of 4 Kb | 100K IOPS | 100K IOPS | 100K IOPS | 100K IOPS | 100K IOPS |
| Random recording in blocks of 4KB | 90K IOPS | 90K IOPS | 90K IOPS | 90K IOPS | 90K IOPS |
| DevSleep Power | 2 mW | 5 mW | |||
| Power in Slumber mode | Max 60 mW | ||||
| Active power (read / write) | Max 3.3 W / 3.4 W | ||||
| Encryption | AES-256, TCG Opal 2.0 & IEEE-1667 (eDrive supported) | ||||
| Drive Warranty Resource | 150 TB | 300 TB | |||
| Warranty | 10 years | ||||
The performance of the 850 Pro V-NAND flash memory has a high write speed that exceeds the performance of the SATA 6 Gbps bus. Another quality is durability. For all capacities, excluding 128 GB, the warranty resource is 150 TB. With a typical load, such a resource means a long SSD service life - more than 56 years with a capacity of 1 TB.
However, the model 850 Pro is distinguished from the more expensive enterprise-level drives by the lack of protection against power failure and comprehensive data protection.
Unlike many manufacturers, Samsung independently produces all the components of its SSD-drives. In particular, it uses a home-made processor, while most vendors are content with the popular SandForce or Marvell models. The result is a high reliability, efficiency and coherence of all components of the drive.
Like the 2TB Pro version, the EVO drive has performance parameters similar to those with 1TB capacity, but the higher power consumption is due to the increased NAND and DRAM memory capacities. From 2TB Pro, this drive is distinguished by the use of TLC V-NAND memory, which is more economical in production: storing three bits in one cell instead of two gives a higher recording density. The user has access to 2000 Gbps of capacity - 48 Gbps less than in 2TB 850 Pro. Part of the NAND memory is allocated to the cache Turbo Write SLC. TLC memory also requires more storage capacity when writing to increase its durability.
Specifications of Samsung SSD 850 EVO:
| Capacity | 120 GB | 250 GB | 500 GB | 1 TB | 2 TB | |
| Controller | MGX | MEX | Mhx | |||
| NAND | Samsung 32-layer memory TLC V-NAND 128 GB | |||||
| DRAM | 256 MB | 512 MB | 1 GB | 2 GB | ||
| Sequential reading | 540 MB / s | 540 MB / s | 540 MB / s | 540 MB / s | 540 MB / s | |
| Sequential write | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s | 520 MB / s | |
| Arbitrary reading in blocks of 4 Kb | 94K IOPS | 97K IOPS | 98K IOPS | 98K IOPS | 98K IOPS | |
| Random recording in blocks of 4KB | 88K IOPS | 88K IOPS | 90K IOPS | 90K IOPS | 90K IOPS | |
| DevSleep Power | 2 mW | 2 mW | 2 mW | 4 mW | 5 mW | |
| Power in Slumber mode | 50 mW | 60 mW | ||||
| Active power (read / write) | Max 3.7 V / 4.4 V | 3.7 V / 4.7 V | ||||
| Encryption | AES-256, TCG Opal 2.0, IEEE-1667 (eDrive) | |||||
| Estimated data volume (storage resource) | 75 TB | 150 TB | ||||
| Warranty | 5 years | |||||
Compared to the 840 EVO series, the 850 EVO drives offer a 13% higher level of performance. They also provide high sequential read and write speeds of 540 and 520 MB / s, respectively.
Survival test
SSD drives of the 850 EVO series guarantee reliability and durability due to the doubling of the life cycle in comparison with the previous generation of drives of the 840 EVO series, which is confirmed by a five-year warranty on the devices. And given the average performance improvement (Sustained Performance) up to 30%, drives of this series become one of the most attractive storage solutions.
The warranty life of the 850 PRO SSDs is also twice as long as their predecessors - the 840 PRO series. Each cell of memory maintains 6 thousand cycles of rewriting. The recording resource for SSD 850 PRO with a capacity of 128-512 GB and EVO is 150 terabytes of data, that is, when writing to a 40 GB drive every day, the resource will be developed only after 10 years. And for 850 PRO drives with a capacity of 1 TB and 2 TB, it is 300 TB. To emphasize the reliability of the 850 PRO series drives, Samsung installs a 10-year warranty on the models of this series.
By the way, the exhaustion of the SSD resource does not mean a loss of warranty. Samsung conducted internal testing of the 128GB 850 PRO drive - it withstood the recording of 8 TB of data and continued to work. As shown by independent tests , the real “vitality” of the 1TB 850 PRO drive also exceeds expectations. Testers recorded 6 PbT of data on this SSD, and it worked fine. 3111 sectors failed and were redistributed. This is 53% of the pool, 47% is left, so the drive is quite lively. 9-day data storage with power off showed that everything is fine.
Peter Chayanov, Co-founder / CEO Hostkey.ru :For three years now we have been using Host SSD-drives of the Samsung Pro series in our servers of all capacities available on the market. In operation, we have several hundred SSD of this type of different series. For all this time there were only 2 cases of their failure and commissioning under warranty, only when rebuilding servers due to obvious power problems.
The use of such SSDs allows you to build servers with high-performance storage for little money. For example, a typical VPS node on SSDs avoids the use of a 12 disk array on SAS disks — we get the required capacity using a pair of 1TB SSDs and a pair of 3TB HDDs for online snapshot storage. This approach allows you to offer the price of mass services at the level of DigitalOcean and other international market leaders.
More and more administrators are redefining their attitude towards SSD - the early series quickly broke down, often without warning. We threw out almost all SSDs purchased in 2010-2012, they did not live. Modern drives are reliable, convenient and have a huge resource.
For example, our usual SSD node for 100 virtual machines writes about 2TB of data to disk (iostat / dev / sda 86400), i.e. the resource of its disks will be enough roughly for 13 years. Since the disks will be replaced after 3 years due to their obsolescence, their resource is redundant for this task. Yes, all VPS are replicated several times a day to hard drives of the same server and once a day to external storage.
In the online server configurator on our website, you can choose any combination of SSD and HDD media - from 128 to 1TB SSD and HDD from 500 to 8TB, including traditional SAS-disks on 600GB 15K. Available for rent servers from 2 to 24 disks and more on the most modern controllers from LSI.
What's next?
The development of SSD is considered a very promising direction. Currently, an active process is underway to optimize the functions and reduce the price of solid-state drives in order to make the use of SSDs massive. Their capacity is growing.
In August, at the Flash Memory Summit conference in California, Samsung introduced the most capacious SSD drive in the world. The 2.5-inch form factor can store 16 terabytes of data. And this is despite the fact that the capacity of traditional HDD hard drives now does not exceed 10 TB. Samsung was able to achieve this capacity thanks to the 256-gigabit V-NAND 3D flash memory with 48 three-bit TLC layers.
Gartner analysts predict a gradual convergence of the cost of storage (dollar / GB) SSD drives and HDD. By 2017, they are almost equal.
If the progress in the development of SSD-drives will continue at this pace, then after a few years hard HDDs are unlikely to be able to compete with them. True, for this you need to significantly reduce the price of SSD. According to analysts, there are two years to wait.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/265803/
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