Form factor U.2 - the inevitable future

Hi, Giktayms! Logical interface and form factor. The two concepts are so closely intertwined that confusion arises with frightening regularity. I'll throw firewood in the fire of the Inquisition and tell you about the “conditionally new” form factor U.2 - almost everything you wanted to know, but were afraid to ask.



First, U.2 is a physical form factor, and it does not affect the data transfer rate directly. Secondly, attentive and experienced IT specialist will certainly note the similarity with SAS disks - the same 2.5 inches, the same thickness - 15 mm. Yes, and the connector is suspiciously similar, albeit with other numbers - SFF-8639 instead of SFF-8482.


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Each U.2 slot can use four PCI-E 3.0 lanes, that is, the maximum transfer rate can reach 4 GB / s.

Attention, question. Why invent something new when all this already exists and is called SAS? Here other letters come into force - NVMe (Non-Volatile Memory Host Controller Interface Specification) - a logical interface, much faster than SATA and specially designed for access to solid-state drives.



The power of the PCI-E lines did not give rest to the manufacturers of drives, but the number of PCI-E slots on motherboards (server and desktop), of course, and to occupy all the slots that are in the 1U package only drives are criminal. The form factor U.2 does not occupy expansion slots, but is installed instead of conventional drives.
All U.2 drives support hot swapping, which is also extremely difficult to implement with a PCI-E drive.

The possibilities of building storage systems are simply admirable - imagine - the SuperMicro company manufactured the 2U chassis for 48 NVMe U.2 drives.

And why is all this for ordinary people? And what's the difference - M.2 or U.2?

Let me remind you that SATA (the most common and familiar) has a maximum bandwidth of 600 MB / s. Taking into account any inaccuracies and transmission of service data, about 550-560 MB / s remain, and this is the speed limit for modern consumer drives. Since SATA does not use PCI-E lanes, the operating speed is significantly lower than that of NVMe.



Prosperous enthusiasts will say, but the lines are non-rubber, the Titans ate everything for us! And they will be right, but in part. The lines for graphics cards and the lines for storage devices are separated and therefore even the most multi-core graphics configuration will not suffer from the connection of a U.2 SSD drive.

Many motherboard manufacturers even began to add adapters from M.2 to U.2 even in a set to top-end products - so that you can connect super-fast new drives even if there is no connector on the board.



By the way, remember SATA-Express? With him most likely have to leave. Half the bandwidth, the complete absence of drives with such an interface on the market. The choice of manufacturers made in favor of M.2 and U.2, it is for such form factors, the future of solid state drives.

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