Intel Optane SSD DC P4800X is the First SSD based on 3D Xpoint Technology

3D Xpoint – pronounced “3D cross point” – was introduced in 2015 with the promise of delivering a 1000 times boost in performance and durability compared to NAND flash, and a density that 10 times better than DRAM. The next year, expectations were lowered quite a bit, when Intel presented a comparison between a high performance “NAND” SSD and a 3X point SSD prototype showing 7.23 times higher IOPS performance. The company has now launched its first 3D Xpoint product with Optane SSD DC P4800X with 375GB capacity.

Optane SSD DC P4800X specifications:

• Capacity – 375GB
• Interface – PCIe 3.0 x4, NVMe
• Form Factor – Add-in-Card (AIC); Half-height, Half-length, Low-profile
• Latency (typical) R/W – <10μs
• Quality of Service (QoS)  99.999%
  • 4kB 5 Random Queue Depth 1, R/W: <60/100 μs
  • 4kB Random Queue Depth 16, R/W: <150/200 μs
• Throughput
  • IOPS Random 4kB R/W – Up to 550/500k
  • IOPS Random 4kB 70/30 Mixed R/W – Up to 500k
• Endurance
  • 30 Drive Writes per day (JESD219 workload)
  • 12.3 Petabytes Written (PBW)

Intel did not mention sequential throughput, that’s because Optane SSD are designed for specific datacenter applications where the important performance metrics are random I/Os, latency, QoS, and endurance.  It’s also possible to get the SSD with “Intel Memory Drive Technology” that integrates the drive into the memory subsystem and presents the SSD as DRAM to the operating system and applications.

Intel did not mention the price in the press release, but Anandtech reports the 375 GB model is selling for $1,520, which goes up to $1951 with Memory Drive support, and 750GB and 1.5 GB models are coming in respectively Q2 & H2 2017. All models with come with a 5-year warranty. More information should be available on Intel Optane SSD DC P4800X Series product page.

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