A Very Tiny Samsung PM971 M.2 NVMe SSD Spotted
I think we mentioned this PM971 M.2 NVMe SSD last year in the summer already, it now has surfaced again and not to be confused with the PM981 series we talked about last week.
The PM971 series NVMe SSDs are OEM targeted and would sit slightly below the PM981 in price and performance, lets call it an entry level NVMe SSD. You can also look at the unit as Samsung 970 series SSD. Have a look at the photo first (and be amazed by the size of it).
The PM971 has a B&M Type M2 connector and thus is PCIe Gen2 x2
The PM971 has been spotted over at Toms and is based on a very small 22mm x 16mm x 1.5mm multi-chip package. The controller, you guessed it ... Samsung's Proton controller is used with the LPDDR4 DRAM cache and 64-layer V-NAND flash all crammed into a single chip. So basically you are looking at a PCB with connector and a single chip. The 971 series should still be able to deliver up to 1,500 MB/s sequential read and up to 900 MB/s sequential write speeds, which is relatively slow for say a NVMe M2 unit, but of course seriously fast compared to a regular SATA3 SSD.
IOPS wise Samsung seems to do really well, at 190,000 IOPS read and 170,000 IOPS write (4K Random). Once the product becomes available you may expect 128 GB, 256 GB, and 512 GB models.
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Don Vito Corleone
Posts: 40653
Joined: 2000-02-22
Correct, I added that info in the article. To be precise, it is a B+M Type M.2 connector (fully compatible with any M2 slot) but thus is PCIe Gen2 x2 lanes.
Member
Posts: 20
Joined: 2014-04-18
So, would an SSD like this fit in the place I removed my WiFi card from my AB350N-Gaming? M.2's are still new to me. I have an M.2 M-Type in one slot with EVO NVMe 250GB. But if I wanted to throw more money into this MicroITX board, is this an option?
Senior Member
Posts: 785
Joined: 2014-09-22
Awesome, as soon as we have competetive budget m.2 drives, sata drives will go out the door.
I can't wait to see how fast the top 980 drive is though. I hope they have s 4gb model.
Senior Member
Posts: 257
Joined: 2017-02-16
Just FYI since I had to look it up, the two notches on the edge connector signify this is a PCIe x2 SSD, vs the single notch ones that are x4. That makes these excellent chips to go in those few z97 boards that had m.2 slots.