Intel Announces Optane 800p Series M.2 NVMe Cache SSD

[btarunr]

Intel today announced the Optane 800p series M.2 NVMe cache SSD. This series succeeds the original Optane Memory series, which came in 16 GB and 32 GB capacities. The new Optane 800p comes in 58 GB and 118 GB, and offers acceleration to a HDD or slower SSD-based machine, just like the original. It can also be used as a standalone SSD since it's big enough to hold an OS installation and some software. Intel also encourages buying two or more of these drives for NVMe RAID.

The drive is built in the M.2-2280 form-factor, and takes advantage of PCI-Express gen 3.0 x2 interface. Both the 58 GB and 118 GB variants have identical performance numbers from Intel: up to 1450 MB/s sequential reads, up to 640 MB/s sequential writes, up to 250,000 IOPS (8 GB span) random reads, and up to 145,000 IOPS (8 GB span) random writes. Endurance is where 3D XPoint memory begins to shine, both variants have their endurance rated at 365 TBW. Available now, the Optane 800p 58 GB is priced at USD $129.99, while the 118 GB variant goes for $199.99.



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[RH92]

Still not compatible with Ryzen as a cache solution , am i wrong ?

 

[btarunr]

Still not compatible with Ryzen as a cache solution , am i wrong ?

You are right. You can use it as standalone drive. But then for $129, you'd rather pick up a 960 EVO 250GB.

 

[newtekie1]

Still not compatible with Ryzen as a cache solution , am i wrong ?

The caching function is built into the chipset, not the drives. It has been a part of Intel chipsets for years now.

 

[HimymCZe]

Why this product exist is beyond my comprehension.
Whats the point of inventing product with sole purpose of speeding up old drives/PC, but its not compatible with anything older then 6 months?

 

[NC37]

The caching function is built into the chipset, not the drives. It has been a part of Intel chipsets for years now.

And doesn't have to be. There was SSD cache drives for years. I've still got a Synapse drive in use. Course I'm using it as a page file drive now, but it is still going strong.

SSD Caching is a much better solution to hybrid drives that seem to be questionable reliability and would save a lot of money over outright buying a full SSD. Trouble is, where it used to have no limits, now it's limited to the point you might as well just buy a full SSD. The makers of the caching software got bought up and their creation promptly killed.

Then the only ones left doing it is Intel and they want a premium to do it by imposing hardware limits which aren't necessary.

Just no win solution for consumers that keeps driving NAND prices up as people are forced to buy full SSD drives.

 

[Chaitanya]

Why this product exist is beyond my comprehension.
Whats the point of inventing product with sole purpose of speeding up old drives/PC, but its not compatible with anything older then 6 months?

It exists because: Intel. Events of last 12 months or have shown the worst of castrations of product lines(current HEDT and Optane consumer caching) from Intel to making biggest security **** ups(ME, Meltdown, Spectre, etc..) and somehow still people are buying their products. So logic behind this overpriced solution searching for problem(on consumer side in form of caching soln, enterprise solution is revolutionary) is Intel can castrate and cripple all they can and still people will empty their wallets for Intel.

 

[Prima.Vera]

Yeah, another completely useless product that in a couple of year will take the way of the dodo.

 

[RH92]

The caching function is built into the chipset, not the drives. It has been a part of Intel chipsets for years now.

My point was it makes litle sense for Intel to not allow Amd implement this function on X370/B350 chipsets since they are loosing potential customers . Then again i shouldn't be surprised since they made it only compatible with Kabylake and up wich is even more weird considering this product is supposed to target older configurations .

 

[dj-electric]

These don't exactly succeed the original Optane drives, as you can't do that closely with a product that's X2 the cost.
The 32GB version is still very relevant.

I do understand the confusion of people who haven't had the chance to experience Optane drives as HDD cache.

 

[bug]

Why this product exist is beyond my comprehension.
Whats the point of inventing product with sole purpose of speeding up old drives/PC, but its not compatible with anything older then 6 months?

Its sole purpose is not to speed up old PCs. This is an order of magnitude faster in QD1 random reads, which is flash's Achilles heel. They also beat flash at endurance, but that may or may not be of any importance to the home user. Sure, it's not big enough or cheap enough just yet. But then again, where were flash based SSDs two years after their introduction?

Also, this is compatible with anything that offers a M.2 NVMe port, but I won't let meaningless details get in the way of a good hating.

 

[Chaitanya]

Its sole purpose is not to speed up old PCs. This is an order of magnitude faster in QD1 random reads, which is flash's Achilles heel. They also beat flash at endurance, but that may or may not be of any importance to the home user. Sure, it's not big enough or cheap enough just yet. But then again, where were flash based SSDs two years after their introduction?

Also, this is compatible with anything that offers a M.2 NVMe port, but I won't let meaningless details get in the way of a good hating.

Optane for caching is only compatible with Intel 200 series motherboards or later. Also it is a overpriced and overglorified snake oil when it comes to speeding up ssds(even Sata ssds). You can get 250/500GB ssds for the price of this stupid thing maybe even a pair of drives in raid and get good peferormance rather than have a snake oil solution costing more than ssd itself.

Anandtech's review of 800p
https://www.anandtech.com/show/12512/the-intel-optane-ssd-800p-review/9

 

[jabbadap]

Yeah fairly good products, but bad prices. $199 for 118GB is awful lot of money, these ones have really stupidly high $/GB ratio... And where the hell is QuantX?

 

[bug]

Optane for caching is only compatible with Intel 200 series motherboards or later. Also it is a overpriced and overglorified snake oil when it comes to speeding up ssds(even Sata ssds). You can get 250/500GB ssds for the price of this stupid thing maybe even a pair of drives in raid and get good peferormance rather than have a snake oil solution costing more than ssd itself.

Anandtech's review of 800p
https://www.anandtech.com/show/12512/the-intel-optane-ssd-800p-review/9

Yes, it says right there: last year's Optane was aimed at caching, this year's Optane is beginning to make sense as a regular boot drive.

 

[newtekie1]

My point was it makes litle sense for Intel to not allow Amd implement this function on X370/B350 chipsets since they are loosing potential customers . Then again i shouldn't be surprised since they made it only compatible with Kabylake and up wich is even more weird considering this product is supposed to target older configurations .

If AMD wanted to add caching into their chipset, they would have by now. But AMD's current chipsets have a lot more problems that need to be addressed before AMD should be worrying about caching.

I do understand the confusion of people who haven't had the chance to experience Optane drives as HDD cache.

I've used it as an HDD cache, and it definitely does improve the responsiveness of the computer. However, it doesn't make much difference over just using a normal SATA SSD as a HDD cache, which has been available since like the 6 series chipsets. I've been setting computers up with this configuration for years. Even ones that have an SSD as the boot drive, I partition the boot drive and make a small partition that I use as a cache for the HDD in the system.

It just annoys me that Intel limits this to 64GB, when now they are allowing over 100GB with Optane. Their claim before was they didn't feel that over 64GB was worth it for caching, but obviously they've changed their mind. So why not unlock the size limit for regular SSD too?

 

[Chaitanya]

Yes, it says right there: last year's Optane was aimed at caching, this year's Optane is beginning to make sense as a regular boot drive.

Thats 900p which is aimed at replacing SSDs but this 800p still doesnt make sense especially 58GB drive is useless for desktop OS even 118GB is not useful for OS and you can get 250GB M.2 ssd either for lower price or spend 10-20$ extra and get 500GB M.2 ssd.

 

[bug]

Thats 900p which is aimed at replacing SSDs but this 800p still doesnt make sense especially 58GB drive is useless for desktop OS even 118GB is not useful for OS and you can get 250GB M.2 ssd either for lower price or spend 10-20$ extra and get 500GB M.2 ssd.

Did you completely miss the detail that this little thing destroys any SSD at your typical home usage pattern (4k random reads at low QD)?
Sure it's expensive, sure 118GB doesn't cut it for everyone (much less 58GB), but these do not make it a cache drive exclusively, that's all I'm saying.

 

[newtekie1]

Did you completely miss the detail that this little thing destroys any SSD at your typical home usage pattern (4k random reads at low QD)?
Sure it's expensive, sure 118GB doesn't cut it for everyone (much less 58GB), but these do not make it a cache drive exclusively, that's all I'm saying.

Your typical home user will never notice the difference between a 800p and a standard SATA SSD.

 

[bug]

Your typical home user will never notice the difference between a 800p and a standard SATA SSD.

I doubt that very much. With the increasing number od services that run in the background of modern operating systems, you don't have to do much to hit the storage limits.
All those times when you look at the screen waiting for an app and the CPU is not pegged at 100% usage, your system is doing I/O. I see that way more frequently than my system being held back by the CPU. And I only have a "measly" quad core.

I'm not saying Optane is going to make all that go away (obviously, sice I haven't tried one), but the general rule when optimizing the performance of a system is to determine which part is the slowest, how much is it being used and focus on that. The slowest part in a HDD-free system today is small, random reads for the flash. I do not see why I would fault a product that improves precisely on that. I mean, this product is in its infancy, it comes with its associated problems (and i've acknowledged that), but to say its only reason for existing os to be cache drive is "a little" out there.

 

[newtekie1]

I doubt that very much. With the increasing number od services that run in the background of modern operating systems, you don't have to do much to hit the storage limits.
All those times when you look at the screen waiting for an app and the CPU is not pegged at 100% usage, your system is doing I/O. I see that way more frequently than my system being held back by the CPU. And I only have a "measly" quad core.

I'm not saying Optane is going to make all that go away (obviously, sice I haven't tried one), but the general rule when optimizing the performance of a system is to determine which part is the slowest, how much is it being used and focus on that. The slowest part in a HDD-free system today is small, random reads for the flash. I do not see why I would fault a product that improves precisely on that. I mean, this product is in its infancy, it comes with its associated problems (and i've acknowledged that), but to say its only reason for existing os to be cache drive is "a little" out there.

What a typical home user does on their computer simply isn't going to be improved enough to notice with an 800p or even a 900p. The improvement over a SATA SSD is just not going to help the things that a typical user does. I mean, hell, I could barely notice the difference between a SATA SSD and a 900p...

Sure, the SATA SSD might be the limiting factor, but the delays it is causing are so small that making them smaller isn't noticeable to the typical user.

 

[Ferrum Master]

How come W1z didn't get one for review?

 

[jabbadap]

How come W1z didn't get one for review?

Well last time W1z asked 760p and got old 600p instead... Maybe W1z is just scared for what intel will send next time

 

[bug]

Well last time W1z asked 760p and got old 600p instead... Maybe W1z is just scared for what intel will send next time

Perfect time to ask for the 900p to get the 800p instead then?

 

[dyonoctis]

according to that yhea, it's faster, but not HDD to SSD faster. When they will sell 256Gb optane at 150 €, they will be worth picking up, but I don't think that they are ready to make people go all : "Dude ! ditch that samsung 960 evo and get dat sweet optane 800p ! you won't believe how fast your PC will become !"