Mainstream PCIe 5.0 SSDs Only Expected in 2024

[watzupken]

Exactly. The fastest. PCI-E 4 drives only make a difference to someone doing large sequential file transfers a lot. ll the benchmarks show for real world usage for the vast majority of us, they make little difference over even a decent SATA SSD. Massive improvements in random ops is what we need.

SSD performance has stagnated for many years. The increase in sequential transfer rate is pointless to most consumers. The chase for higher and higher sequential speed is almost like those days where camera makers were chasing after higher megapixel count. Most people print 3R and 4R size photos, and don't need anything more than 12 megapixels. What matters most is the sensor size, which was stagnant. I feel SSDs needs improvement in terms of latency/ responsiveness, and increase in sequential transfer rate don't help.

 

[Tartaros]

To the degree that in most situations, there's no way of telling the difference between an old beater SATA SSD and a brand-new PCIe 4.0 NVMe drive. There is still tons left in the tank before we get around to needing faster interfaces due to this. The whole point is to make better use of what we already have. Turning that around and making it an argument for needing faster interfaces is entirely missing the point.

Well, I don't think it's bad either. I mean, if 5.0 is standarized sooner we might stop having chipsets with usb 2.0 at last, have way more usb 3.1 ports, maybe we will see a push for more nvme ports instead of the usual 2. I would give up sata entirely for more nvme if there is enough bandwith to power all those drives, not from a performance standpoint but from a space and less clutter on my pc.

 

[AusWolf]

SSD performance has stagnated for many years. The increase in sequential transfer rate is pointless to most consumers. The chase for higher and higher sequential speed is almost like those days where camera makers were chasing after higher megapixel count. Most people print 3R and 4R size photos, and don't need anything more than 12 megapixels. What matters most is the sensor size, which was stagnant. I feel SSDs needs improvement in terms of latency/ responsiveness, and increase in sequential transfer rate don't help.

What I think SSDs need improvement in is heat management. I don't mean all SSDs should come with gigantic heatsinks. What I mean is, controller and nand makers should design chips that can maintain reasonable transfer speeds and latencies during prolonged use. It's no use bragging about a 6-7000+ MB/s sequential read speed if the drive overheats while loading a modern game.

Well, I don't think it's bad either. I mean, if 5.0 is standarized sooner we might stop having chipsets with usb 2.0 at last, have way more usb 3.1 ports, maybe we will see a push for more nvme ports instead of the usual 2. I would give up sata entirely for more nvme if there is enough bandwith to power all those drives, not from a performance standpoint but from a space and less clutter on my pc.

As long as you have a few spare PCI-e slots, you can always use something like this.

 

[Valantar]

Well, I don't think it's bad either. I mean, if 5.0 is standarized sooner we might stop having chipsets with usb 2.0 at last, have way more usb 3.1 ports, maybe we will see a push for more nvme ports instead of the usual 2. I would give up sata entirely for more nvme if there is enough bandwith to power all those drives, not from a performance standpoint but from a space and less clutter on my pc.

IMO that's not something to wish for. USB 2.0 ports are all you need for most peripherals - keyboards, mice, controllers, DACs, speakers, microphones, most webcams, etc, so anything more for those inputs is a waste. And faster I/O is the main factor driving up motherboard prices, which is a strong argument for maintaining a decent selection of "old" inputs. Heck, there aren't really many devices on the market today that make use of fast USB speeds - most USB sticks are (much) slower than USB 3.0, most external SSDs are limited to 10Gbps, and the very few 20Gbps devices that exist typically only need those speeds in short bursts, being much slower in most usage. And the same is mostly true for internal I/O like PCIe. I don't think I know anyone who has an actual need for more than, at most, a couple of >5Gbps devices at any time, and mostly far less than that. I guess there are some people out there with massive needs for external flash storage, but those people are rare.

What a wholesale move to more current generation I/O would get us would mostly be much more expensive motherboards. We're already seeing this, and ditching USB 2.0 for even 3.0 would only exacerbate the issue further.

Heck, let's look at AMD B550 - AMD's mid-range chipset for going on two years. The CPUs deliver 4x 10G USB ports. The chipset delivers another 2x 10G, 2x 5G, and 6x 480M. That's 14 USB ports, the majority of which are high speed. Is there any realistic need for more than that? That can't be rectified by the OEM sticking another USB controller onto a PCIe lane from the chipset? I would say no. And if you somehow need more than that, and need a ton of 5G or higher devices connected at once? Accept that your needs are very niche and get a hub.

There is one potential major benefit of faster I/O that could counteract this cost hike - but one that will sadly never come to pass: lane reductions. PCIe 5.0 can deliver 3.0x4 speeds with a single lane, meaning we could quadruple our port counts with only the same increase in cost and complexity as a single 5.0x4 port. We can see this in the Xbox Series X/S, where they use two lanes of PCIe 4.0 for their drives, simplifying signalling while maintaining good drive speeds. This could deliver significant, real benefits to users (though admittedly most users have 1-2 storage devices and never upgrade them) through more ports at marginal cost increases, or lowering costs for the same port counts. But it won't happen. Why? Marketing and perception. Motherboards won't implement 5.0x1 NVMe ports because there won't be drives for them, and they'd perform poorly with 3.0x4 drives, cutting them to >1GB/s max speed. SSDs won't implement 5.0x1 interfaces because they'd perform badly in older motherboards, there'd be no motherboards matching the ports, and every reviewer in the universe would complain about the drive "leaving performance on the table." Reviewers would also complain if any motherboards implemented lower lane count m.2 slots. And most customers would balk at buying a seemingly cut-down drive, even if it is an entirely reasonable choice that is likely to perform well - because its core feature, its defining characteristic, would be "cut down". That doesn't sell.

Heck, with PCIe 5.0 across the board we could equip a motherboard with four ~3.5GB/s SSDs and a 3.0x16 equivalent GPU with just eight TX/RX pairs from the CPU. That's ridiculously low, and could make for small, cheap, efficient motherboards. Or you could add another four SSDs with twelve total TX/RX pairs. But because it would always be seen as "cut down", this will never come to market, outside of niche industrial applications and other made-to-order/appliance style equipment. Instead, we'll keep getting ever more expensive full lane count stuff that has no practical use, because "bigger number better". And that's a shame.

 

[trsttte]

IMO that's not something to wish for. USB 2.0 ports are all you need for most peripherals - keyboards, mice, controllers, DACs, speakers, microphones, most webcams, etc, so anything more for those inputs is a waste. And faster I/O is the main factor driving up motherboard prices, which is a strong argument for maintaining a decent selection of "old" inputs.

Not only is USB 2.0 all that's necessary for peripherals it's also in a lot of cases the best option and preferable because of the higher noise generated by USB 3.0+ that interferes with 2.4ghz dongles, zigbee devices and others.

 

[Valantar]

Not only is USB 2.0 all that's necessary for peripherals it's also in a lot of cases the best option and preferable because of the higher noise generated by USB 3.0+ that interferes with 2.4ghz dongles, zigbee devices and others.

Yeah, that interference can be hell on WiFi and even wireless peripherals. I've had far, far too many issues with plugging in a USB 3.0 thumb drive or similar next to a mouse/keyboard dongle.