SilverStone unveiled a new addition to its expansion card with the ECM40 PCIe 4.0 x16 to 4x M.2 NVMe SSD adapter card. This device supports 4x M.2 SSDs (M Key) in 2230, 2242, 2260, and 2280 form factors. The expansion card comes in a single slot format measuring 147.74 x 181 x 21.59 mm and is equipped with a 40 mm dual ball-bearing fan spinning at 7000 RPM to ensure better cooling of the SSDs. The fan can be turned on and off using the included power switch. A two-mode LED indicator provides additional operating status based on signals from the motherboard and SSD. The top cover is made from aluminium and acts as a radiator to dissipate heat. Moreover, thermal pads are included.

In terms of performance, the SilverStone product page informs us that the ECM40 is capable of achieving speeds up to 7,351 MB/s for continuous reads and up to 6,845 MB/s for write speed. These results were achieved using Kingston Fury 2T SSDs on a system built around an ASRock X570 Pro4 motherboard, with an AMD R9 5900X CPU and Micron Crucial DDR4 2133/8G (4Gx2) memory modules. The motherboard or add-on card must support PCIe bifurcation, allowing the PCIe x16/x8 slot to be split into 4x4 or 4x2 configurations. Currently, there is no information about pricing.

Infortrend Technology, Inc., the industry-leading enterprise storage provider, introduces the latest additions to its high-density 4U 90-bay HDD solutions: unified storage EonStor GS 5090 and expansion enclosure JB 4090. The large capacity and high throughput performance of the solutions make them ideal for applications like High-Performance Computing and Media & Entertainment.

EonStor GS 5090 is a high-availability unified storage solution with a dual redundant controller design, ensuring uninterrupted operation. With its new hardware powered by the Intel Xeon Scalable Processor, the GS 5090 delivers ultra-high performance, achieving 45 GB/s read and 20 GB/s write—around three times the performance of the previous top-performing model, the GS 4090. The GS 5090 introduces ultra-fast 200GbE connectivity, setting a new benchmark for data transfer speed while simplifying deployment and management to meet the demands of today's high-performance enterprise workloads. It also supports SAS 24G expansion, doubling throughput compared to SAS 12G. Additionally, the GS 5090 features four dedicated U.2 NVMe SSD slots for cache, providing fast data access while fully leveraging the ample capacity of its 90-bay storage.

Struggling to balance space, performance, and thermal management in compact industrial platforms? The new Cervoz T445 M.2 2280 NVMe PCIe Gen 4x4 SSD delivers with its space-saving single-sided design, high-speed capabilities, and wide temperature resilience. Ideal for IoT gateways, industrial tablets, and automation systems. Ready to elevate your storage solution? Discover how the T445 drives efficiency in demanding industrial environments.

Single-Sided Design for Space-Limited Environments
One of the standout features of the T445 is its single-sided design, making it especially suited for space-constrained systems. By consolidating critical components like the NAND flash, controller, and power management IC on one side, it optimizes space efficiency and improves thermal management for better airflow and heat dissipation. This design is particularly important for fanless systems and compact environments, ensuring reliable performance even in extreme conditions. With a slim profile—single-sided design that reduces height by 1.35 mm compared to dual-sided models—the T445 is engineered for easy installation in tight industrial setups, providing high efficiency without compromising durability or speed.

Micron at the 2025 International CES showed us product that hint at the company planning a strong comeback to the client and PC-DIY market segments. The company's Crucial brand is already a high-volume player in the client segment, but the company never really approached the enthusiast segment. Products like the company's new T705 Pro and P510 NVMe SSDs, and DDR5 Pro Overclocking memory, seek to change this. We begin our tour with PC memory, and the DDR5 Pro OC CUDIMMs. Crucial has jumped onto the CKD bandwagon, introducing memory modules and kits that come with DDR5-6400 out of the box, but which are geared for manual overclocking to take advantage of the 1β DRAM chips underneath (hence the name).

The company also showed us their first DDR5 CSODIMM suitable for the next generation of notebooks with HX-segment processors. This module comes with a CKD and a DDR5-6400 JEDEC-standard SPD profile out of the box. Lastly, there's the Micron-branded LPCAMM2, which comes in speeds of up to LPDDR5X-8533, and is suitable for the next generation of ultraportables.

ADATA brought some innovative storage products to the 2025 International CES. The XPG MARS 970 Storm is an M.2 NVMe Gen 5 SSD with a self-contained liquid cooling loop. Its construction involves a baseplate from which heat is conventionally transferred to a cylindrical heat dissipation surface—a sort of radiator, where a pair of tiny 20 mm fans push and pull air through, to keep the controller cool. Speaking of which, the drive is based on the Silicon Motion SM2508 flagship controller that's built on the TSMC 6 nm process. It comes in capacities of up to 8 TB. ADATA claims sequential transfer speeds of up to 14 GB/s reads, with up to 12 GB/s writes.

You can have this drive without this cooling solution (eg: if you have a nice one of your own from your motherboard). It's called the MARS 970 Blade. It can be used without a cooler, but performance will be lesser. ADATA hence advertises sequential speeds of up to 12 GB/s reads, with up to 10 GB/s writes. The MARS 970 Blade strangely only comes in capacities of up to 4 TB—there's no 8 TB variant.

InWin has showcased several new server chassis models at CES—these new introductions form part of the company's efforts to expand regional IPC, server, and systems assembly operations going into 2025. New manufacturing facilities in the USA and Malaysia were brought online last year, and new products have sprung forth. TechPowerUp staffers were impressed by InWin's RG650B model—this cavernous rackmount GPU server has been designed with AI and HPC applications in mind. Its 6.5U dual-chamber design is divided into two sections with optimized and independent heat dissipation systems—GPU accelerators are destined for the 4.5U space, while the motherboard and CPUs go into the 2U chamber.

The RG650B's front section is dominated by the nine pre-installed hot swappable 80 x 30 mm (12,000 RPM max. rated) PWM fans. This array should provide plenty of cooling for any contained hardware; these components will be powered by an 80 Plus Titanium CRPS 3200 W PSU (with four 12V-2x6 pin connectors). InWin's spec sheet states that their RG650B supports 18 FHFL PCI-Express slots with four PCI-Express riser cables—granting plenty of potential for the installation of add-in boards.

Today marks the launch of the new ASUS Vivobook Pro 15 (N6506CU), the latest version of this high-performance 15.6-inch laptop designed for pro creators and pro gamers.

ASUS Vivobook Pro 15 offers seamless creativity and gaming with cutting-edge components: up to the latest Intel Core Ultra 9 processor (Series 2) with a built-in 13 TOPS NPU, NVIDIA GeForce RTX 4050 GPU with a low-latency MUX switch, 24 GB DDR5 RAM, and a 2 TB PCIe SSD. It boasts advanced ASUS IceCool Pro cooling technology that enables up to a 125-watt combined thermal design power (TDP).

Micron Technology, Inc., today announced expansions across its Crucial consumer memory and storage portfolio, including unveiling the high-speed Crucial P510 SSD, and expanding density and form factor options across its existing DRAM portfolio to enable broader choice and flexibility for consumers. The P510 features read and write speeds of up to 11,000/9,550 megabytes per second (MB/s), bringing blazing fast Gen 5 performance to the masses.

"With the exciting memory and storage offerings we're debuting today, Crucial's portfolio is now broader and stronger than ever before," said Dinesh Bahal, corporate vice president and general manager of Micron's Commercial Products Group. "These updates - from making fast Gen 5 SSDs available to the mainstream to launching high-density memory options - illustrate our commitment to driving innovation, performance and value for every consumer from casual gamers to creatives and students to hardcore enthusiasts."

Graid Technology, the global leader in innovative storage performance solutions, is proud to announce the launch of SupremeRAID AE (AI Edition), the most resilient RAID data protection solution for enterprises leveraging GPU servers and AI workloads. Featuring GPUDirect Storage support and an intelligent data offload engine, SupremeRAID AE redefines how AI applications manage data, delivering unmatched performance, flexibility, and efficiency.

SupremeRAID AE's cutting-edge technology empowers organizations to accelerate AI workflows by reducing data access latency and increasing I/O efficiency, while protecting mission-critical datasets with enterprise-grade reliability. Its seamless scalability enables enterprises to meet future AI demands without overhauling existing infrastructure. Designed for a wide range of users, SupremeRAID AE benefits AI/ML teams by delivering faster training and inference for data-intensive models, enterprises with GPU servers by optimizing GPU performance for critical workloads, and data scientists and researchers by providing seamless access to vast datasets without bottlenecks. IT teams also gain resilient, scalable RAID storage that integrates effortlessly into existing systems without requiring additional hardware.

The Cooling X Pro from Cooler Master is a case designed for the "cooling defined build," a high-end PC build where the primary focus is on high-performance liquid cooling of the CPU, GPU, and NVMe SSD. The case reimagines the layout of key components in the build, such as positioning the PSU toward the front, putting the CPU and VGA under a proprietary liquid cooling solution, and using a large, common square 360 mm x 360 mm radiator to dissipate heat from both. This is ventilated by four 180 mm fans.

Besides this unique cooling solution, the Cooling X Pro appears to feature an aluminium inner chassis similar to the MasterFrame Aluminium series that the company also showcased this year. The various panels aren't as modular, the one facing the left side is a curved tempered glass. The right probably features a coarse mesh panel to let the 360 mm x 360 mm radiator breathe.

NVIDIA today unveiled NVIDIA Project DIGITS, a personal AI supercomputer that provides AI researchers, data scientists and students worldwide with access to the power of the NVIDIA Grace Blackwell platform. Project DIGITS features the new NVIDIA GB10 Grace Blackwell Superchip, offering a petaflop of AI computing performance for prototyping, fine-tuning and running large AI models.

With Project DIGITS, users can develop and run inference on models using their own desktop system, then seamlessly deploy the models on accelerated cloud or data center infrastructure. "AI will be mainstream in every application for every industry. With Project DIGITS, the Grace Blackwell Superchip comes to millions of developers," said Jensen Huang, founder and CEO of NVIDIA. "Placing an AI supercomputer on the desks of every data scientist, AI researcher and student empowers them to engage and shape the age of AI."

Acer today launched the new Nitro Blaze 8 and Nitro Blaze 11 handheld gaming devices, designed to elevate mobile gaming experiences with cutting-edge performance and versatile features. Powered by AMD Ryzen 7 8840HS processors, 16 GB of LPDDR5X memory, and up to 2 TB of storage, the Nitro Blaze series boasts lightning-fast performance and responsiveness. Their WQXGA touch panels (8.8-inch or 10.95-inch) featuring Radeon Super Resolution and AMD FidelityFX Super Resolution technology, ensure fluid image quality. The dedicated Acer Game Space application simplifies managing and accessing popular games and applications on handheld gaming PCs.

The new Nitro Mobile Gaming Controller enhances the mobile gaming experience by enabling users to game anywhere and anytime with its foldable design. It supports fast charging to allow uninterrupted gaming sessions while powering mobile devices quickly.

Alienware is reintroducing the iconic Area-51 back into the family, reanimated in desktop and laptop forms. Deep lore underpins Area-51, dating back to 1998. While the design, technology and gameplay have evolved significantly from iteration to iteration, one fact has remained the same: Area-51 represents the best that Alienware offers. Reclaiming its position as the ultimate gaming experience, the new Area-51 Desktop debut an arsenal of cutting-edge features -- including next-gen NVIDIA graphics - to power the next generation of AAA gameplay.

ALIENWARE AREA-51 DESKTOP
Area-51 Desktop makes a bold entrance to retake the throne as Alienware's flagship gaming PC. With this edition, we are returning to our roots with a machine that caters to the desires of PC gaming enthusiasts and longtime Alienware fans who have a deep appreciation for technology and a can-do attitude for manually customizing their build to their needs. It is an icon that honors the wishes of all gamers seeking unyielding performance and the ability to make serious upgrades for years to come.

AMD today announced the Ryzen 9 9000HX and 9000HX3D line of mobile processors targeting enthusiast-segment gaming notebooks and portable workstations. These chips compete in the same market-segment as the Intel Core Ultra 200HX series. Codenamed "Fire Range," and powered by the "Zen 5" microarchitecture, the chip succeeds the "Zen 4" based "Dragon Range." This is essentially a thin BGA package of the desktop "Granite Ridge" chiplet-based processor, just the way "Dragon Range" relates to "Raphael." The chip has two "Zen 5" CCDs with full-sized "Zen 5" cores that are geared for high clock speeds, and have the full hardware FP implementation for AVX512, unlike the "Zen 5" cores on the "Strix Point" mobile processor.

AMD has, curiously, skipped single-CCD variants of "Fire Range," there are no Ryzen 7 9000HX models being announced today. There are just three processor-models—the Ryzen 9 9955HX3D, the Ryzen 9 9955HX, and the Ryzen 9 9850HX. The 9955HX3D is AMD's flagship mobile processor for gaming notebooks. It features a 16-core/32-thread configuration, and features 3D V-Cache memory on one of the two CCDs. The chip hence comes with 144 MB of "total cache" (L2 + L3). It ticks at 2.50 GHz base frequency, and can boost up to 5.40 GHz for the CCD with 3D V-Cache. It comes with a configurable TDP range of 55 W and 75 W. There is no NPU, but the client I/O die puts out a boatload of I/O that includes 28 PCIe Gen 5 lane, from which 24 are usable, so the discrete GPU has a PCI-Express 5.0 x16 connection, besides two M.2 NVMe Gen 5 connections directly from the processor.

ASMedia Technology Inc., a leading provider of high-speed transmission interface ICs, showcased its latest innovations at CES 2025, focusing on USB4, Thunderbolt 4, and PCIe Gen 4 Switch technologies. These new technologies can be used in many different applications such as consumer electronics, AI, HPC, and industrial computing.

Key highlights include:

• PCIe Gen 4 Switch ASM58000 Series: This low-power, cost-effective solution offers high bandwidth (up to 16 Gbps per lane), ideal for servers, edge computing, NAS, surveillance storage, and industrial PCs. It excels in demanding applications like AI, ML, and HPC.
• USB4 ASM2464PDX with AI Enhancements: The USB4 device controller ASM2464PDX empowers PCs with enhanced AI capabilities. By leveraging USB4 and PCIe, it enables seamless external GPU connectivity for AI tasks, gaming, and content creation.
• Comprehensive USB4 Solutions: ASMedia demonstrated a complete range of USB4 solutions, including host, device, and peripheral controllers, ensuring optimal compatibility and backward compatibility with Thunderbolt 3/4 and legacy USB standards.

The ASUS ROG Apex brand extension is reserved for motherboards with the best CPU and memory overclocking capabilities. Since Intel processors tended to overclock better than AMD, Apex remained confined to the Intel platform, until now. ASUS at CES showed off the ROG Crosshair X870E Apex, the first AMD platform motherboard to feature this brand extension. The board features a powerful CPU VRM solution meant for sub-zero overclocking of Ryzen 9000X3D processors that are fully capable of overclocking. It also comes with a 1 DIMM-per-channel memory topology, with just two DDR5 DIMM slots. 1DPC is the most optimal dual-channel topology for memory overclocking.

The topmost M.2 Gen 5 NVMe slot features an elaborate fan-heatsink solution. Right next to the two DDR5 DIMM slots, is a breakout DIMM.2 module that provides additional M.2 NVMe slots. There are a couple of more Gen 4 NVMe slots scattered across the board. The board features an I/O feature-set that's at least as good as the ROG Crosshair X870E Hero. The board draws power from two 8-pin EPS, a 24-pin ATX, and an additional 8-pin PCIe power input. The board is packed to the gills with features professional overclockers would look for, including onboard buttons, diagnostic readouts, a hydrophobic PCB surface treatment, dual-BIOS, and clearly labelled voltage domains.

A South Korean online retailer has listed Huawei's eKitStore Extreme 200E M.2 NVMe SSD for sale at 47,500 Won ($32) for the 1 TB model. This marks Huawei's entry into consumer storage products after previously only manufacturing server SSDs. The PCIe 4.0 drive's specifications show read speeds of 7,400 MB/s and write speeds of 6,700 MB/s. Beyond confirming the use of QLC memory without a DRAM cache, Huawei has not disclosed the drive's internal components. Due to trade restrictions, both the controller and memory chips likely come from Chinese manufacturers, though specific suppliers remain unknown. Chinese makers have been recorded to use Silicon Motion's SSD controllers, but domestic controllers are also an option here.

Manufacturing costs for similar drives typically exceed $32, raising questions about the pricing strategy. The drive's components could match those used in other brands' SSDs, as multiple storage companies often use identical parts in their products. For NAND Flash, Huawei likely sourced its chips from YMTC, whose Xtacking 4.0 proves to be quite a success. The drive has appeared only at one retailer so far, and Huawei has not announced plans for sales in other regions. This price is notably lower than comparable PCIe 4.0 drives. Common retail prices for 1 TB PCIe 4.0 SSDs are typically more than double this amount. Whether this represents a temporary price or a long-term strategy remains unclear. Perhaps Huawei is operating at a net loss to gain some customers, with possible plans for more SSDs in the future, along with the PCIe 5.0 version.

Patriot Memory today announced the launch of the P400 V4, a high-performance PCIe Gen 4 x4 M.2 SSD that delivers exceptional speeds of up to 6,200 MB/s read and 5,200 MB/s write. This versatile storage solution is optimized for both PC and PlayStation 5 platforms, offering gamers and content creators unprecedented performance and reliability.

The P400 V4 leverages cutting-edge PCIe Gen 4 x4 NVMe technology to provide lightning-fast data transfer speeds while maintaining efficient power consumption. On the PlayStation 5, the drive achieves impressive sequential read speeds of up to 6,000 MB/s, ensuring quick load times and smooth gameplay across all gaming platforms.

Here are some of the first pictures of ASRock's upcoming Live Mixer series motherboards based on mid-range chipsets from AMD and Intel. The Live Mixer brand of motherboards has a similar positioning in ASRock's product stack as Steel Legend, but with a variation in product design, and a mid-range onboard audio solution that uses audio codecs such as the ALC1200 or ALC4080. There's nothing that particularly stands out in this audio solution (no fancy amp circuits or exotic I/O). The B850 Live Mixer Wi-Fi is an ATX board based on the AMD B850 chipset. This is essentially a re-brand of the popular B650, but with out-of-the-box support for the latest Ryzen 9000 series processors, including the 9000X3D series. The board offers three M.2 NVMe slots, one of which is Gen 5, and the others Gen 4. The WLAN solution is very likely Wi-Fi 6E.

Next up, is the ASRock B860 Live Mixer Wi-Fi. This Socket LGA1851 motherboard is based on Intel's mid-range chipset for its "Arrow Lake" processors, the Intel B860. Much like the previous generation B760, it is expected to lack CPU overclocking support. This board visually looks a lot similar to its AMD B850-based sibling, you could almost confuse the two if you're not looking at the CPU socket. You get three M.2 NVMe slots here, too; one of which is Gen 5, and doesn't eat into the x16 PEG slot. We expect this board to offer Wi-Fi 6E, just like the B850 Live Mixer Wi-Fi. Lastly, there's the B860M Live Mixer Wi-Fi, a Micro-ATX variant of this board, with mostly the same feature-set, it's just that the third M.2 slot is without a heatsink; and the second PCIe slot is physically x8 instead of x16, which shouldn't matter since the slot is likely electrical x4 on both motherboard models. Intel and AMD are expected to debut the B850 and B860 in January.

Intel Arc board partner MAXSUN earlier this month announced that it is working on an Arc B580 custom-design graphics card with two M.2 Gen 4 NVMe slots on the card, so you can utilize the unused 8 lanes from the x16 PEG slot to connect a pair of SSDs, since the B580 makes do with a PCIe Gen 4 x8 host interface. In the previous report, we were shown renders of what the card could look like—with two M.2 slots sticking out from the tail of the PCB, with an aluminium heatsink that cools the SSDs under airflow from the second- and third fans. We now have the first picture of this PCB in the flesh.

A Tom's Hardware report reveals the first picture of this contraption, thanks to a leak on Chinese social media. The picture reveals what looks like an 18 cm-long PCB, with two M.2 Gen 4 slots at the tail end. One can make out PCIe interface traces making their way from the x16 PEG interface to the M.2 slots. You can make out the key components of the card, including the "BMG-G21" ASIC, wired to six GDDR6 memory chips, and a 6-phase VRM. The card draws power from two 8-pin PCIe power connectors. The second 8-pin connector might prove useful in managing the card's power budget, given that the B580 comes with a power limit of 190 W, and the M.2 Gen 4 SSDs each have a peak power draw of around 10 W. This wouldn't be the first time someone decided to put M.2 slots on graphics cards; the ASUS DUAL GeForce RTX 4060 Ti SSD OC introduced this concept, but with just one M.2 slot.

Silicon Power (SP) is excited to announce the launch of its first M.2 PCIe 2230 E-Key SSD, the MEM3K0E, further solidifying its commitment to delivering innovative and versatile solutions for the growing demands of artificial intelligence (AI) and edge computing applications. With the introduction of this compact form factor, the company provides developers with more options to optimize system configurations while empowering next-generation AI technologies.

An Optimized Cache and Buffer Solution
Compliant to the PCIe 3.1 standard and NVMe 1.4 protocol, the MEM3K0E is specifically designed for devices equipped with E-Key slots, making it an ideal cache and buffer storage solution to complement M-Key slot primary drives. Its chief role is to maintain stable system performance by balancing the workload during resource-intensive tasks, which it achieves with features such as a thermal throttling function and built-in voltage detector. With storage capacity options of 64 GB, 128 GB, 256 GB, and 512 GB, the MEM3K0E offers scalability for various applications, ranging from compact embedded systems to high-performance computing environments.

Crucial has reportedly discontinued the MX500 line of SATA SSDs after nearly 7 years of market presence. The MX500 is arguably the most popular line of SATA 6 Gbps SSDs, and comes in both the 2.5-inch and M.2-SATA form-factors. The drive continued its run into 2020s given its extremely low price-per-GB, and reasonable levels of performance to serve as a warm storage solution in client PCs. The market is changing, with the advent of cheap QLC NAND NVMe SSDs, an increase in the number of NVMe slots on today's motherboards, and a reduction in SATA ports, which mean that it is time for Crucial to retire the MX500. The MX500 is still in stock with retailers, and comes in capacities of up to a respectable 4 TB, although at prices similar to NVMe Gen 3 or Gen 4 drives based on QLC NAND, such as Crucial's own P3 Plus. The 4 TB variant of the P3 Plus Gen 4 NVMe SSD in fact costs less than the 4 TB MX500, but with significantly higher performance.

Although it was revealed back in March this year, SK hynix new Platinum P51 PCIe 5.0 has only just now launched in South Korea and the specs have been boosted since March. The official sequential read speed is now rated at 14.7 GB/s vs. 13.5 GB/s in March and likewise, the sequential write speed has increased to 13.4 GB/s from 11.5 GB/s. We're also looking at a random IOPS read speed of up to 2,300k and random write IOPS of up to 2,400k. This compares really favourably compared to Phison E26 based SSDs, especially the random IOPS are very impressive.

However, it's not all good news, as the endurance tops out at 1200 TBW on the 2 TB SKU, which is pretty much what every other modern SSD offers today and somewhat disappointing considering that we're looking at SK hynix 238 layer 3D TLC NAND here. The 2 TB SKU is also the largest size available for now and the Platinum P51 will also come in 1 TB and 500 GB flavours. Another not so great, is the 10 W power consumption, even though SK hynix claims it's industry leading, but we know that this isn't true, as the Silicon Motion SM2508 controller is more power efficient than that. The drive has already been quickly benchmarked by South Korean hardware site Quasar Zone and it delivers in terms of the claimed speeds from the manufacturer, at least according to the CrystalDiskMark numbers. No pricing has tipped up as yet, so we'll have to wait to see how competitive the drive will be in an already crowded market. However, it's worth keeping in mind that SK hynix tends to charge a premium for its SSDs over many of its competitors.

Update Dec 14th: The 2 TB SKU has a retail price of 473,000 Korean Won, which equals about US$330, making it prohibitively expensive at the moment, even compared to most other PCIe 5.0 SSDs on the market. The 1 TB SKU comes in at 279,000 Korean Won, or about US$195. The Korean prices include 10% VAT/sales tax.

PNY announced the addition of the CS2150 M.2 NVMe PCIe Gen 5 x4 SSD to its lineup of solid-state drives. The CS2150 leads the way in advanced storage technology, utilizing the NVMe PCIe Gen 5 x4 interface to achieve exceptional data transfer speeds. With sequential read speeds reaching up to 10,300 MB/s and write speeds up to 8,600 MB/s, this groundbreaking solution elevates computing performance to new heights. Perfect for professionals, tech enthusiasts, content creators, and anyone demanding top-tier storage performance, the CS2150 sets a new standard for speed and efficiency.

Enhanced Gameplay with Microsoft DirectStorage
PNY's CS2150 SSD harnesses the power of Microsoft DirectStorage, a revolutionary Windows 11 feature that accelerates game load times and enhances image quality. Combined with the legendary PNY XLR8 Gaming DDR5 DRAM and a high-performance graphics card like the PNY GeForce RTX 4080 SUPER 16 GB XLR8 Gaming VERTO EPIC-X RGB Overclocked Triple Fan, you'll enjoy faster load times and smoother gameplay, giving you more time to spend immersed in the world of gaming.

KIOXIA America, Inc. today announced that the cryptographic module used in KIOXIA CM7 Series PCIe 5.0 NVMe Enterprise SSDs has been validated to meet Federal Information Processing Standard (FIPS) 140-3, Level 2 for cryptographic modules.

The FIPS 140-3 standard specifies a set of security requirements of the Cryptographic Module Validation Program administered by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), used as a security metric for federal agencies to procure validated IT equipment. Companies and federal agencies may prefer or may now be required to deploy newer, more stringent government standards - which SSDs validated to FIPS 140-3 requirements would meet. Compared to the previous FIPS 140-2 requirements, 140-3 provides higher standards for SSDs, including a stronger authentication method and updated implementation guidance.