Intel is readying a fleet of new SSDs based on its new 3D XPoint non-volatile memory, a technology that Intel hopes will replace NAND flash in the years to come. The company developed this technology in collaboration with Micron Technology, under its IMFlash Technologies banner. The first Intel SSDs with this memory will be sold under the Optane brand. There are several sub-brands targeting the various market segments (client, enterprise, data-center, etc.), and technical slides of the data-center targeted Optane DC P4800X SSD were leaked to the web.

One of the first Optane DC P4800X SSDs comes in a rather measly capacity of 375 GB. The drive is built in the half-height PCI-Express add-on card (AIC) form-factor, with PCI-Express 3.0 x4 host interface. The drive belts out sequential transfer rates of up to 2400 MB/s reads, with up to 2000 MB/s writes, which may not sound like much given that even TLC NAND flash based PCIe 3.0 x4 drives offer higher transfer rates; until you look at three key metrics - latency, random-access performance, and endurance.

Super Talent introduced the SuperCache AIC314 PCI-Express SSD. Built in the half-height add-on card form-factor, with PCI-Express 3.0 x4 interface, the drive combines a Phison PS5007-E7 controller with MLC NAND flash memory, and comes in capacities of 480 GB, 960 GB, and 1920 GB. The drive takes advantage of the new NVMe protocol, and offers sequential transfer rates of up to 3000 MB/s reads, with up to 2200 MB/s writes; 340,000 IOPS 4K random reads, with up to 260,000 IOPS 4K random writes. The drives feature banks of capacitors that mitigate data loss to power outages. Super Talent is targeting enterprises with these drives.

SanDisk today announced the SkyHawk and SkyHawk Ultra lines of enterprise SSDs. Built in the 12 mm-thick 2.5-inch form-factor, the drives feature PCI-Express 3.0 x4 interface over U.2 or SATA-Express connections. The drives incorporate high-endurance 15 nm MLC NAND flash memory. The SkyHawk series includes 1920 GB and 3840 GB variants, and offer transfer speeds of up to 1500 MB/s reads, with up to 1700 MB/s writes; up to 250,000 IOPS 4K random reads, and up to 47,000 IOPS 4K random writes. Its MTBF is rated at 2 million hours, and it is backed by a 5-year warranty.

The more premium SkyHawk Ultra series comes in 1600 GB and 3200 GB variants, with sequential transfer speeds of up to 1700 MB/s reads, and up to 1200 MB/s writes, up to 250,000 IOPS random reads, with up to 83,000 IOPS random writes. These drives offer nearly triple the durability of the SkyHawk (standard) series, with 1.7 DWPD (vs. 0.6 DWPD of the SkyHawk standard); although their MTBF are rated the same, at 2 million hours, and are backed by the same 5-year product warranties.

QNAP Systems, Inc. today announced the new business-class TS-x31XU series rackmount NAS; available in 4, 8 and 12-bay models with single and redundant power supply options. Powered by an AnnapurnaLabs, an Amazon company Alpine AL-314 quad-core 1.7 GHz ARM Cortex-A15 CPU, the TS-x31XU features 2GB or 4GB DDR3 RAM (expandable to 16GB), includes two built-in 10GbE SFP+ ports, and supports the innovative VJBOD (Virtual JBOD) and Container Station, providing a high-performance, multifunctional and power-efficient storage solution.

Coupled with a hardware encryption engine and SSD cache support, the quad-core TS-x31XU series offers two 10GbE SFP+ ports that ensure top notch networking capabilities of up to 1,242 MB/s transfer speeds. An additional single-port 10GbE PCIe card can be installed for more flexible deployment. The TS-x31XU is ideal for small-and-medium businesses looking for backup, restoration, virtualization storage, private cloud, and to future-proof their IT infrastructure for 10GbE networks.

NVM Express, Inc., the organization that developed the NVM Express specification for accessing solid-state drives (SSDs) on a PCI Express (PCIe) bus, today announced the results of its recent board elections. Elected to Promoter positions were Facebook, Micron, Microsoft, Samsung, Seagate, Toshiba, and Western Digital. Facebook and Toshiba are new to the Promoter level, and the others are incumbents. The election winners join existing Promoters Cisco, Dell EMC, Intel, Microsemi, NetApp and Oracle, whose current terms expire at the end of 2017.

Representatives from the 13 Promoter companies form the NVM Express, Inc. Board of Directors, which governs the organization, including setting strategic direction. All Contributor and Promoter member companies are eligible to run for Promoter positions, where there are elections each year for roughly half the positions.

"We're very pleased to welcome Toshiba and Facebook to the NVM Express, Inc. Board, to help shape the future direction of NVM Express technology and the organization," said Amber Huffman, NVM Express President. "In 2016, we marked major milestones, such as publishing the NVM Express over Fabrics specification. We look forward to publishing revision 1.3 in the first half of this year - with much more to come later in 2017."

With its 200-series chipset motherboards, MSI introduced its exclusive M.2 Shield accessory on some of its more premium products. This aluminium heatspreader with a thermal pad, according to its makers, is designed to lower temperatures on M.2 SSDs, and reduce thermal throttling of performance. Tests by Gamers Nexus claim that far from reducing throttling, the M.2 Shield creates a "heat trap" that throttles performance further.

The M.2 Shield accessory was tested by Gamers Nexus using a Kingston HyperX Predator PCIe M.2 drive, on an MSI Z270 Gaming Pro Carbon motherboard. Driven by a Marvell 88SS9293 controller, the drive is known to heat up and lose performance to overheating. The data presented by the publication is Delta T (temperatures subtracting ambient temperature). MSI on its part, stands by the efficacy of the M.2 Shield accessory, and is sharing testing methods and data of its own with media sites. Tests by other publications such as Bit-Tech and KitGuru show positive results for the M.2 Shield.

Adding to their SSD lineup, Mushkin, which makes some really interesting, good price-performance ratio products has recently announced the upcoming availability of their Helix line of M.2 2280 SSDs. Based on Silicon Motion's SM2260 controller paired with 3D MLC NAND, Mushkin positions the Helix line as a premium, high-performance offering for desktops and laptops alike. Models will vary from a 250 GB entry-level offering thorugh a 2 TB high-end SKU, with the 2 TB version offering sequential read performance at up to 2.5 GB/s and write performance at up to 1.1 GB/s, when Silicon Motion's pseudo-SLC caching technology is used to its best effect.

The woes for the trusty old HDD continue, as Seagate, one of the world's biggest players on the HDD manufacturing field, has confirmed they are closing up one of their largest plants. The factory, located in Suzhou, China, is one of the company's largest HDD production epicenters, and its closure will significantly reduce the company's HDD output - a step in the company's purported "optimizations" towards reducing their HDD production capabilities from 55-60 million HDDs per quarter to around 35-40 million. Production and demand's age-old feud are once again taking their toll, as demand for spindle-drive technology subsides on the wake of SSDs increased performance and consecutive price declines, with most laptops now shipping with either SSD-based storage or cheaper, yet less power-hungry, eMMC solutions.

At CES 2017, Plextor announced their next SSD product line. Dubbed the M8Se, these will be restricted to NVMe SSDs with 15nm 3-bit-per-cell TLC of Toshiba manufacture, ranging from 128 GB, 256 GB, 512 GB and 1TB capacities leveraged by Marvell's Eldora controller.

The new mid-range NVMe SSD uses a new heatsink design (slight cost-reduction when compared with the one the M8Pe carries), that Plextor says will improve cooling by up to 20% - convenient, since throttling does happen with NVMe based SSDs - and particularly with Marvell's Eldora controller - as it did with Plextor's M8Pe line of SSDs. The card also features blue accent lighting. Plextor will also sell a heatsink-less M8PeGN model in the M.2 form factor.

At CES 2017, ECS showcased a number of ultra-compact form-factor PCs. basically building upon their previous LIVA family releases, the new LIVA feature either Intel's Apollo Lake SoCs (with Celeron Processors N3350 / N3450 / N4200 and 6 W TDP) on the Z and ZE, or Intel's Kaby Lake-U processors (Intel Core i3-7100U / i5-7200U / i7-7500U and 15W TDP) on the Z Plus.

The Z Plus is obviously the most powerful of the lot, supporting DDR4 memory (the Z and ZE support only DDR3), having better integrated graphics (Intel's HD 620 versus the Intel HD 500/500 on the Z and ZE models), and having an expected extra energy consumption (an external 65 W adapter on the Z Plus versus a 40 W external adapter on the other two models).

Toshiba showed off its new BG Series M.2 SSDs, which will grab your attention for being quite small. Measuring 16 mm x 20 mm, these drives are shorter than the shortest (30 mm) M.2 length standard. They still take advantage of the PCI-Express 3.0 x2 interface, and the NVMe protocol. At the heart of this drive is Toshiba's BiCS Flash, a multi-chip module that combines stacked TLC NAND flash memory with an SSD controller into one package. The drives come in capacities of 128 GB, 256 GB, and 512 GB. Toshiba is also separately selling these drives as chip-only, to notebook manufacturers, so they can solder them directly onto the mainboards of their low-cost ultra-portable notebooks.

ADATA, at its 2017 International CES booth, also unveiled the SD700X external SSD. An improved version of the original SD700 it launched in November 2016, the drives feature a more compact body that retains the military-grade waterproof and shockproof protection mechanisms. It comes in capacities of 256 GB, 512 GB, and 1 TB. Under the hood, the drive features 3D TLC NAND flash memory, and a SIliconMotion controller that takes advantage of USB 3.0 (5 Gbps), with a single cable handling both power and host connectivity. The drive offers sequential transfer speeds of up to 440 MB/s. ADATA is marketing this as a "gaming-grade" product, targeting notebook gamers.

ADATA showed off its SX950 Gaming mid-range SSD. Built in the 7 mm-thick 2.5-inch form-factor, with SATA 6 Gb/s interface, the SX950 comes in capacities of up to 960 GB. It appears to be based on a Phison-made controller, wired to 3D MLC NAND flash memory. It offers sequential transfer speeds of up to 560 MB/s reads, with up to 530 MB/s writes. The drive features SLC caching, in which the controller treats a user-abstract portion of the MLC NAND area as fast SLC, by writing only one bit per cell, and juggling data in and out of this area based on its "heat." The drives are backed by 5-year warranties.

Western Digital has announced the WD Black PCIe SSD, their first PCIe SSD for the consumer market. This particular SSD is aimed at the cheaper half of the M.2 PCIe SSD market rather than competing for the highest performance: it will be available in 256GB and 512GB capacities for $109 and $199.99 respectively, making it cheaper than any currently available M.2 PCIe SSD except the Intel 600p.

MSI, the world's leading manufacturer of true gaming hardware, has fitted its Aegis gaming desktop line with the recently introduced Intel Kaby Lake chipset. Besides the new chipset, MSI has revamped its high-end Aegis Series desktops in terms of design, convenience and performance. The MSI Aegis Ti3, Aegis X3, Aegis 3, Nightblade 3, Nightblade MI3 and Trident 3 will be available worldwide in January 2017.

On the outside, a handy headset handle is added to the sides, and a touch of carbon effect on the front. Applied to MSI's full gaming desktop family, MSI VR Link provides an HDMI port on the front side and 'One-Click to VR' software to optimize your VR experience. The Aegis Ti3 and Aegis X3 also feature the MSI Game Boost button on the front side, automatically overclocking the system when pressed. On the backside, a convenient carry-handle enables gamers to easily carry their Aegis when on their way to a friend or LAN-parties. For those who like to add a little personal touch to their system, MSI Aegis Series feature RGB Mystic Light. By using the Mystic Light App or MSI's Gaming Center software, gamers can change the color and effects of all LEDs individually.

OWC, a leading zero emissions Mac and PC technology company, announced the OWC DEC, the first-ever expansion solution designed specifically for the 2016 Apple MacBook Pro. The OWC DEC is the finishing touch to a MacBook Pro, allowing users to take their laptops to the next level, extending the life and the functionality of the already-exceptional 2016 MacBook Pro. The DEC is the latest in OWC's long line of upgrades for nearly every Mac made, and continues the company's legacy of providing the best solutions for Mac owners.

The OWC DEC attaches completely flush to the bottom of the 2016 MacBook Pro, providing additional flash storage and connectivity, ultimately increasing the performance of MacBook Pros. With the OWC DEC, users will get an enhancement path for their 2016 MacBook Pro and MacBook Pro with Touch Bar to keep their system upgradeable for the long term in a clean and integrated fashion. On top of the core functional benefits, the OWC DEC also touts a sleek design. When installed, the OWC DEC and MacBook Pro will be as thin as a 2012 MacBook Pro, allowing this advanced solution to retain the attractive light weight design that users favor.

In a realm of ever-expanding storage needs, and increasingly constrained time slices, being able to quickly transfer or back-up your files and carry them with you is still an important metric. Even in an increasingly cloud-powered world, sometimes, simply being able to care about a piece of hardware, and not losing a password or having your cloud account hacked, still pulls its weight in some users' considerations. Sharkoon is looking to address those users' needs with the release of the Rapid-Case 2.5" USB 3.1 Type-C, a DIY enclosure which is sure to give your old HDDs (or even SSDs) a new lease of life.

PNY announced the CS2030 line of high-performance SSDs in the M.2-2280 form-factor. The drives take advantage of PCI-Express 3.0 x4 (32 Gb/s M.2 slots), and the NVMe protocol, and are available in two capacities - 240 GB and 480 GB. Combining a Phison PS5007 controller with MLC NAND flash memory, the drives offer sequential transfer-rates of up to 2,750 MB/s reads, with up to 1,500 MB/s sequential writes. 4K random access performance is rated by the manufacturer at up to 210,000 IOPS reads, and up to 215,000 IOPS writes. Backed by 3-year warranties, the 240 GB variant is priced at US $179.99, and the 480 GB variant at $329.99.

Used to game in the 2000s, through your college, and then "life happened"? Want to turn your 4-year old Dell into a gaming PC, but its 350W generic OEM power supply is holding you back? For these things and other, NVIDIA is selling a "PC Gaming Revival Kit," a package consisting of a graphics card, an SSD, a PSU, and a game, to help you bring PC gaming back into your lives. The kit includes hardware to turn just about any desktop with a SATA port and PCI-Express slot, into a 1080p gaming machine (provided it meets some basic requirements of the graphics card).

Available in the EU, priced at 399€, the kit includes an MSI GeForce GTX 1060 3GT OC graphics card, a factory-overclocked GTX 1060 3GB card with a dual-fan cooling solution; a Corsair Force LE 240GB solid-state drive, a Corsair CX450M partially modular 450W power supply, an NVIDIA GeForce t-shirt, and a copy of "Gears of War 4." Bought separately, the graphics card goes for 229€, and PSU for 51€, the SSD for 77€, and the game for 45€, total: 402€, so it's not that big a value, but could point a lot of people in the right direction. It could also make for a decent X'mas gift.

CORSAIR, a world leader in enthusiast memory, high-performance gaming hardware and PC components today announced the immediate availability of the CORSAIR Force MP500 range of M.2 solid state drives, the fastest SSDs yet produced by CORSAIR. Available in 120GB, 240GB and 480GB capacities, the MP500 range delivers blistering performance up to five times faster than traditional SATA 6Gbps SSDs, offering users the next step in high-performance storage in an ultra-compact form factor.

Equipped with a Phison PS5007-E7 NVMe controller and high-bandwidth PCIe Gen. 3 x4 M.2 2280 interface, the MP500 range of drives put your data in the fast lane. Delivering phenomenal data performance including read speeds of up to 3,000 MB/s and write speeds of up 2,400 MB/s, the MP500 range of SSD accelerate system boots, game load times and file transfers beyond anything possible over a single SATA 6Gbps connection.

ADATA Technology, a leading manufacturer of highperformance DRAM modules, NAND Flash products, and mobile accessories today launchedthe Ultimate SU900 2.5" SATA 6Gb/s SSD, which signals further expansion in 3D NAND Flash storage. The SU900 delivers high-grade 3D MLC NAND and uses the SMI 2258 controller. Most importantly, it offers up to 2TB capacity, reinforced by performance-boosting SLC Cache Buffer and DRAM Cache. For data integrity, the SU900 offers LDPC error correction, data shaping, wear leveling, and RAID Engine. It reaches 560MB/s read and 525MB/s write, and includes a 2.5mm spacer and 3.5" bracket in the box. ADATA provides a 5-year warranty with the drive.

The time has come for 3D NAND SSDs to realize their higher density potential, and so the SU900 lineup includes a 2TB model. However, consumers can choose 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB variants based on needs and budgets. Flash on the SU900 is high-grade 3D MLC (multi-level cell), ensuring improved reliability, longevity, and performance. The SSD employs an SMI 2258 controller, pushing 560MB/s read, 525MB/s write, and 85K/90K IOPS. Thanks to ADATA sorting and quality assurance, the SU900 has a TBW (total bytes written) of up to 800TB and an MTBF (mean time before failure) of 2,000,000 hours.

ADATA Technology, a leading manufacturer of highperformance DRAM modules, NAND Flash products, and mobile accessories today launchedthe updated Premier SC660H and Premier SV620H external SSDs. Based on previous designs, the new models are part of the ADATA move to 3D NAND Flash in all new SSDs and in refreshes of existing models. The SC660H and SV620H feature 3D TLC NAND instead of traditional 2D NAND to provide increased reliability, durability, and efficiency. The drives connect to host PCs via USB 3.1 Gen 1, and are presented in two distinct enclosure styles. Thanks to 3D NAND, the updated SSDs are available in 256GB and 512GB as opposed to 240GB and 480GB in the original SC660/SV620. Performance is 440 MB/s read and 430MB/s write in both models.

Micron Technology, Inc. today introduced the Micron Enterprise 5100 Series SATA solid state drive (SSD) family, enabling future-focused data storage platforms to meet the combined demands of performance, capacity and enterprise-class reliability. Micron's 5100 Series Enterprise SATA SSDs provide IT with an easy migration to bridge the infrastructure divide to tomorrow's all flash data center. With an industry-leading 8-terabyte (TB) capacity, the 5100 Series helps you manage the data deluge created by today's diverse digital universe with performance characteristics perfectly tailored to manage the data tsunami.

"Micron is uniquely positioned to help IT embrace modernization and agility, and leading enterprise and cloud data centers look to Micron for breadth and depth in solid state storage solutions to tame a diverse digital universe," Darren Thomas, vice president of storage at Micron. "Our Micron 5100 Series SATA SSDs featuring FlexPro architecture offer a seamless migration path with enterprise class reliability and proven ROI, ensuring flexibility, continuity and agility for data management today and tomorrow."

Western Digital Corp. today further expanded its data center SSD and HDD portfolio with the introduction of next-generation storage solutions designed to help IT managers address the intensive data and extreme performance demands of today's enterprise, cloud and hyperscale workloads.

The new solutions include the blazingly fast HGST-branded Ultrastar SN200 NVMe-compatible PCIe solid-state drive (SSD) series, which offers class-leading random read performance of up to 1.2 million IOPS in key workloads, and the company's fastest and highest capacity SAS SSD to date, the HGST-branded Ultrastar SS200 Series SSD. The company also introduced its fourth-generation helium-based HelioSeal enterprise-class hard disk drive (HDD), the 12TB HGST-branded Ultrastar He12 drive. Additionally, the company announced it will extend the He12 platform to 14TB, leveraging Shingled Magnetic Recording (SMR).

Remember Geil'sEVO X? If you wanted some lighting phenomena going on inside your case with those DDR4 RAM modules, you'd also have to make do with unsightly cables, adding to the clutter of your chosen component holder. ZADAK511 has done away with those additional power cables, and now allows you to "pimp" your rig without them.

These two products were designed by the ZADAK Lab team, and ZADAK has developed a piece of software they named "ZArsenal" which allows the user to regulate the colors and lighting effects of both the memory modules and SSD, with a claimed nil performance impact on either. Details on the SSD refer only to its dual interfaces (SATAIII and USB 3.1, TYPE-C Gen2, updated from their Shield [sans RGB] series), while the memory kit's details are a little more scarce - we expect them to be on par with the companies' previously announced Shield line (sans RGB), which would mean at least DDR4-3000 speeds at timings of 16-18-18-38 (with 4 GB density modules) or the companies' top-of-the-line DDR4-4266 kit. No details on pricing for either of the products were given.