Samsung Unveils 990 Evo Plus SSDs Up To 4TB With A Huge Speed Boost

If the 990 Evo Plus is the last PCI Express 4.0 solid state drive (SSD) that Samsung releases before fully embracing PCI Express 5.0, then it stands as one heck of a PCIe 4.0 swan song, at least on paper. To be clear, we have not tested this drive (yet). But looking at Samsung's rated specifications, the company's latest Evo variant brings some pretty sizable performance uplifts to the table compared to the non-Plus model it released earlier this year.

The new 990 Evo Plus pairs Samsung's own 8th generation 236-layer 3D triple-level cell (TLC) V-NAND memory with an in-house controller chip built on a 5-nanometer manufacturing process. There's no DRAM cache on the 990 Evo Plus, just as there isn't with the non-Plus model, but according to Samsung, the memory upgrade and controller tweaks enable up to 50% faster speeds.

Samsung's making the drive available in three capacities, including 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB. Both of the larger models tout a rated sequential read speed of up to 7,250MB/s while the 1TB model nips at their heels at 7,150MB/s. All three feature rated sequential write speeds of up to 6,300MB/s.

Those are big speed bumps compared to the non-Plus variant that's available in 1TB and 2TB capacities, both of which top out at speeds of up to 5,000MB/s for sequential reads and 4,200MB/s for sequential writes.

4K random read and write performance metrics get some nice speed bumps as well. Here's a breakdown by capacity...

• 4TB Evo Plus: 1,050K IOPS (4K random read) / 1,400K IOPS (4K random write)
• 2TB Evo Plus: 1,000K IOPS (4K random read) / 1,350K IOPS (4K random write)
• 1TB Evo Plus: 850K IOPS (4K random read) / 1,350K IOPS (4K random write)

"The 4TB model has an industry-leading random read speed of 1,050K IOPS and 1,400K input/output operations per second (IOPS) for random write. This remarkable performance nearly rivals that of SSD products with DRAM, despite not using DRAM cache, making it an optimal solution for gaming and AI tasks that require high performance," Samsung brags.

Samsung's also touting a huge jump in power efficiency, saying its nickel-coated controllers increases MB/s per watt to the tune of 73%.

It's an intriguing lineup, especially if/when you're able to catch them on sale, as frequently happens in the SSD space. As it stands, MSRPs on Samsung's 990 Evo Plus SSDs have been set at $109.99 for the 1TB model, $184.99 for the 2TB model, and $344.99 for the 4TB model.

Those aren't bad price points in a vacuum, just not super competitive with existing sales, including on Samsung's own models. For example, a 1TB 990 Pro sans heatsink can currently be had for $109.99 on Amazon, the 2TB model for $171.77, and the 4TB drive for $289.99. The versions that come bundled with a heatsink currently street for $129.99 for the 1TB model, $184 for the 2TB drive, and $349.99 for 4TB. All of those represent significant discounts over their MSRPs.