A manufacturer introduced the first consumer PCIe 5.0 SSDs at Computex. They reach high speeds.
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The PCIe 5.0 SSDs are extremely fast.
© Apacer
Although PCIe 5.0 has been available for a few months, we haven’t seen any storage drives (nor graphics cards) that can take advantage of this since the introduction of the 12th generation of Intel’s Alder Lake CPUs. As far as SSDs go, that’s about to change thanks to Apacer announcing the first consumer PCIe 5.0 SSDs at Computex 2022, according to our US sister publication PC-WORLD.
The storage specialist has introduced the Apacer AS2280F5 and Zadak TWSG5, two series of 5th Gen PCIe SSDs in M.2 format. Both offer read speeds of
up to 13,000 MB/s,
write speeds are only slightly lower at 12,000 MB/s. That’s a little less than twice the speed of the fastest Gen 4 M.2 drives on the market.
Both SSDs are backward compatible with Gen 4 connectors and come with solid aluminum heatsinks, which can cause space issues if your motherboard’s M.2 slots are in an awkward spot. Both have a 5 year guarantee.
No information on prices and start dates yet
So far there are no prices or release dates. Information on read and write speeds (IOPS) and endurance estimates is also not yet available.
Intel’s 12th Gen line of processors are compatible with PCIe 5.0, as are the motherboards that support them (although such motherboards don’t necessarily have to actually be PCIe 5.0. It may just be PCIe 4.0). AMD’s upcoming AM5 platform and Ryzen 7000-series CPUs scheduled for release this fall will also support PCIe 5.0, and AMD is working closely with partners to ensure PCIe 5.0 SSDs will ship with the new platform be introduced.
Although Apacer’s announcement was the first, we can be sure that more SSDs with PCIe 5.0 will be unveiled soon. While you wait, be sure to check out our roundup of the best SSDs.
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