The Samsung 980 Pro is still the epitome of a fast gaming SSD that will let you boot up instantly, and load massive games quickly.
Find out why it is still the favourite SSD for discerning gamers all over the world!
Samsung 980 Pro : Super Fast Gaming SSD!
When it was launched back in September 2020, the Samsung 980 Pro was amongst the best and fastest gaming SSD money could buy.
It boasted a brand new 8nm Samsung Elpis controller with a native PCIe 4.0 interface, as well as improved TurboWrite caching.
To keep it running at peak performance, the Elpis controller is nickel coated to improve heat dissipation. It also uses a heat spreader label to keep the NAND chips cool.
The 980 Pro SSD also uses Samsung’s latest V-NAND TLC flash memory, with storage capacities of up to 2 TB in an M.2 2280 form factor.
Each SSD comes with 512 GB to 2 GB of LPDDR4 cache, and uses some of its storage as a fast SLC cache of between 49 GB and 216 GB in size.
Thanks to this combination of both DRAM and SLC caching, the Samsung 980 Pro boasts sequential read speeds of 6.4 GB/s to 7.0 GB/s, and sequential write speeds of 2.7 GB/s to 5.1 GB/s.
Of course, once the write caches ran out, sustained write speed fell to 400 MB/s for the 250 GB model, 900 MB/s for the 500 GB model, and 1.7 GB/s for the 1 TB and 2 TB models. But this was generally not an issue for gaming PCs, where read speed is paramount.
| Capacity | Fixed | Intelligent | Total | TurboWrite Speed |
After TurboWrite |
| 250 GB | 4 GB | 45 GB | 49 GB | 2.7 GB/s | 0.4 GB/s |
| 500 GB | 4 GB | 90 GB | 94 GB | 5.0 GB/s | 0.9 GB/s |
| 1 TB | 6 GB | 108 GB | 114 GB | 5.0 GB/s | 1.7 GB/s |
| 2 TB | 6 GB | 210 GB | 216 GB | 5.1 GB/s | 1.7 GB/s |
But note that TurboWrite requires you keeping approximately 20% of the drive’s storage capacity free or empty. If you fill up the drive beyond that, the Intelligent portion of TurboWrite will be reduced.
Also, to fully utilise the Samsung 980 Pro, your gaming PC should PCIe 4.0. It is backward compatible and will have no issues working with PCIe 3.0, but your drive will be limited to 3.5GB/s for sequential reads.
Samsung 980 Pro : Now A Fast SSD That Won’t Break The Bank!
When it was first released, the Samsung 980 Pro was not only expensive, it was much sought after and were consequently hard to come by.
The COVID-19 pandemic didn’t do us any favour, with computer part prices skyrocketing from a combination of increased demand and reduced production.
18 months later – the Samsung 980 Pro remains one of the better gaming SSDs money can buy, only it’s more affordable these days!
Of particular interest are the smaller 250GB and 500GB models. While they don’t offer that much storage space, they are much cheaper on a per GB basis.
Here is a look at the latest deals on the Samsung 980 Pro SSD globally :
Malaysia
- 250GB : RM323 | RM379 | RM383 | RM389 | RM390
- 500GB : RM619 | RM620 | RM659 | RM679 | RM683 | RM699
- 1TB : RM980 | RM1,083 | RM1,109 | RM1,149 | RM1,299
- 2TB : RM1,698 | RM1,999 | RM2,159 | RM2,187 | RM2,217 | RM2,359 |
Singapore
- 250GB : $100 | $108 | $109 | $109 | $109
- 500GB : $149 | $178 | $179 | $179 | $179
- 1TB : $255 | $277 | $277 | $277
- 2TB : $490 | $499 | $499 | $500
United States
United Kingdom
Australia
Samsung 980 Pro : Specifications
| Specifications | Samsung 980 PRO | |||
| Form Factor | M.2 (2280) | |||
| Interface | PCIe 4.0 x4 / NVMe 1.3c | |||
| Controller | Samsung Elpis (8 nm) | |||
| NAND Storage | Samsung 1xxL V-NAND TLC | |||
| Capacities | 250 GB | 500 GB | 1 TB | 2 TB |
| LPDDR4 Cache | 512 MB | 1 GB | 2 GB | |
| TurboWrite Cache |
49 GB | 94 GB | 114 GB | 216 GB |
| Sequential Read |
6.4 GB/s | 6.9 GB/s | 7.0 GB/s | |
| Sequential Write | 2.7 GB/s | 5.0 GB/s | 5.0 GB/s | 5.1 GB/s |
| Uncached Write | 0.4 GB/s | 0.9 GB/s | 1.7 GB/s | |
| Random Read | 22,000 IOPS | |||
| Random Write | 60,000 IOPS | |||
| Peak Random Read |
500K IOPS | 800K IOPS | 1M IOPS | |
| Peak Random Write |
600K IOPS | 1M IOPS | ||
| Endurance | 150 TBW | 300 TBW | 600 TBW | 1200 TBW |
| Security | AES 256-bit FDE, TCG / Opal v2.0, IEEE1667 |
|||
| TRIM | Yes | |||
| Garbage Collection | Yes | |||
| WNN | No | |||
| Dimensions | 80.15 mm long 22.15 mm wide 2.38 mm thick |
|||
| Weight | 9.0 grams | |||
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