[Infographic] At a glance: The “860 QVO” high-performance, high-capacity 4-bit SSD

Samsung Electronics will be launching the “860 QVO series” across 50 countries this month. The “860 QVO series” is the industry’s first-ever terabyte (TB) class high-performance, high-capacity 4-bit (QLC) SATA SSD. Welcome to our overview of the “860 QVO”, a new line of reasonable consumer SSD solutions. What is an SSD? An SSD (Solid-State Drive) is a next-generation large-capacity storage device that uses a memory semiconductor as the storage medium. An SSD is comprised of NAND flash memory, used for data storage, a controller that controls movement of data between the interface and memory, and DRAM, which serves as cache memory between the drive and external devices.

The SSD boasts fast speeds and high stability, as data is stored on NAND flash memory without the need for motors and other mechanical components. Smaller and more lightweight than HDDs (Hard Disk Drive) with less heat, noise, and power consumption, SSDs bring new value into our everyday lives, all the way from data centers down to general consumers. SSDs categorized according to NAND Flash memory data storage method In computers, one binary value (0 or 1) is called a bit (a binary digit). Depending on how many bits each cell in the NAND flash memory of an SSD can store, SSDs are categorized as 1-bit (SLC), 2-bit (MLC), 3-bit (TLC), and 4-bit (QLC).

* Cell: A minimum unit of digital data * Bit (binary digit): A minimum unit for data storage The “860 QVO series” of SSDs feature 4-bit, that is, QLC (Quad Level Cell) NAND flash. QLC NAND flash memory stores 4 bits per cell. Moving up from 1-bit to 4-bit drives, the amount of data that can be stored in a given cell increases. This means higher productivity as well as storage efficiency. To store a single Korean character (2 bytes or 16 bits), 1-bit NAND requires 16 cells, while 2-bit NAND uses 8. 3-bit NAND needs 6, while 4-bit NAND just needs 4 cells. As the number of data bits that need to be distinguishable from each other in a cell doubles with each step, more precise control of charge is needed, and the technical difficulty increases drastically. The “860 QVO” series: High capacity, high performance, stability, and reasonable pricing to boot Samsung Electronics’ “860 QVO” series of new terabyte-class high-performance 4-bit SSDs reflects the latest memory storage market trends, which demand high-performance and high-capacity SSDs. The drives enable comfortable PC usage environments for users who need to work fast through large amounts of data. The useful life of an SSD is measured using TBW (Total Bytes Written). Samsung backs the stability of the new drives with a warranty of 3 years, or up to 1,440TB total bytes written, all at reasonable prices.

* TB (terabyte): A unit expressing the amount of data. 1 terabyte is 2 to the 40th power bits. This can be converted to approximately 1 trillion bytes. A terabyte is also expressed as 1024 gigabytes (GB). The latest in a line of market-leading SSDs Samsung Electronics has consistently been an SSD storage market leader, from the first 32GB 1-bit NAND SSD solution released in 2006 all the way up to the new 4-bit “860 QVO series” SSDs.

There’s a great deal more to come from Samsung Electronics, with a number of industry-first innovations in the high-capacity SSD market under its belt. Starting with the “860 QVO series”, we intend to once again take the lead in expanding the market for terabyte-class SSDs.