Samsung Quietly Listed a New Entry Level 990 PCIe 4.0 SSD

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Samsung appears to be preparing another consumer SSD, but this one takes a different path from the company’s premium lineup. A new Samsung 990 PCIe 4.0 NVMe SSD briefly showed up on Samsung Canada’s website before the listings disappeared.

Samsung 990 4.0 SSD drops DRAM for HMB

As spotted by folks over at Videocardz, it’s availanle in 1TB and 2TB storage capacities, which hints that the official launch may not be far away. Interestingly, the new Samsung 990 isn’t another PRO or EVO model. Instead, Samsung has positioned it as a more affordable option by dropping dedicated DRAM.

The specifications mention Host Memory Buffer (HMB), a feature that lets the SSD borrow a small portion of the system’s RAM for caching instead of carrying its own DRAM chip.

Even without dedicated DRAM, the listed performance is still impressive on paper. The 1TB version offers sequential read speeds of up to 7,150 MB/s and write speeds of up to 6,450 MB/s. The 2TB model pushes read speeds slightly higher to 7,250 MB/s while keeping the same write speed.

There is, however, a catch. Samsung has also lowered the endurance compared to the 990 PRO. The 1TB model is rated for 400TBW, while the 2TB version reaches 800TBW. Both drives carry a three year limited warranty. In simple terms, TBW measures how much data can be written to the SSD before it reaches its expected lifespan.

Samsung hasn’t shared pricing or an official release date yet. Even so, the SSD has already surfaced at some reseller listings as an entry level NVMe product. Those early prices appear to be placeholder business listings rather than final retail figures, so it’s best to take them with a pinch of salt until Samsung makes everything official.

Written by

Abhinav Anand

Abhinav Anand is the News Editor at SammyGuru and a technology journalist based in New Delhi. Before joining SammyGuru, he contributed to numerous outlets, including Android Headlines, ExtremeTech, The Mac Observer, Financial Express, Economic Times, iGeeksBlog, KnowTechie, PhonesWiki, SlashGear, and more. You can reach him at [email protected].

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