Samsung has a new 61.44TB capacity drive. Dubbed the Samsung BM1743, this is a new generation of high-capacity NVMe SSDs, joining Solidigm at that capacity. Solidigm, as a note, was production-constrained earlier this year on the 61.44TB drives due to customers buying so many of the large-capacity drives. What is more, Samsung is also teasing a drive twice as large.
Samsung BM1743 61.44TB and 122.88TB SSDs
The new Samsung BM1743 uses v7 QLC V-NAND and also supports PCIe Gen5. That puts it ahead of a Solidigm 61.44TB PCIe Gen4 drive in terms of interfaces. Here are the specs on the new drive:
| Operation | BM1743 2.5” U.2 Performance |
| Sequential Reads | 7200 |
| Sequential Writes | 2000 |
| 4KB Random Reads | 1600 |
| 4KB Random Writes | 110 |
(Source: Samsung)
While the drive supports PCIe Gen5 speeds, it is basically a PCIe Gen4 device when it comes to sequential read speeds. As we would expect from a capacity-focused drive, the SSD is much better at reads than writes. In terms of endurance, this is only a 0.26 DWPD drive. Endurance on a drive that is this large is perhaps a bit less exciting since they are designed to be read-focused drives. A great example is being used in a CDN server hosting many video or image files for streaming.
Final Words
While we do not have the Samsung BM1743 to test yet, you can find our popular Solidigm D5-P5336 61.44TB SSD review from earlier this year. We expect more 61.44TB and 122.88TB drives to hit the market later in 2024 and into 2025. Samsung said its 122.88TB drive is possible, but we fully expect to see that capacity in 2024. Some are using these as hard drive replacements, but the other side is that AI workloads tend to be very read heavy and so many PCIe slots are being used for networking that getting more capacity per drive is a big deal on a scale-up AI server. While we wait for the new drives, you can check out our original 61.44TB SSD video here:
So this could theoretically be a drive that is used with just two gen5 PCIe lanes, essentially doubling the number of drives that can be installed in a system, while retaining the performance of gen4 drives.
In that respect, it’s quite interesting.
The only issue I can see is that bifurcation generally doesn’t allow grouping PCIe lanes into pairs, but that may be something that MB manufacturers will look into if these drives gain some popularity.
Samsung likes to do paper launches *far* in advance of real launches. I’ll believe it when I see it.
Any idea whether mere mortals can buy these drives (especially outside the US)?
John S
I just purchased 10 of these drives.
What you believe when you see is of no matter.
Samsung does not do far off product announcement – when they release the model # you can just about be assured that the product is available.
Malv
Today, and they are $2800 per – list is $4000 – as far as outside the US – no idea.
John S, where did you buy them? I’d love to get a a couple of them too.