7.68 TB SSD: The Last SATA and E1.S Step, and the First 9400 PRO

7.68 TB SSD price on Amazon.co.uk

The table lists any 7.68 TB enterprise SSD offers we track on Amazon.co.uk, lowest £/TB first. It holds 7 listings right now. Lowest £/TB among tracked offers at the last check: £408.43/TB. Every price is pounds sterling inc VAT.

A £/TB ranking at this size can set very different drives side by side: SATA next to PCIe, an E1.S ruler next to a 2.5-inch body. The Interface column settles the first. For the second there is no column, so read the Part number against the codes further down. Whether a SAS row appears depends on what we track on Amazon.co.uk at the last check. Rows for models we hold no sheet for can appear too, and for those the title is only the seller's description.

7.68 TB SSD SATA: the last capacity in three documents

Three SATA documents we read end here: Samsung's PM893 data sheet, Micron's 5400 specification and the Intel D3-S4520 and D3-S4620 brief hosted by Solidigm. Nothing larger appears in any of them, and what each prints at 7.68 TB is not alike.

• Samsung PM893: part number MZ7L37T6HBLA-00W07, model name MZ-7L37T600. It carries 14,016 TB on the warranty TBW row, about 1.0 DWPD by our arithmetic, at 2.2 W read and 3.2 W write.
• Micron 5400 PRO: 9,110 TB, about 0.65 DWPD by our arithmetic, which is TBW divided by capacity and 1,825 days.
• D3-S4520: 7.68 TB in a 2.5-inch, 7 mm body. The brief gives >1 DWPD, up to 36.5 PBW, stated for the family. We have not found that rating mapped to this capacity.

Micron's rating barely moves with size: 8,410 TB for the PRO at 3,840 GB and 9,110 TB at 7,680 GB, about 8% more for double the capacity, by our arithmetic. Samsung's doubles, from 7,008 TB to 14,016 TB. Two 7.68 TB SATA drives can therefore carry very different write ratings, so the model matters more than the label.

The higher-endurance SATA class stops one step lower. Micron's 5400 MAX table runs to 3,840 GB, and the D3-S4620 list ends at 3.84 TB, so neither document shows that class at 7.68 TB. The Intel brief speaks of 'read-intensive and mixed-use workloads' for the D3-S4520 and D3-S4620 without assigning either word to a model, and we have not found either label for the PM893 or 5400 in the data sheet or specification we read, so we go by rating here. That is a finding about those documents, not a claim about everything these makers sell. On SATA, the documented step for that class is 3.84 TB.

7.68 TB E1.S: the top of the range for the PM9A3 and Micron 7450

Samsung's white paper says the PM9A3's E1.S model provides up to 7.68 TB, while M.2 stops at 3.84 TB and U.2 goes on to 15.36 TB. Micron lists the 7450 PRO in E1.S up to 7,680 GB and calls 7.68 TB the top of a range starting at 400 GB, with M.2 22110 ending at 3,840 GB. In Rev. C of these documents 7,680 GB appears only under E1.S, and the specification's revision history says Rev. C removed U.3 form factors. An older U.3 7450 listing is therefore outside these documents, not disproved by them.

What separates E1.S drives in these documents is height, and whether the drive is a bare board or in an enclosure. Micron's Table 10 gives maximum dimensions of 33.75 x 118.75 mm at 15 mm and 25 mm, close to Samsung's 33.6 x 118.75 x 9.5 mm, and 31.50 x 111.50 mm for the 5.9 mm bare board. The sheet's feature bullets print 31.5 x 111.49 mm for all three heights, which conflicts with that table and its drawings at 15 mm and 25 mm, so we follow the table.

The power slot changes what the Micron drive delivers. Its specification prints 5,600 MB/s sequential write at 7,680 GB, reduced to 4,000 MB/s at 12 W. Its notes measure the 15 mm and 25 mm versions at 25 W and the 5.9 mm at 12 W, whereas the brief says the 3.84 TB and 7.68 TB E1.S figures were measured at 20 W. We print both rather than pick one. Take the slot's power limit from your own system's documents before relying on the higher number.

7.68 TB SSD NVMe in 2.5-inch: U.2 and U.3 at 7 mm or 15 mm

A 2.5-inch label leaves the thickness open, and at this capacity it varies. Your bay's documents have to confirm which height it takes.

Micron says not all options on its part-number chart can be combined to define an offered product, so use those codes to read a number, not to build one.

Each row is that maker's own figure from its own set-up, so read them as what the sheets print, not as a contest. Inside the PM9A3 range 7.68 TB brings the top random read, but sequential read eases to 6,700 MB/s from 6,900 MB/s at 3.84 TB.

One figure recurs across interfaces. The PM9A3, the 9400 PRO and the SATA PM893 all print 14,016 TB, about 1.0 DWPD by our arithmetic. Power is another matter: 2.2 W read on the PM893 and 11.0 W on the PM9A3, both averages, 17 W maximum RMS on the 9400 PRO, and on the CM7-R 25 W typical active and 5 W ready. Those last two are different measures.

7.68 TB or 6.4 TB: the mixed-use siblings

On NVMe the mixed-use line carries a different number at this step. Micron's 7450 brief labels the PRO read-intensive at 1 drive write per day and the MAX mixed-use at 3.

The 9400 repeats the ratio at 14,016 TB for the PRO and 35,040 TB for the MAX, exactly 2.5 times by our arithmetic on one-sixth less labelled capacity, and its MAX doubles random write from 300 KIOPS to 600 KIOPS. KIOXIA pairs the same sizes: KCMY1RUG7T68 at 1 DWPD against KCMY1VUG6T40 at 3 DWPD.

We have not found a document stating that these pairs share NAND, so the pairing is by capacity and endurance class as printed. Nor have we found a maker document saying why the label reads 7.68 TB rather than 8 TB. Micron's Flex Capacity brief says over-provisioning is spare capacity, usually set in the factory, and in its own 800 GB example says extra over-provisioning gives better write performance but less user capacity. That is a general statement, and we do not stretch it to explain these numbers.

7.68 TB SSD SAS: PM1643 at 12 Gbps, PM7-R on SAS-4

Samsung's PM1643 brochure lists 7.68 TB on 12 Gbps SAS, with 1 DWPD for five years, though we hold no part number and have not read a PM1643a sheet. KIOXIA's PM7-R brief lists base model KPM71RUG7T68 and prints its interface speed as 22.5 Gbit/s, 12.0 Gbit/s, 6.0 Gbit/s, 3.0 Gbit/s, 1.5 Gbit/s.