Samsung's 6th-gen 3D V-NAND SSDs have a groundbreaking design for faster 256Gb data-transfers

Samsung has announced that its new generation of V-NAND SSDs is now bring manufactured. This will be its 6th generation of this form of 3D memory. It is composed of vertically-stacked flash cells, each of which can house 3 bits of data. As they are arranged into the current conventional maximum of 256 gigabits (Gb) on an individual chip, it makes for exceptionally high-density storage.

The first of these new drives will be released with a total of 250GB in capacity. Samsung also claims that the design of this new V-NAND memory makes for improved data-retention, while also delivering read speeds of as little as 450 microseconds, as well as write speeds that can approach 45 microseconds. This represents a 10% improvement over the preceding generation, while using 15% less power.

This 6th-gen 3D flash memory is arranged into at least 100 layers (136 to start off with in the initial 250GB model) of single-stack structures, whereas the 5th generation could not get beyond 99. This breakthrough may be the key to even denser flash memory in the future; for example, Samsung now asserts that the immediate successors to this new NAND could scale up to 512Gb per chip.