TL;DR: Samsung has finally shared additional details regarding the large-capacity 990 Pro NVMe SSD it first introduced earlier this year. The base model 990 Pro 4TB will be sold without a heatsink for $344.99, but we’d recommend grabbing the heatsink-equipped variant that’ll retail for just $10 more.
High-end SSDs can experience severe thermal throttling when temperatures climb, so anything you can do to prevent that from happening and to keep the drive operating at peak performance is worthwhile.
Sammy’s latest utilizes Samsung V-NAND 3-bit TLC and an in-house controller along with 4GB LPDDR4. According to the specs sheet, the 990 Pro can deliver up to 7,450 MB/s sequential reads and up to 6,900 MB/s sequential write speeds, and up to 1,600K random read IOPS / up to 1,550K random write IOPS.
Samsung’s Magician software allows users with the heatsink-equipped variant to control its RGB functionality. The software, which is due for an update to version 8.0 this month, can also help keep drivers and firmware up to date.
The new 4TB version is rated for 2400TB of total bytes written and carries a five-year limited warranty, whichever comes first. Look for it to land in October.
Jose Hernandez, senior director of memory product marketing at Samsung, said they recognized that people need more innovative storage options to meet their day-to-day needs – whether that includes downloading large games or accessing high-res content – and that their new 990 Pro 4TB is the perfect solution.
Samsung’s high-capacity drive falls around the middle of the field in terms of pricing among similar 4TB SSDs. A quick check of Amazon shows the WD Black 4TB SN850X currently commands $299.99, Sabrent’s 4TB Rocket 4 Plus is going for $349.99, and the Kingston Fury Renegade 4TB is $384.79.
Samsung’s 990 Pro got off to a rocky start after some users reported rapid “health” declines. The issue gained enough traction that boutique builder Puget stopped using the drives due to reliability concerns. Samsung issued a firmware update in February to address the matter, and that’s the last we’ve heard about it.
