256TB SSDs could hit the market before 2026 at a surprisingly low price, but will most likely use a controversial and popular trick borrowed from tape technology
ScaleFlux has announced its latest SSD controller, which could be a major step forward for the company.
The SFX 5016, the successor to the SFX 3016, includes several design improvements, including an upgrade from PCIe 4.0 to PCIe 5.0, doubling the speed and bandwidth of the host interface.
The new controller is designed to support a maximum storage capacity of up to 256 TB, a volume that according to JB Baker, VP Products at ScaleFlux, can be achieved faster than expected by using tape technology.
256TBe drives are coming
Reaching 256TB is a big goal for SSD makers, and there are some challenging hurdles to overcome. For starters, the physical space, determined by the size and form factor of the SSD, determines how many NAND components can fit inside. The density of these components also plays a role, with higher densities providing more storage capacity. The total capacity of the SSD can be limited by the controller’s ability to handle a certain number of NAND chips and manage them effectively. Additionally, SSDs maintain a “logical-physical map” to keep track of every byte of data stored, usually in DRAM, for consistent performance in enterprise SSDs. The amount of DRAM that fits in the drive can further limit the maximum drive capacity.
For all these reasons, we probably won’t see a 256TB physical capacity drive released until 2026 at the earliest, with prices expected to be around $25,000 each. But there is a solution that is closer. Baker says a “256T effective compression drive could arrive in 2025 and cost a fraction of the price.”
While offering a 256TB SSD ahead of the competition, and at a lower price, sounds great, the method to achieve this is not without controversy.
Transparent compression, a feature included in the SFX 5016 and carried over from the SFX 3016, is a popular trick borrowed from tape technology that allows an SSD to store more data than its physical capacity by compressing it. As Baker explains, “a 3.84 TB SSD can store 7.68 TB of compressible data at a 2:1 ratio for ‘effective capacity’. Storage array vendors are pitching ‘TBe’ (terabyte effective) capacity based on achieving a certain data compression ratio.”
While there’s no set timetable, if Baker is right, it’s possible we’ll see the first 256TBe drives late next year.