The end of SATA SSD is inevitable and here are the reasons

Martin Woolridge 2 years ago 3 min read

Everywhere we do not stop reading that buying a solid-state drive is a much better option than a hard drive in terms of performance, and this is true, however, there is a type of drive that can become extinct in the short term and disappear from the hard drive. the scientist. the map. We are talking about SSD SATA The form factor is 2.5 inches. A piece of hardware you won’t see in stores in a few years.

In the hardware world, we’ve been able to see how many peripherals and components have come and gone over time. Mostly due to the fact that they have been replaced by devices that perform the same function more efficiently. An interesting case was the case for SSDs with the M. 2 form factor, which completely replaced the 2.5-inch form factor. Not surprisingly, there are a few laptops that come with a slot for this type of module, which is not used in most cases.

Why will SATA SSD disappear?

We don’t want to name bad weather, but things are as they are, but we have to make arguments for that.

They take up more space on your laptop’s motherboard than an M.2 SSD.
Its bandwidth is lower, 6Gbps, which is the limit of the SATA port, look at the case of small b, which means that it can transfer 10 times less data in the same period of time compared to the PCIe interface.
Storage is not the cheapest in a SATA SSD from M.2. The memory chips are the same, what changes is the interface.
No application takes advantage of the capabilities of a SATA SSD, on the other hand, with DirectStorage we will see how M. 2 SSDs can be used in games and multimedia creation applications.
All current laptops have a replaceable M.2 drive and an additional slot of the same type. The same can be said about motherboards.

Although for older laptops, it is a good idea to replace the DVD drive or hard drive with a SATA SSD to improve their performance, little by little there will be fewer and fewer laptops that can install them. Ultimately they will be a specialized component that sits between two worlds. Not fast enough and not enough storage. Players of everything, masters of nothing.

It is a standard that has stopped evolving

The controller for a SATA SSD does not require a lot of power to transfer data from the drive to RAM. It’s special considering that one NVMe will manage 4 to 20 times more data in the same amount of time. Therefore, despite the annual launch of models with a larger capacity, its technology is stagnant.

As if that weren’t enough, USB 3.1 and above drives have already been outpaced in bandwidth for a long time and can be used on any system. It is not surprising that soon SATA SSDs will be replaced by USB SSDs, with the same performance and much more in line with people’s needs.