Sandisk is launching new SATA SSDs in 2026 because NVMe prices are out of control

[trparky]

Agreed. If anything, SATA drives should be MORE expensive than M.2 NVMe drives, since the BOM has to be more expensive: A similar sized PCB, a similar controller, the same NAND, PLUS a case for the 7mm form factor. The only reason a SATA drive should be less expensive would be is lesser "desirability".

But SATA drives can use lesser, slower NAND chips keeping the really, really good expensive stuff for AI buyers.

 

[LordVile95]

In normal everyday use cases, that's very true.

But for a person who's only running email, office suites, and a web browser... Who the hell cares?

Outside of people pushing serious data throughput like photo and video editing, virtual machines, and of course, gaming, a SATA SSD more than adequate. It's only those that chase benchmark numbers that really care.

And even in gaming it’s only direct storage type titles where a noticeable difference observed, most of the time you’re taking a load time difference of a few seconds if that.

 

[Draconian]

Even a good SATA SSD is limited by the interface, which tops out around 600 MB/s.

USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 is way faster than that, which is what I'm running Windows on.

 

[Vanderlinde]

Most of my PCs still have SATA SSDs for their main drive, but multiply that with some RAID and I can’t tell the difference from a NVMe drive…

I think it was tested before; but in general if your not doing the heavy work you would not even notice the difference.

And yes you can raid-0 them all together, with some boards up to 8, to have 8x the max ~ 500MB speeds to reach 4000MB p/s.

 

[OortCloud]

A SATA Hard Drive is perfect for Games and Pics/Movies - you'll barely notice a difference. Just keep your OS on a nice fast nvme drive and you'll be fine.

 

[OortCloud]

Oh and can we say another thanks to AI for the thousand ways in which it is making our lives worse.

 

[LemmingO]

Unless Sandisk is sitting on a Smaug-level cache of old NAND chips, I don't see how this makes an iota of a difference. The chips used in SATA SSDs are the same tech as the ones in NVMe. That's where the supply is constrained. Not the form factor/packaging/interface. The actual NAND chips.

 

[OortCloud]

Unless Sandisk is sitting on a Smaug-level cache of old NAND chips, I don't see how this makes an iota of a difference. The chips used in SATA SSDs are the same tech as the ones in NVMe. That's where the supply is constrained. Not the form factor/packaging/interface. The actual NAND chips.

At a guess... given the bandwidth restrictions of SATA, the NAND required are probably a larger, older, process node and so can be made at the same time as DDR5/NVME/GDDR6 etc on older production lines without interfering? Just a guess...

 

[airbornex]

Motherboard makers spent years deleting SATA ports to make room for more M.2 slots, and now storage prices are about to make everyone wish they still had six of them.

 

[Gravitytr1]

Society is decaying and now technology is going back in time

Thanks Government for the people by the people