Micron
Technology, Inc. announced the Micron 4600 PCIe
Gen5 NVMe SSD, an innovative client storage drive for OEMs that is
designed to deliver exceptional performance and user experience for gamers,
creators and professionals. Leveraging Micron G9 TLC NAND, the 4600
SSD is Micron’s first Gen5 client SSD and doubles the performance of its
predecessor.
The Micron
4600 SSD showcases sequential read speeds of 14.5 GB/s and write speeds of 12.0
GB/s. These capabilities allow users to load a large language model (LLM) from
the SSD to DRAM in less than one second, enhancing the user
experience with AI PCs. For AI model loading times, the 4600 SSD reduces load
times by up to 62% compared to Gen4 performance SSDs ensuring rapid
deployment of LLMs and other AI workloads. Additionally, the 4600 SSD provides
up to 107% improved energy efficiency (MB/s per watt) compared to Gen4
performance SSDs, enhancing battery life and overall system
efficiency.
The 4600 SSD
is the second Micron client SSD to incorporate the most advanced Micron G9 NAND
technology, following the Micron 2650 NVMe SSD already in production.
Why it
matters
Accomplishing
more and cutting down wait time is more important than ever to gamers, creators
and professionals alike. The 4600 leverages PCIe Gen5 technology and the Micron
G9 TLC NAND to provide remarkable speed and energy
efficiency.
“With the
4600 NVMe SSD, users can load large language models in less than one second,
enabling PC experiences in data-intensive applications, especially for AI,”
said Prasad Alluri, vice president and general manager for Client Storage at
Micron. “As AI inference runs locally on the PC, the transition to Gen5 SSDs
addresses the increased need for higher performance and energy efficiency.”
Gen5 SSD
technology will grow rapidly in 2025 and 2026. The 4600 NVMe SSD is compatible
with the leading-edge platforms such as AMD’s Ryzen 9000 Series
processors, and the Intel Core Ultra Desktop and Mobile
(Series 2) processors, ensuring seamless integration for PC OEMs.
“AMD is
excited to collaborate on the validation of the Micron 4600 NVMe SSD with our
latest Ryzen family of processors,” said Joe Macri, senior vice president and
chief technology officer of Compute and Graphics at AMD. “The Micron 4600 NVMe
SSD is anticipated to deliver exceptional performance and a best-in-class user
experience for the most demanding professional applications and high-speed
gaming.”
“The
co-validation efforts with Micron in our Intel Folsom Open Labs have been
instrumental to achieving today’s compatibility milestone. The Micron 4600 SSD,
which has been designed for PCIe Gen5 platforms and offers fantastic
performance and power efficiency, is now listed on the Intel PCL (Platform
Component List),” said Todd Lewellen, vice president of Client Ecosystem
Group at Intel. “The 4600 SSD is an ideal fit for AI PCs based on Intel
Core Ultra processors, as well as future platforms.”
“Lenovo will
qualify the Micron 4600 SSD because of its industry-leading performance and its
use of low temperature soldering (LTS) technology during SSD module assembly,”
said Takashi Sugawara, director and principal engineer at Lenovo. “As a pioneer
in LTS technology, Lenovo has been collaborating with Micron in the pursuit of
reducing the amount of energy consumed in the SSD manufacturing process.”
Level
up to high-performing Gen5 storage
The
Micron 4600 NVMe SSD delivers up-to performance improvements over Gen4 SSDs:
- 14.5 GB/s sequential read speeds, 107%
- 12.0 GB/s sequential write speeds, 71%
- 2.1 million random read IOPS, 83%
- 2.1 million random write IOPS, 83%
Enhanced
user experience
Designed
to elevate AI, scientific, gaming and content creation experiences, the Micron
4600 NVMe SSD unlocks best-in-class PCMark 10 benchmark scores:
- Up
to 38% better than Gen4 performance SSDs - Up
to 11% better scores compared to Gen5 competitors
The 4600 SSD
provides exceptional user experiences over previous Gen4 drives for scientific,
media and entertainment, along with a variety of other use cases, as
demonstrated with the SPECwpc5 benchmark results on speed improvements:
- Media and entertainment applications: up to 61% faster
- Energy industry
applications: up to 59% faster - Product development applications: up to 45% faster
- Life sciences
applications: up to 38% faster
Building upon
prior ultra-secure features like TCG Opal, signed firmware and secure boot, the
4600 SSD includes the latest in advanced security features such as Security
Protocol and Data Model (SPDM), Data Object Exchange (DOE) and Device
Identifier Composition Engine (DICE), helping provide improved protection of
user data.
The Micron 4600 NVMe SSD is now available for
OEM sampling globally.
