WD's Black 3D NVMe SSD is about to give Samsung's 960 Evo a run for its money
Paint it black
Western Digital have a new NVMe SSD on the block. Dubbed the WD Black 3D NVMe SSD, this super-fast storage stick finally brings some much needed competition to Samsung's 960 Evo and 960 Pro, as it will be going on sale later this month with prices starting from just $120 in the US.
UK pricing has yet to be revealed, but what we do know is that the WD Black 3D NVMe SSD will be available in 250GB, 500GB and 1TB capacities. It also uses the M.2 2280 form factor, so you'll need to make sure you've got a motherboard that supports it before you chuck it in your shopping basket.
The 1TB model will be particularly good news for anyone who's been eyeing up Samsung's 960 Evo range but hasn't yet taken the plunge, as WD say the 1TB model will have sequential read speeds of up to 3400MB/s and sequential write speeds of up to 2800MB/s. Samsung's 1TB 960 Evo sequential speeds, by comparison, are only rated for 3200MB/s read and 1900MB/s write.
Sequential speeds fall slightly for the 500GB and 250GB models of the WD Black 3D NVMe SSD, but you're still looking at a fairly zippy 3400MB/s read and 2500MB/s write for the former, and 3000MB/s read and 1600MB/s write for the latter.
WD have also including a tasty five-year warranty with its Black 3D NVMe SSD, along with an endurance rating of up to 600TBW (terabytes written) for the 1TB model. Again, this beats what's on offer with the 1TB Samsung 960 Evo, as this only gives you a three-year warranty and a 400TBW endurance rating, making WD's latest better value for money. The rest of the WD Black 3D NVMe SSD range, meanwhile, will offer a 300TBW endurance for the 500GB model and 200TBW for the 250GB version.
I'll have to wait until review samples are available before I can put its performance claims to the test, of course - after all, sequential speeds aren't the best indicator of what you'll actually be getting in real-world use - but with the 250GB version costing $120, the 500GB model going for $230 and the 1TB one topping out at $450, it's certainly looking like it could be a very tempting alternative, especially when the 1TB 960 Evo is currently going for $480.