Kingston Announces DC400 Entry-Level Data Center SSD

Kingston is announcing a new addition to its family of enterprise storage solutions, which they have designated as the Data Center 400 (DC400) solid-state drive (SSD).  The DC400 SSD is meant to be an entry-level enterprise SSD geared toward data center server usage, particularly those users that utilize a rip-and-replace deployment strategy.  The DC400 is an excellent choice for read-intensive applications, including as boot drives, for web servers, and lower data rate data bases and analytics.  It is ideal for data center mixed workloads, where reliability and endurance are critical requirements.

For data center users whose usage scenarios require sustained IOPS and consistently low latency, the DC400 SSD provides a superior level of quality of service.  By utilizing an expanded on-board DRAM acceleration cache, the DC400 SSD provides a high level of sustained IOPS that increases performance over diverse read/write workloads.  The DC400’s standard (and also user-adjustable) over-provisioning increases random IOPS performance and endurance, along with enterprise firmware that decreases latency.  This allows the DC400 SSD to provide consistently low data access times with steady-state workloads.  It also features enterprise-grade reliability, with end-to-end data path protection and firmware-based power loss protection (pFAIL) to protect against data loss in the event of an unanticipated power interruption.

According to Ariel Perez, Kingston’s SSD business manager, “Kingston is proud to offer our next-generation entry-level enterprise SATA SSD to our data center and corporate customers looking for consistent application performance, stringent quality of service requirements and all-around reliability.  DC400 SSD’s combination of high IOPS, low latency and advanced data protection gives server IT managers and decision makers the perfect front-loading server storage option that they can deploy with confidence.”

Kingston is offering the DC400 SSD in capacities of 400GB, 480GB, 800GB, 960GB, 1.6TB and 1.8TB.  The 400GB, 800GB and 1.6TB versions are optimized for greater IOPS performance to speed up applications and to reduce storage latency.  The 1.8TB read-intensive model is factory-optimized for read-intensive usage scenarios.  All are produced in the standard 2.5” form factor, and with a SATA 3.0 (6Gb/s) interface.  All are hot-plug capable, and utilize both static and dynamic wear leveling.  The DC400 SSD also supports enterprise-level S.M.A.R.T. drive monitoring attributes, providing the ability to track reliability, usage, wear leveling, temperature and remaining drive life.

All capacities attain sequential read speeds of up to 555MB/s, with sequential write speeds ranging from 510MB/s to 535MB/s, depending upon capacity.  Random 4K read speeds are stated as up to 99,000 IOPS (1.6TB = 100,000 IOPS), with random 4K write speeds ranging from 86,000 IOPS to 90,000 IOPS depending upon capacity.   Steady-state 4K read speeds range from 67,000 IOPS to 85,000 IOPS (varies by capacity), and steady-state 4K write speeds ranging from 11,000 IOPS to 35,000 IOPS (varies by capacity).

Endurance for the DC400 SSD also varies by capacity, with the 400GB rated for 422TB (0.57 DWPD), the 480GB rated for 257TB (0.30 DWPD), the 800GB rated for 860TB (0.58 DWPD), the 960GB rated for 564TB (0.32 DWPD), the 1.6TB rated for 1678TB (0.57 DWPD) and the 1.8TB rate for 1432TB (0.43 DWPD).  Power consumption is stated as an average of 1.6W, and 1.5W at idle.  Kingston is backing the DC400 SSD with a five-year limited warranty.

Kingston also offers industry-leading sales support via their “Ask an Expert” program.  The DC400 SSD also includes the Kingston SSD Manager, a free downloadable “toolbox” to help manage your drive’s health and usage.  For more information, you can view the Kingston press release announcing the DC400 SSD in its entirety here.