Kingston Digital Announces M.2 2280 SATA SSD — Computex 2014 Update

Kingston Digital Inc., the Flash memory division of Kingston Technology Company, Inc., and world-leading producer of memory devices, is announcing a new M.2 2280 SATA solid-state drive (SSD).  With shipments to begin in the second week of June 2014, the new 22mm x 80mm M.2 dimensions create a compact, thin and caseless form factor that is ideal for newer notebook platforms (such as Ultrabooks), ultra-thin computing devices, smaller design embedded systems, and for the latest motherboards featuring the Intel Z97 chipset and dedicated M.2 slot(s).

Kingston’s M.2 2280 SATA SSD utilizes advanced garbage collection and wear-leveling routines, as well as support for the TRIM command to ensure consistent drive performance over the lifespan of the drive.  DevSleep (device sleep) mode enables extreme power management efficiency, resulting in minimized power consumption, yet permitting devices to stay powered on and connected, without a significant impact on battery life.  Kingston’s M.2 2280 SSD also offers firmware-based power-loss protection to protect data integrity in the event of power loss or interruption.

According to Ariel Perez, SSD business manager at Kingston, “We are proud to release the new M.2 form factor to the channel for both consumer and corporate customers upgrading their systems, as well as the system builder community when designing new embedded applications.  This is an exciting follow-up to our previously-released OEM-only M.2 2260 SATA SSD used in certain models of the ASUS Zenbook.”

Kingston’s M.2 2280 SSD is a SATA 6Gb/s device rated for sequential read speeds of up to 550MB/s and sequential write speeds of up to 520MB/s.  Random 4K reads attain up to 66,000 IOPS, while random 4K writes attain up to 65,000 IOPS.  Power consumption is stated as 0.09W at idle, 1.11W average, and a maximum of 1.02W for reads and 2.86W for writes.

The new M.2 2280 also supports Intel’s SRT caching and supports S.M.A.R.T. drive health monitoring.  Kingston is backing the M.2 2280 with a three-year warranty and technical support.  The M.2 2280 SATA SSD will ship initially only in a 120GB capacity, with 240GB and 480GB versions to be released in Q3 of this year.