News Memblaze Releases New PBlaze5 520 Series Low-Power Enterprise SSDs

[News]

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terday we saw Memblaze introducing a new series of low-power server-class NVMe SSDs that focus on providing excellent performance whilst maintaining lower power consumption levels, aiming at enterprises improving their storage energy efficiency. The new PBlaze5 C520, D520, C526 and D526 SSDs come in either 2.5” U.2 or HHHL form-factors in two capacity classes for each model.

Unlike its bigger brethren C900 series models which we had reviewed last year, the new 52X series units limit their performance characteristics by sticking to a PCIe 3.0 x4 interface, with all devices covered today peaking at a sequential read speed of 3.3GB/s.

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The 520 models come with in either 1.92TB or 3.84TB variants, while the 526 models feature in 1.6TB or 3.2TB configurations. Random read IOPS come in at a flat 520K for all the models, whilst random write IOPS for the 520 series range from 68K on the 1.92TB unit to 70K on the 3.84TB unit. The D526 and C526 both measure in at 135K random write IOPS.

As opposed to the 900 series SKUs which either use 32- or 64-layer enterprise 3D TLC NAND, the new more energy efficient models use newer 96L chips.

The reason why’d you want to choose these lower power models is of course for deployments which require higher energy conservation or lower heat generating hardware. Compared to the 900 series, idle power consumption is reduced from 7W to down to 4W, whilst operating power reduces from 25W to 9W, with an advertised 12W peak consumption.

Memblaze PBlaze5 Series Specifications​
Form Factors	2.5" U.2 Drive​	HHHL AIC​	2.5" U.2 Drive​	HHHL AIC​
Interface	PCIe 3.0 x4​	PCIe 3.0 x8​	PCIe 3.0 x4​	PCIe 3.0 x4​
Capacities	1.92TB 3.84TB​	1.6TB 3.2TB​
Controller	?​
Protocol	NVMe 1.3​
NAND	96L 3D Enterprise TLC NAND memory​
Sequential Read	3.3 GB/s​	3.3 GB/s​	3.3 GB/s​	3.3 GB/s​
Sequential Write	1.7 GB/s​	1.9 GB/s​	1.7 GB/s​	1.9 GB/s​
Random Read (4 KB) IOPS	520,000​	520,000​	520,000​	520,000​
Random Write (4 KB) IOPS	68,000 70,000​	135,000​
Latency Read	85 µs​
Latency Write	15 µs​
Power	Idle	4 W​
Operating	9 W typical, 12W max​
Endurance	1 DWPD​	3 DWPD​
Dual-Port Support	​
Encryption	AES-256​
Power Loss Protection	​
MTBF	2 million hours​
Additional Information	Link​

Pricing is not publicly listed for the new 500 series as it’s dependent on the customer order and the exact drive configuration required – the products are now available for enterprise customers.

Related Reading:

• Enterprise NVMe Round-Up 2: SK Hynix, Samsung, DapuStor and DERA
• The Memblaze PBlaze5 C916 Enterprise SSD Review: High Performance and High Capacities
• The Memblaze PBlaze5 C916 Enterprise SSD Review: High Performance and High Capacities
• Memblaze Launches PBlaze5 SSDs: Enterprise 3D TLC, Up to 6 GB/s, 1M IOPS, 11 TB