Samsung Starts Mass Production of 256bit V-NAND

With super large SSDs arriving for both consumers and enterprise, the ability to produce dense NAND dies is critical. As with all silicon products, a denser die means lower costs on the same wafer size as it means you can get more usable dies out of the same wafer if the dies are denser. Samsung looks to have raced ahead of its competitors with the mass production of 256 Gbit (32GB) 3D V-NAND dies.

Samsung has always been at the forefront of extracting more efficiency from their wafers with dense dies. They were the first to arrive at market with TLC dies and the first to get 3D NAND out. With the first 32GB 3D V-NAND, Samsung has the ability to offer cheaper NAND or to reap a larger margin. One major caveat though is that the 256 Gbit dies are actually TLC, which normally is slower but denser than the usual SLC or MLC and suffers from slower speeds and lower lifespan. This shouldn’t be an issue though as V-NAND TLC is just as fast as 2D MLC and the lifespan should be improved compared to 2D TLC.

Samsung likely plans to use these new dies in their tablet and smartphone lines where space and cost savings are always welcome. We can also expect the V-NAND to show up in the refresh of the 850 EVO TLC SSD lineup later on. With ever cheaper NAND, the 16GB tier of smartphones may soon disappear from flagship devices as NAND gets cheaper and cheaper; you can find the Samsung release here.