With its first PCIe 5.0 SSD, Samsung finally tries to catch up with rivals such as Crucial but is it already too late?

(Image credit: Samsung)

After two years, Samsung’s first PCIe 5.0 consumer SSD has (almost) arrived
The 9100 Pro doubles speeds over the 990 Pro, hitting 14,800MB/s
Launching in April 2025 with up to 4TB models, plus an 8TB version later this year

After nearly two years of waiting, Samsung’s first consumer PCIe 5.0 SSD - that people can actually buy - has arrived. The 9100 Pro is the company’s attempt to finally compete with PCIe 5.0 drives from brands like Crucial, Gigabyte, and Corsair, which have been on the market for a while.

The 9100 Pro, which was teased in 2024 as the PM9E1, is a step up from Samsung’s previous 990 Pro SSD, nearly doubling speeds thanks to the PCIe 5.0 interface. The drive offers sequential read and write speeds of up to 14,800MB/s and 13,400MB/s, respectively, while also improving random read and write speeds to 2,200K IOPS and 2,600K IOPS. That’s a performance boost of up to 99% compared to its predecessor.

This puts it ahead of previous Samsung SSDs but brings it more in line with what competitors have been offering for some time. It is faster than the 1TB Crucial T705 though. That model offers 13,600MB/s and 10,200MB/s read/write speeds.

8TB coming soon

Power efficiency has also been improved, with Samsung claiming a 49% boost over the 990 Pro. The 9100 features a new heatsink design to help manage thermal performance, an area where earlier PCIe 5.0 drives famously struggled.

The 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB versions, offered with or without an 8.8mm heatsink, will be available in April 2025, while an 8TB model - Samsung’s first for consumers - will launch in the second half of the year. That will come with an 11.25mm heatsink .

The 9100 Pro is designed to be compatible with laptops, desktops, and game consoles and is aimed primarily at creatives, especially those working with AI content. Samsung will be bundling its Magician software with the SSD, which offers tools for drive optimization, data migration, and firmware updates.

The MSRPs for the 1TB, 2TB, and 4TB (non-heatsink) models are $199.99, $299.99, and $549.99, respectively. The heatsink versions cost slightly more at $219.99 for 1TB, $319.99 for 2TB, and $569.99 for 4TB. Pricing for the 8TB model has not been announced yet.

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Wayne Williams is a freelancer writing news for TechRadar Pro. He has been writing about computers, technology, and the web for 30 years. In that time he wrote for most of the UK’s PC magazines, and launched, edited and published a number of them too.