facebook rss twitter

ASUS set to launch own-brand PCI Express SSDs in May

by Mark Tyson on 19 April 2013, 14:00

Tags: ASUSTeK (TPE:2357), Toshiba (TYO:6502)

Quick Link: HEXUS.net/qabvbv

Add to My Vault: x

ASUS is expected to launch a range of SSD drives under its Republic of Gamers (ROG) sub-brand sometime in May, according to a new report published on DigiTimes today. The SSDs will be part of the ROG Raidr Express range, which we caught a little sniff of at CES, Las Vegas earlier in the year.

PCI Express 2.0 x4 interface

The ROG Raidr is said to deliver “significantly faster data transfer speeds and game loading times than SATA-based SSD storage, thanks to the greater bandwidth of its PCI Express interface”. The “Raidr” name provides a hint to how these new drives will offer better performance than SATA alternatives. The Raidr PCI card contains multiple SSD drives in RAID0 mode and utilises the PCI Express 2.0 x4 interface to eliminate bandwidth bottlenecks reported XBit Labs, during the CES show.

ASUS has officially stated that its new performance storage solution “maintains full compatibility with all major chipsets and operating systems, and can be used as a bootable drive for accelerated PC performance across the board”. DigiTimes explains that the Raidr Express series features a built-in AHCI driver “and supports both legacy and UEFI BIOS systems”. ASUS will also bundle some performance and longevity enhancing software including ASUS SSD TweakIt and ROG HybriDisk.

The DigiTimes sources also reveal that the new drives will feature MLC flash supplied by Toshiba. It is also suggested this business initiative may be strategic for ASUS to gain better purchasing leverage with regard to SSDs.

830MB/s read & 810MB/s write

ASUS has just teased us a little bit more info with the speed statistics of a Raidr Express storage card, “830MB/s read and 810MB/s write speeds” statistics were touted and a new image released by the Nordic ROG team.

We look forward to further official details and to testing these drives when they become available next month.



HEXUS Forums :: 17 Comments

Login with Forum Account

Don't have an account? Register today!
I'd be amazed if they sell many of these.

How many people are genuinely frustrated about how slow their SSDs are for gaming purposes?
snootyjim
I'd be amazed if they sell many of these.

How many people are genuinely frustrated about how slow their SSDs are for gaming purposes?

The few seconds I have to wait for a Skyrim area transition are unacceptable I tell you, I see the text but don't have time to read it which is so annoying. I *must* have a faster SSD so I don't even get teased by this tidbits of lore I don't get chance to read.
Depends on the price premium, but if it's not too much more then why not get a neat card that slots in your system rather than a drive? Saves on a couple of cables and runs faster.

If people weren't fussed about the speed of their SSDs then there wouldn't be a whole premium sector pushing out faster drives.
Slower read/writes than the competition won't help them out, so if the price is lower, they'll sell quite a few - also if people are silly enough to buy based on brand only. I wonder if this will bring the Revos price down, since they've not had any competition.
Not being hugely technically minded, but is making a PCI interface drive inherently (significantly) more expensive than making a SATA III drive? More speed doesn't exactly hurt, and as already mentioned is a ‘neater’ solution physically than cables to a drive. I think I do agree on the main market for this one not necessarily being Gamers BUT - if the price is right, I'd take it over a standard SSD. If the speed difference didn't matter, why would ‘premium’ SSDs keep selling for premium prices? Why would SATA III matter, rather than SATA II, and how can a premium drive differentiate further when they are starting to saturate the SATA III connection?