New Micron PCIe 6.0 SSDs support speeds of 30.25 GB/s

Against the background of PCIe 5.0 solid-state drives that transfer data at speeds of up to 15 GB/s, the novelty from Micron looks like a real leap: the 9650 Pro model showed a result of 30.25 GB/s in sequential reading and writing. However, this is not a serial device, but an engineering prototype.

The prototype SSD was spotted by Tom’s Hardware journalists at the Astera Labs booth at Computex 2025. The drive was used to demonstrate the capabilities of the new generation PCIe 6.0 switches and bandwidth management software. The device is installed in a massive metal case and connected via an expansion card – the form factor is clearly different from the usual M.2 solutions.

The drive is currently at the EVT3 (Engineering Validation Test 3) stage – this is the stage at which performance tuning and compatibility testing are taking place. Ahead are the DVT (Design Validation) and PVT (Production Process Validation) tests. There is no talk of a consumer launch yet.

An important nuance: at the moment, no mass processor supports PCIe 6.0, and PCI-SIG certification is expected no earlier than the end of 2025. This means that even in theory, it is still impossible to use such drives in real systems – there are not enough compatible chipsets, motherboards and platforms.

The interest in the demonstration is not only due to the record speed. PCIe 6.0-based solutions allow data to be transferred between drives and other components directly without the participation of the central processor, thereby reducing the load on the system.

Earlier, Micron and Astera Labs have already demonstrated the operation of PCIe 6.0 at DesignCon. Then they managed to achieve a transfer speed of 27 GB/s. The new result of 30.25 GB/s indicates steady progress, but for mass adoption the technology is still a thing of the future.