#USB PCIE USB 3 CARD PORTABLE#
There are currently two shipping device solutions for USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 - the Silicon Motion SM2320 used in portable SSDs like the Kingston XS2000 is a native UFD controller, while the ASMedia ASM2364 is a bridge solution more suitable for use in enclosures. This review looks at the AK-ENU3M2-07, an aluminum enclosure sporting a USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 20Gbps Type-C upstream interface and a M.2 0/80 NVMe downstream port internally.
We reviewed a bunch of their M.2 SATA and NVMe enclosures last year, and came away impressed with their comprehensive lineup addressing different requirements. They have been maintaining a lineup of storage bridge products catering to different market segments since 2013. Since the mid-2010s, we have seen a regular stream of SSD enclosures hit the market, catering to 2.5", mSATA, and M.2 form-factors.Īkasa is a well-known manufacturer of thermal solutions for computing systems targeting industrial applications as well as home consumers.
In addition to portable SSDs, this type of segmentation is also applicable to storage enclosures.
Sub-400MBps+ class: USB 3.2 Gen 1 flash drives with direct flash-to-USB controllers. 400MBps+ class: USB 3.2 Gen 1 SSDs with SATA drives. 500MBps+ class: USB 3.2 Gen 2 SSDs with SATA drives. 1GBps+ class: USB 3.2 Gen 2 SSDs with PCIe 3.0 (x4 or x2) NVMe drives. 2GBps+ class: USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 SSDs with PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe drives. 2.5GBps+ class: Thunderbolt SSDs with PCIe 3.0 x4 NVMe drives. Recently, we have seen direct flash-to-USB controllers across all but the highest performance tier listed here. Traditionally, such drives have fallen into one of the six categories below, depending on the performance profile and internal components. These SSDs have also formed the base platform for portable SSDs. Starting from 2.5-inch disk drives barely able to saturate the SATA III (6 Gbps) interface in the early 2010s, we now have gumstick- and palm-sized drives with PCIe 4.0 support capable of sustaining more than 7000 MBps (56 Gbps). SSD speeds and storage capacity have improved significantly in the last decade, thanks to rapid advancements in flash technology as well as high-speed interfaces / protocols. The review below presents our evaluation report of Akasa's AK-ENU3M2-07 - a USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 enclosure for M.2 NVMe SSDs. We have been analyzing these aspects (in addition to regular performance numbers) in our reviews of the 20Gbps-performance class PSSDs and enclosures. The key challenges for enclosures and portable SSDs supporting USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 include handling power consumption and managing thermals. Host support has also started to look up. The last couple of years have seen many vendors introduce new products in this 20 Gbps-performance class - including portable SSDs and M.2 NVMe SSD enclosures. USB 3.2 Gen 2x2 enables the highest performance class (up to 20 Gbps) in USB devices without resorting to PCIe tunneling. 
From a bus-powered DAS viewpoint, Thunderbolt has been restricted to premium devices, but the variants of USB 3.2 have emerged as mass-market high-performance alternatives. These may range from thumb drives using an UFD controller to full-blown RAID towers carrying Infiniband and Thunderbolt links. The bridges may be external or internal, with the former ones enabling a range of direct-attached storage (DAS) units. Storage bridges have become an ubiquitous part of today's computing ecosystems.
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