Samsung has announced that it has started mass producing the industry's first ultra-fast 128GB memory chips based on the Universal Flash Storage (UFS) 2.0 specification. The announcement comes right before the Galaxy S6 and Galaxy S6 Edge are set to be unveiled, with both devices expected to have a 128GB model (these UFS 2.0 chips also have 32 and 64GB versions, the other two storage variants that will be offered on the two flagships.)
Samsung's language in the press release seems to suggest that we might see the microSD slot disappear from flagship devices, as higher capacity chips will begin to be mass produced and be easily available to OEMs in the mobile industry. In terms of performance, Samsung says the new ultra-fast UFS memory “conducts 19,000 input/output operations per second (IOPS) for random reading, which is 2.7 times faster than the most common embedded memory for high-end smartphones today, the eMMC 5.0.”
The new chips also consume less power and have higher random read speeds. With smartphones expected to be faster and more powerful in the coming months, this faster storage standard will no doubt come in handy in matching the performance improvements gained by other components like mobile CPUs and RAM chips.
