ThinkSystem Vendor Agnostic Read Intensive 6Gb SATA SSDs

The ThinkSystem Vendor Agnostic Read Intensive SATA SSDs are general-purpose SSDs with an average endurance of 1 drive write per day. These drives are non-vendor-specific, streamlining the ordering and delivery process. They are readily available, ensuring the shortest supply lead time. Some part numbers feature SED encryption for enhanced data security, even when the drive is removed from the server.

SED support: Table 1 indicates which drives support SED encryption.

Lenovo Read Intensive SSDs are suitable for read-intensive and general-purpose data center workloads. They offer outstanding IOPS/watt and cost/IOPS for enterprise solutions, making them an excellent choice for applications such as web serving, hyperscale cloud, content delivery, caching, databases, and analytics.

Self-encrypting drives (SEDs) encrypt data on-the-fly at the drive level with no performance impact. They allow for instant secure erasure, making data unreadable, and enable auto-locking to secure active data if a drive is misplaced or stolen. These features are crucial for businesses, especially those handling customer data.

Part Number Information

Table 1 lists the part numbers and feature codes for the drives.

Features

The Vendor Agnostic SSDs offer the following features:

• Low cost for read-intensive workloads from industry-leading SSD vendors.
• 6 Gbps SATA interface.
• SED drive encryption (TCG Opal or TCG Enterprise) for select part numbers.
• Advanced ECC Engine and End-to-End Data Protection.
• TLC V-NAND technology, which stacks vertical NAND layers in three dimensions to solve cell-to-cell interference that causes data corruption in planar NAND.
• Power Loss Protection (PLP) architecture.
• Support for Self-Monitoring, Analysis and Reporting Technology (S.M.A.R.T).

Read-Intensive (Entry) vs. Write-Intensive (Performance) SSDs: Both have similar read and write IOPS performance, but differ in endurance (lifetime). Read-Intensive SSDs have a better cost/IOPS ratio but lower endurance than Write-Intensive SSDs. SSD write endurance is measured by the total bytes of written data (TBW).

The TBW value represents the total bytes of written data a drive is guaranteed to complete. Reaching this limit does not cause immediate failure but indicates the maximum guaranteed writes. Drives will eventually enter a read-only mode after surpassing the TBW value. For Read-Intensive SSDs, careful planning is needed to ensure they are used in environments with up to 70% read/30% write to avoid exceeding the TBW before the expected life expectancy.

Benefits of Drive Encryption

Self-encrypting drives (SEDs) provide benefits in three main ways:

• Encrypting data on-the-fly at the drive level with no performance impact.
• Providing instant secure erasure (cryptographic erasure), making data unreadable.
• Enabling auto-locking to secure active data if a drive is misplaced or stolen while in use.

Automatic Encryption

Data security is vital. SEDs address challenges with performance, scalability, and complexity associated with traditional encryption methods. They do not require owners to maintain authentication keys for normal operation, as the drive handles encryption and decryption automatically.

Drive Retirement and Disposal

When drives are retired and leave the data center, the data on them is at significant risk. IT departments retire drives for various reasons, including warranty returns, disposal, or repurposing. Corporate data on these drives remains readable, posing a risk of data theft.

Current practices to erase data on retired drives often involve human intervention, which can lead to errors. SEDs eliminate the need for overwriting, destroying, or storing retired drives. Cryptographic erasure is an instantaneous process for securely retiring a drive.

Instant Secure Erase

SEDs provide instant data encryption key destruction via cryptographic erasure. This process replaces the encryption key, making previously encrypted data permanently inaccessible.

SEDs reduce IT operating expenses by simplifying asset control and disposal. They also help ensure compliance with privacy regulations without hindering IT efficiency. Government regulations may allow companies to avoid notifying customers of data theft if the data was encrypted and unreadable.

Furthermore, SEDs simplify decommissioning and preserve hardware value by:

• Eliminating the need to overwrite or destroy the drive.
• Securing warranty returns and expired lease returns.
• Enabling drives to be repurposed securely.

Auto-locking

Insider theft and misplacement are growing concerns. SEDs feature an auto-lock mode to secure active data against theft. When enabled, the drive's data encryption key is locked whenever the drive is powered down. Upon powering the drive back on, authentication is required to unlock the encryption key and access data, protecting against misplacement and theft.

Technical Specifications

The following tables provide the technical specifications for the 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch drives.

Tip: The M.2 drives support SED drive encryption.

Server Support

The following tables list the ThinkSystem servers that are compatible with these SSDs.

Warranty

The ThinkSystem Vendor Agnostic Read Intensive SATA SSDs come with a one-year, customer-replaceable unit (CRU) limited warranty. When installed in a supported server, these drives inherit the system's base warranty and any upgrades. Solid State Memory cells have a finite number of program/erase cycles. The warranty covers drives that have not reached the maximum guaranteed number of program/erase cycles, as documented in the Official Published Specifications.

Physical Specifications

The Vendor Agnostic SSDs have the following dimensions (without the hot-swap tray):

• Height: 7 mm (0.3 in.)
• Width: 70 mm (2.8 in.)
• Depth: 100 mm (4.0 in.)

Operating Environment

The Vendor Agnostic SSDs are supported in the following environment:

• Temperature: Operating: 0 to 70 °C (32 to 158 °F); Non-operating: -40 °C to 85 °C (-40 to 185 °F)
• Relative humidity: 5 to 95% (noncondensing)
• Maximum altitude: 3,050 m (10,000 ft)

Agency Approvals

The Vendor Agnostic SSDs conform to the following regulations:

• UL
• TUV
• FCC
• CE Mark
• C-Tick Mark
• BSMI (Taiwan)
• KCC (Korea EMI)

Related Publications and Links

For more information, see the following documents:

• Lenovo ThinkSystem SSD Portfolio comparison: https://lenovopress.com/lp1261-lenovo-thinksystem-ssd-portfolio
• Lenovo RAID Introduction: https://lenovopress.com/lp0578-lenovo-raid-introduction

Related Product Families

Product families related to this document are the following:

• Drives

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This document, LP2191, was created or updated on July 1, 2025.

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