SK hynix will launch consumer solid state drives here for the first time, the company said Monday, as the remote working trend boosted demand for personal storage devices.

The chipmaker will introduce two models -- Gold P31 and Gold S31 – which were launched in the US market in 2020 and 2019, respectively, and received positive reviews.

Gold P31 is an PCI Express SSD model, the world‘s first consumer SSD with 128-layer NAND, that can be used for any motherboard that has an available slot.

Listed specifications include a performance of 3500 megabytes per second read speed and 3200 MBps write speed.

Available in capacities of 500 gigabyes and 1 terabytes, the Gold P31 model also features Hyperwrite technology, offering optimized speeds for gamers and content producers, according to SK hynix.

Another model to be launched is the SATA-based Gold S31 that comes in capacities of 250GB, 500GB and 1TB, with listed specifications of 560 MBps read and 525 MBps write speeds.

With the launches, SK Hynix will vie with Samsung Electronics in a consumer gadget segment that is seeing an increasing demand for SSD, with people working from home and using personal computers amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Samsung Electronics in 2020 launched its second-generation quad-level cell (QLC) flash drive, the 870 QVO SATA SSD with 8TB capacity and PCIe SSD model 980 Pro.

By Shim Woo-hyun (ws@heraldcorp.com)