Dell 400-BSKK 61.44TB PCI-E Gen4 NVMe Enterprise Solid State Drive.

Dell 400-BSKK 61.44TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe U.2 Enterprise SSD with Tray

The Dell 400-BSKK 61.44TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe U.2 2.5-inch Small Form Factor (SFF) Solid State Drive is designed for demanding enterprise workloads. With its cutting-edge 192-layer QLC 3D NAND flash technology, this drive provides massive storage, reliable endurance, and exceptional speed for data-intensive applications. Built for Dell PowerEdge servers of the 14G, 15G, 16G, and 17G generations, it ensures seamless compatibility and uncompromising reliability.

Key Highlights

• Massive 61.44TB storage capacity in a compact 2.5-inch form factor
• Utilizes PCIe Gen4 x4 NVMe interface for ultra-fast data transfers
• Powered by advanced 192L QLC 3D NAND flash memory
• Sequential read performance up to 7000 MB/s
• Sequential write throughput reaching 3000 MB/s
• Supports over 1 million random read IOPS for extreme workloads
• Engineered for long-term endurance with 2,000,000 hours MTBF
• Integrated tray for seamless installation in Dell servers

General Specifications

Manufacturer Details

• Brand: Dell
• Part Number: 400-BSKK

Physical Characteristics

• Form Factor: 2.5-inch SFF (15mm)
• Interface: PCIe Gen4 x4, NVMe protocol
• Flash Type: QLC NAND
• Lithography: 192-layer technology
• Shock Resistance: Up to 1000 G

Performance Insights

Sequential Operations

• Read Speed: Up to 7000 MB/s
• Write Speed: Up to 3000 MB/s

Random Workloads

• Random Read (4K, QD256): 1,005,000 IOPS
• Random Write (16K, QD256): 42,600 IOPS

Reliability and Durability

• Mean Time Between Failures (MTBF): 2,000,000 hours
• Optimized for enterprise-grade workloads
• Designed for consistent uptime and maximum data integrity

Enterprise-Level Benefits

Scalability for Modern Data Centers

This high-capacity solid state drive allows IT departments to scale storage without compromising on speed or efficiency. The compact 2.5-inch format ensures compatibility with dense server environments, delivering a significant reduction in physical footprint compared to legacy storage options.

Accelerated Business Applications

From artificial intelligence workloads and real-time analytics to cloud storage and virtualization, the Dell 61.44TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe SSD accelerates performance where it matters most. Its remarkable IOPS and bandwidth ensure fast response times, minimal latency, and smooth handling of large transaction volumes.

Energy Efficiency and Reduced Costs

Compared to traditional spinning disks, this SSD significantly reduces energy consumption and cooling requirements. Enterprises benefit from lower operational expenses and improved sustainability without compromising on capacity or reliability.

Ideal Use Cases

Data-Intensive Applications

The drive is built to handle environments where large-scale data processing is critical. This includes artificial intelligence, big data analytics, machine learning, and scientific research.

Cloud and Virtualization Environments

Perfectly suited for large-scale cloud deployments, this SSD enables businesses to maximize VM density and streamline storage resources across virtualized infrastructures.

Mission-Critical Enterprise Workloads

With extremely high endurance ratings and robust fault tolerance, it supports enterprise tasks such as transactional databases, ERP systems, and financial applications that require consistent uptime.

Technical Breakdown at a Glance

• Storage Capacity: 61.44TB
• Interface: PCIe Gen4 x4 NVMe
• Form Factor: 2.5-inch, 15mm thickness
• NAND Type: QLC 3D NAND (192L)
• Sequential Read: Up to 7000 MB/s
• Sequential Write: Up to 3000 MB/s
• Random Read: 1,005,000 IOPS (4K, QD256)
• Random Write: 42,600 IOPS (16K, QD256)
• MTBF: 2 million hours
• Shock Resistance: 1000G

Future-Proof Storage Investment

As enterprises generate and process ever-larger datasets, investing in high-density SSD solutions like the Dell 61.44TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe U.2 drive ensures organizations are prepared for upcoming workloads. With unmatched performance, massive storage, and reliability, it is a critical asset for businesses focused on growth, digital transformation, and competitive advantage.

Dell 400-BSKK — Enterprise-Grade 61.44TB PCIe Gen4 NVMe U.2 (2.5") Solid State Drive

The Dell 400-BSKK is a purpose-built enterprise storage component: a high-capacity, high-density 61.44TB NVMe solid state drive in a 2.5-inch small form factor with a U.2 connector and carrier tray. Designed for modern PowerEdge servers and storage arrays, this drive combines the low latency of NVMe over PCI Express with the rack-friendly 2.5" U.2 package and an enterprise-grade NAND implementation to deliver a reliable building block for database servers, virtualization platforms, software-defined storage and other I/O-intensive workloads. :contentReference[oaicite:0]{index=0}

Key attributes and quick specification overview

• Part number: 400-BSKK
• Capacity: 61.44TB (raw, enterprise usable)
• Interface: PCIe (NVMe) — Gen4 x4
• Form factor: 2.5-inch small form factor (SFF), U.2 connector, compatible with U.2 drive bays and trays
• NAND type: Enterprise-class (vendor-implemented QLC/3D NAND typical for this density; controller and firmware tuned for endurance and telemetry)
• Target market: Hyperscale servers, enterprise PowerEdge server lines (14G/15G/16G/17G), storage enclosures and NVMe RAID/adapter environments

These attributes make the Dell 400-BSKK an option when density and cost-per-terabyte matter while still retaining NVMe performance characteristics required by modern storage stacks. :contentReference[oaicite:1]{index=1}

Capacity density and rack real estate

When designing systems for large datasets, backup pools, or archival and hot/cold tier mixes, the ability to pack large amounts of capacity into compact drive bays is valuable. A 61.44TB 2.5" NVMe drive allows system architects to maximize usable terabytes per rack-unit when compared to many traditional HDDs or smaller SFF SSDs. This density reduces the number of servers and chassis required, which lowers power, cooling and floor-space costs while simplifying cabling and management.

NVMe performance for modern workloads

PCIe Gen4 x4 NVMe provides substantially higher IOPS and bandwidth than SATA and prior-generation PCIe links for small random I/O and large sequential transfers respectively. For latency-sensitive database transactions, virtual machine boot storms, containerized microservices, and high-concurrency read/write tasks, NVMe's protocol efficiency and parallelism reduce application response time and increase throughput per server. NVMe over U.2 also simplifies deployment: the 2.5" U.2 form fits standard server bays and leverages existing hot-swap trays and backplanes. :contentReference[oaicite:2]{index=2}

Enterprise reliability, telemetry and manageability

Enterprise NVMe drives like the 400-BSKK typically include features that go beyond consumer SSDs: power-loss protection, thermal throttling and monitoring, SMART and NVMe telemetry reporting, enterprise firmware that manages wear leveling and reserved spare area, and support for common server management tools. These features enable system administrators to integrate drive health data into monitoring systems and perform preemptive replacement before failures become critical.

Detailed technical breakdown

Form factor and physical compatibility

The U.2 (SFF-8639) connector used by this 2.5" drive is engineered for enterprise server backplanes and drive sleds. The drive ships with a tray/carrier that aligns with Dell PowerEdge hot-swap bays, enabling tool-less insertion/removal in compatible chassis. Because it's a standard 2.5" SFF device, it fits in the same physical bay as many SAS/SATA drives while offering NVMe electrical performance — a convenient mix of form factor familiarity and modern interface speed. :contentReference[oaicite:3]{index=3}

Interface: PCIe Gen4 x4 (NVMe)

PCIe Gen4 provides double the per-lane throughput of Gen3, enabling much higher aggregate bandwidth when paired with an NVMe controller and optimized firmware. In practical terms, the Gen4 x4 link reduces bottlenecks for sequential reads and writes and allows internal controllers to service a large number of parallel queues efficiently — important for multi-tenant virtualized environments and scale-out storage nodes.

NAND and endurance considerations

High-density enterprise SSDs often use QLC or highly stacked TLC/3D NAND in combination with sophisticated controllers and firmware that apply over-provisioning, SLC caching, and background data relocation to achieve the balance of capacity, endurance and predictable performance. For deployments where write-amplification and endurance are concerns (heavy database logging, write-intensive caching), administrators should plan endurance budgets and consider mixed-tier strategies (e.g., mix higher-endurance NVMe drives with these high-density drives) to match workload profiles.

Thermal and power design

Large-capacity NVMe drives can dissipate more heat under sustained workloads. The provided drive tray and carrier are designed to maximize airflow across the drive body when mounted in supported Dell chassis. When populating servers with multiple high-density NVMe drives, ensure the server's recommended cooling options (fans, airflow baffles, and placement) are followed to maintain sustained performance and long-term reliability.

Deployment scenarios and ideal use cases

Primary use cases

• Hyperscale capacity pools: Large object stores, cold-hot tiering layers and multi-PB scale-out filesystems where high TB/drive reduces chassis count.
• Backup and snapshot retention: Fast restore windows with NVMe read performance and compact physical footprint.
• Data analytics and log ingest: High sequential throughput benefits ETL pipelines and batch analytics scans.
• Virtualization density: Hosts running many small VMs can take advantage of NVMe IOPS and lower per-GB cost compared to smaller enterprise NVMe SKUs.

When to avoid

This high-capacity NVMe drive may not be the best fit for workloads that are extremely write-heavy with tight endurance requirements (e.g., intensive OLTP logging without write amplification mitigation). In such cases, consider drives marketed explicitly for high-endurance (enterprise SLC/TLC with higher DWPD ratings) or deploy mixed-tier caching where a small number of ultra-endurance drives absorb heavy writes while the large capacity drives store colder data.

Performance expectations and benchmarking considerations

Performance for enterprise NVMe drives depends on many factors: controller/firmware tuning, host CPU and PCIe lanes, driver stack, queue depth, and workload mix (random small I/O vs sequential large I/O). While synthetic benchmarks offer useful comparative data points, real-world application-level testing (e.g., database OLTP measurements, VDI boot storms, container startup patterns) provides the most actionable signal for provisioning. For architects evaluating these drives, test them under representative concurrency and data patterns rather than relying solely on peak throughput numbers.

Storage reviewers and enterprise testers emphasize that raw throughput is only part of the story; consistent tail-latency, QoS and predictable performance under sustained activity are crucial metrics for production systems. Planning should include headroom for QoS requirements and consideration for workload shaping where necessary. :contentReference[oaicite:4]{index=4}

Benchmark tips for lab validation

1. Use a mix of queue depths (1, 4, 16, 32) to emulate light-to-heavy concurrency.
2. Measure both sustained sequential throughput and small-block random IOPS.
3. Monitor device temperature and thermal throttling events during long runs.
4. Track SMART/NVMe telemetry before and after tests to spot anomalies.
5. Repeat runs after periods of idle time and after power cycles to verify recovery behavior.

Compatibility and integration notes

Server and chassis support

The drive is typically sold and validated for Dell PowerEdge server lines (including 14G–17G generations) and is intended to be used in systems with U.2 backplanes and appropriate NVMe passthrough or RAID controllers that support NVMe drives. When integrating into a server fleet, confirm firmware compatibility (BIOS/UEFI, system firmware and NVMe driver versions) and the server vendor's compatibility matrix to ensure full support for monitoring and hot-swap behavior. :contentReference[oaicite:5]{index=5}

Controller and software considerations

Some server RAID controllers do not natively manage NVMe devices in the same way they do SATA/SAS drives; instead, NVMe offers direct host communication. If your environment relies on hardware RAID features, ensure the controller supports NVMe in the desired configuration (or plan for software-defined storage or NVMe-capable RAID appliances). Additionally, check that OS-level NVMe drivers and vendor management tools are installed to collect telemetry and apply firmware updates when required.

Firmware and lifecycle management

Enterprise SSDs receive periodic firmware updates to improve reliability, performance and address edge-case behaviors. Implement a maintenance plan to test and deploy vendor-supplied firmware updates during scheduled windows; maintain inventory tracking (serial numbers, part numbers) and align firmware baselines across systems to simplify troubleshooting.

Practical buying guide and procurement tips

What to verify before purchase

• Confirm the Dell part number (400-BSKK) and capacity (61.44TB) match your procurement records.
• Validate that your target servers support U.2 NVMe drives and have sufficient PCIe Gen4 lanes to feed the drives without bottlenecks.
• Ask the vendor for the drive's detailed datasheet covering endurance (DWPD or TBW), recommended operating temperature range, and power draw under idle and active conditions.
• Check warranty terms, RMA procedures and whether an advanced exchange or on-site support contract is available.
• Consider buying a small evaluation quantity for lab testing before wide-scale roll-out.

Price-to-performance considerations

High-density NVMe drives are often positioned to optimize cost-per-GB while accepting tradeoffs in endurance relative to smaller, higher-cost-per-GB NVMe SKUs. Create a cost model that includes device price, expected lifetime write volume (TBW), and expected replacement cadence; this will let you compare total cost of ownership (TCO) across drive tiers more accurately than sticker price alone.

Security, encryption and data protection

Many enterprise SSDs support hardware-based encryption (e.g., TCG Opal or native controller encryption). If data-at-rest encryption is required for compliance or security policy, confirm the drive's encryption capabilities, key management compatibility and whether your ecosystem supports out-of-band key management or self-encrypting drive (SED) workflows. For drives used in shared or multi-tenant environments, encryption and secure erase procedures should be part of the lifecycle policy to ensure data is unrecoverable when drives are repurposed or decommissioned.

Comparisons and alternatives

Alternatives to consider

If your priority is endurance over capacity, consider enterprise NVMe drives with higher DWPD ratings (TLC or SLC-based enterprise models). If raw cost-per-GB is paramount but NVMe is optional, dense SATA SSDs may offer lower cost while sacrificing latency and IOPS. Emerging PCIe Gen5 NVMe drives present future-proofing options with even greater bandwidth — however, Gen5 requires compatible host hardware to unlock the benefits.

How the Dell 400-BSKK stacks up

The Dell 400-BSKK positions itself as a high-capacity NVMe building block suitable for density-optimized deployments in the PowerEdge ecosystem. Its value proposition is clearly in the TB-per-drive metric and U.2 compatibility with existing server trays and management systems; deciding whether it is the right choice depends on workload endurance needs and whether your servers can feed the drives with sufficient PCIe bandwidth. :contentReference[oaicite:6]{index=6}

Operational scenarios and design patterns

Design pattern: Tiered NVMe architecture

One effective design is to layer storage tiers: a small pool of low-latency, high-endurance NVMe drives for write-heavy, latency-sensitive workloads, backed by a larger pool of high-density NVMe (like the 61.44TB drives) for bulk capacity, snapshots and historical data. This pattern preserves responsiveness for hot data while benefiting from the lower cost-per-TB of density-optimized drives.

Design pattern: Caching and write-coalescing

Using a caching layer (software or hardware) in front of high-density drives can improve perceived endurance and performance. Cache controllers can absorb short-term write bursts and coalesce small writes into larger sequential patterns that are friendlier to QLC/3D NAND, reducing write amplification on the backend drives.

Checklist for IT operators — pre-deployment and roll-out

• Confirm server U.2 slot and backplane compatibility with NVMe drives.
• Verify the server's PCIe lane provisioning (Gen4 lanes available and not shared in a way that constrains throughput).
• Obtain the manufacturer's datasheet and endurance figures (TBW or DWPD) and record them in procurement documentation.
• Plan a small pilot: 3–5 drives in a non-production node to validate firmware, thermal behavior, and performance under representative workloads.
• Integrate drive telemetry into your monitoring and alerting platform before wide rollout.
• Document RMA contact and retention policies for warranty and replacement.

Additional resources and next steps for purchasers

• Request the full vendor datasheet and detailed endurance/warranty terms from your supplier.
• Order evaluation units and run application-specific performance tests.
• Coordinate with server firmware/BIOS teams to ensure NVMe and U.2 support is enabled and patched.
• Plan monitoring and lifecycle policies to maintain predictable long-term operation.