The Samsung 9100 Pro deal at Amazon has brought the 2TB PCIe 5.0 SSD down to $399.99, according to the retailer’s listing, cutting 41% from its list price and returning it to the kind of pricing seen around the most recent Prime Day sale.
The awkward bit for Samsung’s own lineup is the spacing. Amazon lists the 2TB Samsung 990 Pro, a PCIe 4.0 model, at $389.99. The newer 2TB Samsung 990 is listed at $369.99. That leaves only $10 between the 9100 Pro and 990 Pro, and $30 between the 9100 Pro and the lower-priced 990.
Those gaps matter because the 9100 Pro is not a small step up on paper. Samsung rates the 2TB 9100 Pro for sequential reads up to 14,700 MB/s and sequential writes up to 13,400 MB/s. It uses 236-layer Samsung TLC V8 flash, according to the product details cited by Tom’s Hardware.
By comparison, the 2TB 990 Pro is rated at about 7,450 MB/s for reads and 6,900 MB/s for writes. The 2TB Samsung 990 is rated for up to 7,250 MB/s reads and 6,450 MB/s writes, with up to 850K random read IOPS and 1,200K random write IOPS. The 990 also moves from TLC to QLC NAND, according to Tom’s Hardware.
Is the Samsung 9100 Pro worth it over the 990?
On the listed prices alone, the 9100 Pro is the more aggressive deal if the buyer’s PC can actually use PCIe 5.0 storage. PCIe 5.0 gives the drive more available interface bandwidth than PCIe 4.0, which is why Samsung can advertise roughly twice the sequential throughput of its Gen 4 models.
That does not mean every system will benefit. A PCIe 5.0 SSD needs a motherboard slot that supports PCIe Gen 5 speeds. If a system only has PCIe 4.0 M.2 slots, or if its only Gen 5 M.2 slot is already occupied, the 990 Pro remains the more sensible fit among the listed Samsung options.
An SSD stores data on flash memory rather than spinning platters, so its speed depends heavily on the controller, NAND type, cache behavior and the connection to the rest of the PC. Sequential speeds are most relevant to large transfers and some professional workloads; they are not a magic wand for every desktop task, despite what storage marketing departments would like you to believe.
Tom’s Hardware said its review of the Samsung 9100 Pro placed the drive near the top of its benchmark charts. In its PCMark 10 Storage testing, Tom’s Hardware said the 9100 Pro scored higher than any other drive it had tested.
What are the Samsung SSD prices at Amazon?
- Samsung 9100 Pro 2TB PCIe 5.0 SSD: $399.99 at Amazon, listed as 41% off.
- Samsung 990 Pro 2TB PCIe 4.0 SSD: $389.99 at Amazon.
- Samsung 990 2TB PCIe 4.0 SSD: $369.99 at Amazon.
The practical buying line is blunt: choose the 9100 Pro if the target PC has a PCIe 5.0 M.2 slot and the workload can use the extra speed. Pick the 990 Pro if the machine is limited to PCIe 4.0 or if the Gen 5 slot is unavailable. The 990 saves another $20 versus the 990 Pro, but the 9100 Pro sitting just $30 above it makes that budget argument thinner than usual.
Tom’s Hardware also noted that RAM and SSD pricing remains elevated compared with a year ago, citing pressure on memory and NAND supply while manufacturers increase production and AI hyperscalers absorb demand. In that context, a narrow price gap between Samsung’s fastest consumer Gen 5 SSD and its Gen 4 models is the part of the deal worth reading twice.
This story draws on original reporting from Tom's Hardware.
