The emergence of NVMe SSDs in the compact M.2 form-factor, coupled with the rising popularity of Thunderbolt 3, has enabled a new class of portable high-performance flash storage devices. External SSDs with a Thunderbolt interface have been around for a few years now, but, the price to performance ratio had prevented them from getting wide acceptance. Things are changing with the portable Thunderbolt 3 SSDs, and wallet-friendly choices are emerging, thanks to Phison’s reference designs that went public at the 2018 CES.
