The reason Apple uses NVMe storage technology on their iPhone.
The computer world is developing rapidly. The term computer world includes personal computers, laptops, smartphones, and all the stuff related to computing. Computer and smartphone manufacturers are spending a lot of money to improve their current technologies so that their upcoming devices become more powerful in terms of performance and power efficiency. Storage technology plays a vital role in the case of performance, efficiency, and capability of handling tasks. Flash storage is used in personal computers, laptops, and smartphones. In smartphones, UFS storage and NVMe storage are mainly used. All the Android smartphone manufacturers use UFS storage. On the other hand, Apple uses the NVMe type storage for their iPhone though NVMe is mainly used in personal computers, laptops, and data centers. In this article, we will discuss about the UFS and NVMe storage, the difference between these two, and then find out the reason why Apple uses the NVMe storage in their iPhone instead of UFS.
The full meaning of the UFS is Universal Flash Storage. It is a non-volatile memory used in smartphones, tablets, and digital cameras. UFS storage is the replacement of the eMMCs storage. MIPI Alliance’s M-PHY high-speed serial interface is used as the electrical interface for the UFS that is targeted for 23.32Gps per lane with 2.9GBs per lane, as per the latest version of UFS 4.0. This structure ensures the possibility of compatibility and efficiency for portable devices. UFS provides a full-duplex interface that allows UFS storage to read and write at the same time. UFS uses an architecture that consists of a UFS host controller layer, a transport layer, and a physical layer. The physical layer is known as MIPI Alliance’s M-PHY. The host layer is the interface between the host and the UFS storage device. Here the host indicated the user device such smartphone. UFS uses the advanced power management system as it is developed to work with low power.
What is NVMe storage
The full meaning of NVMe is Non-Volatile Memory Express. It is a high-speed connect interface that is used for SSDs and other flash storage. It creates a bridge for SOCsd and CPU to modify and access the data. Simply, NVMe storage is a flash storage that uses an NVMe controller. NVMe controller chip manages all the data requests of the CPU and fetches the data as well as the write request. NVMe is generally connected with the PCIe as NVMe is a protocol that is used for data handling where PCIe is the physical interface and the purpose of PCIe is to connect the storage with the Motherboard. NVMe storage is used for powerful tasks where lots of data are handled such as personal computers, laptops, and data centers. NVMe storage consumes high power compared to UFS storage but consumes less power than the HDDs. That’s why NVMe storages are used in the system where higher performance is required. In the case of a mobile phone, there is no need for higher performance like the PC, and power consumption is also a big deal and that’s why UFS storage is ideal for smartphones, tablets, and digital cameras.
Comparison between the UFS and NVMe storage
UFS | NVMe |
Used in the Mobile Devices | Used in the SSDs in various systems where higher performance is required such as personal computers, laptops, and data center |
Used MIPI Alliance serial interface | Used in PCIe (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express) |
Used for the system where so much high performance is not required; higher latency compared to the NVMe | Used for the system where higher performance is required. Higher data read and write speed |
Scalability is lower and only used in mobile devices | Scalability is higher; used in various systems including the data center |
Power efficiency as used in mobile devices | Power efficient compared to the HDDs but more power is required while compared to the UFS |
Why Apple use NVMe in the iPhone
Apple is always concerned about the performance and user experience of their device. They do not compromise when it comes to the higher performance of the device. It can be a Desktop, Laptop, or mobile phone, Apple always wants to provide higher performance. As the NVMe storage provides higher performance with higher read and write speed, Apple chose the NVMe storage. However, the NVMe storage developed by Apple to use in the iPhone is different compared to the NVMe storage used in the computer. Apple made a low-power custom NVMe controller for their iPhones and iPads. By doing this, they make their NVMe storage of capable reading and writing with a higher speed as well as consuming low power. Apple’s mobile NVMe storage is lower power and less fast than the NVMe storage that is used in the PC but they provide higher performance when compared to the UFS storage used in the Android phone. Another thing is that the Processor and the operating system of Apple are more advanced and designed and controlled by themselves. That’s why they can optimize the power consumption of the overall device.
Conclusion
The latest version of the UFS storage is UFS 4.0 which reduces the gap with NVMe storage in terms of read and write speed. However, still now iPhone custom mobile NVMe storage provides higher performance and lower latency than the UFS storage. Apple will stick to using NVMe for the iPhone storage and will try to improve the technology behind this as they are already ahead in the storage speed. In the Android phone market, the low-budget phones are still now using another storage technology known as eMMCs storage which was used before the invention of UFS while mid-budget Android phones are using UFS 2.0. UFS 3.0 and UFS 4.0 still now only exist in the flagship Android phone.
