Sandisk Splits From WD And Launches Optimus SSD Brand
Sandisk is shaking up the SSD world with a full rebrand of its popular solid state drives. If you have been shopping for gaming storage under the WD name, there is an important change coming that you will want to know about.
For years, many SSDs sold under the WD brand, especially the WD Black gaming models, were actually developed and produced by Sandisk. Sandisk used to be a subsidiary of Western Digital, but that changed in February of last year when WD and Sandisk split. WD decided to focus on hard drives while Sandisk became an independent company focused on SSDs.
The split went smoothly on the business side, but it created a confusing branding situation. Some of the best gaming SSDs still carried the WD name even though Sandisk was now operating on its own. To fix that, Sandisk is rolling out a new unified brand for its internal SSDs called Sandisk Optimus.
Meet Sandisk Optimus: New Names For Familiar Gaming SSDs
The new Optimus family will gather Sandisk’s consumer and gaming SSDs into a clear three tier lineup:
- Sandisk Optimus
- Sandisk Optimus GX
- Sandisk Optimus GX Pro
The naming might sound typical for tech, loaded with letters and the word Pro, but the goal is simple. Sandisk wants gamers and PC builders to easily recognize which drives are which as WD branding fades out.
Several well known drives are being renamed under the Optimus lineup, with their hardware staying the same:
- WD Black SN7100 will become the Sandisk Optimus GX 7100. This is one of the top SSDs for gaming and will keep its performance while gaining the new name.
- WD Blue SN5100 will become the Sandisk Optimus 5100, a more mainstream option under the base Optimus label.
- WD Black SN850X will match up with the Sandisk Optimus GX Pro 850X, staying in the high end performance tier targeted at demanding gamers and power users.
The WD Black SN8100 is not yet officially listed on the Sandisk Optimus site, but from the images Sandisk has shared it will likely become the Optimus GX Pro 8100. It seems Sandisk is trying to keep the model numbering familiar so existing WD users can easily map old names to new ones.
The key takeaway for gamers is that these are not totally new products. They are mostly the same SSDs you already know, only with new branding. That means if you already trust a WD Black drive for your rig, its Sandisk Optimus equivalent should offer the same performance and reliability.
New 2230 SSD And What This Means For PC Gamers
Alongside the rebrand, Sandisk is also introducing a new compact 2230 form factor drive, the Sandisk Optimus GX 7100M. This SSD will offer up to 2 TB of capacity with read speeds up to 7250 MB per second.
The 2230 size is especially interesting for portable and small form factor devices like handheld gaming PCs and some laptops. Faster and larger 2230 drives are becoming more important as handheld gaming systems and compact builds need more storage without sacrificing space or speed. With the Optimus GX 7100M, Sandisk is clearly targeting those use cases.
Sandisk says the Optimus family is built to handle demanding workloads ranging from developer tasks to high end gaming. In practice, that means these drives are tuned for:
- Fast game load times and level transitions
- Quick transfers of large game files and assets
- Smooth performance when multitasking or streaming while gaming
- Handling big project files for content creation
The company admits indirectly that the rebrand is more of a necessity than an optional style change. Years of reputation built under the WD name will take time to fully transfer over to Sandisk in the minds of gamers and PC builders. However, under the hood, the SSDs are still built on the same joint venture technology between Sandisk and Kioxia, which has powered many of WD and Sandisk’s best performing drives.
For anyone planning a new gaming PC build or upgrade between now and 2026, it is worth noting the rollout timing. Sandisk says products under the new Optimus brand will gradually appear through the first half of 2026. During that period, both WD branded and Sandisk Optimus branded versions of essentially the same hardware may be on store shelves at the same time.
If you are shopping and see a WD Black SN7100 or SN850X next to Optimus GX 7100 or Optimus GX Pro 850X, you are essentially choosing between different labels on the box rather than different performance tiers. The underlying hardware should be the same high performance mix that made these drives some of the top choices for gaming SSDs in the first place.
In short, Sandisk Optimus is not a complete reboot of the company’s SSD lineup. It is more a nameplate swap and brand consolidation that should make things clearer in the long run. Gamers still get the fast NVMe storage they expect, just now under the Sandisk Optimus badge instead of WD Black or WD Blue.
Original article and image: https://www.pcgamer.com/hardware/ssds/the-names-of-some-of-the-most-popular-ssds-are-changing-so-their-new-owner-sandisk-now-gets-the-glory/
