- Virtual CIO
How to Create an IT Budget That Actually Works
11 Mar, 2026

£2194.63 inc. VAT
AI-generated summary
At ~£1,829 ex-VAT for a 960GB M.2 Dell internal SSD, this is **not** a “sensible upgrade for everyone” kind of buy. That price only makes sense if you’ve got a Dell environment where you need **Dell-branded media** and want the simplest path for procurement, spares management, and support/compatibility expectations. If you’re just looking to speed up a workstation or normal server boot/storage for general business use, you’ll usually find better value elsewhere without sacrificing noticeable real-world performance.
Who I *would* put this in front of: teams standardising on Dell servers/lifecycle processes, where the IT department cares about vendor alignment and predictable replacements, or where the drive is part of a planned refresh with internal spares already pegged to Dell parts. Who I *wouldn’t*: small IT teams trying to stretch budget, mixed-hardware estates, or anyone buying purely for “faster than HDD” — at this cost, you could typically get more usable performance and capacity by looking at cheaper alternatives with similar practical behaviour. If you tell me what device/model it’s going into and what the workload is (VMs, database, file storage, hypervisor, etc.), I can give you a clearer “yes/no” on whether this specific spend is justified.

Kingston
Kingston KC600 - SSD - encrypted - 256 GB - internal - mSATA - SATA 6Gb/s - 256-bit AES - TCG Opal Encryption, Self-Encrypting Drive (SED)

Dell
Dell - Customer Kit - SSD - Read Intensive - 480 GB - 512e - 2.5" (in 3.5" carrier) - SATA 6Gb/s - for PowerEdge R240, R540, R550, R650, R660, R6615, R6625, R750, R7525, R760, R7615, R7625

Lenovo
Intel P5500 Entry - SSD - 1.92 TB - hot-swap - 2.5" - U.2 PCIe 4.0 x4 (NVMe) - for ThinkAgile HX3331 Certified Node, MX3330-F Appliance, MX3331-F Certified Node

Lenovo
Micron 7450 PRO - SSD - Read Intensive - encrypted - 480 GB - internal - M.2 2280 - PCIe 4.0 x4 (NVMe) - 3072-bit RSA - Self-Encrypting Drive (SED), TCG Opal Encryption 2.01 - for ThinkEdge SE450, ThinkSystem SN550 V2, SR650 V2, SR670 V2, SR860 V2, ST50 V2, ST650 V2