A couple things I want to know.
We know from teardowns that there are 2 NVMe slots and it uses the same bespoke modules as the iMac Pro.
1) Is the 8TB option a pair of 4TB NVMe drives (as opposed to 1 8TB module)? and if so, is it running in RAID 0? If so, then I can see having 8TB of SSD running at near PCIe 4.0 speeds (~5GB/sec) for a main work partition as desirable for heaving duty processing.
2) Are these NVMe SSD drives using MLC or TLC NAND cahips? Right now, only Samsung's 9x0 Pro drives are left using MLC NAND chips, which have more durability and are correspondingly more expensive. Given the "PRO" focus, I would hope so.
Right now, the only 4TB M.2 NVMe drive I can find retails around $700. If Samsung made an 970 Evo 4TB version, it would retail around $1000.
That makes the "Apple Tax" not too bad IMHO. Using MLC NAND is more expensive (because it needs more NAND chips), so if is this a "PRO" drive and uses MLC, the cost of 8TB becomes downright reasonable.
This is very true. There are SO many things that go into how this stuff is made and how it's priced, and looking at Chinese brands on Amazon is not necessarily a good comparison.