Ion S5 550 Chip - a serious competitor to NextSeq?

[ymc]

https://www.thermofisher.com/cn/en/home/life-science/sequencing/next-generation-sequencing/ion-torrent-next-generation-sequencing-workflow/ion-torrent-next-generation-sequencing-run-sequence/ion-s5-ngs-targeted-sequencing/ion-s5-specifications.html

It was announced two weeks ago. It can generate 26Gbp (200bp x 130M reads) in 3.5 hours.

Not sure about the chip and reagent cost but the previous S5 540 chip's per Gbp cost is only double that of NextSeq 2x150 mode. I suspect 550 with 62.5% more throughput should be more competitive.

If you are doing amplicon that typical requires either 200bp single from Ion or 2x150bp PE from NextSeq, it will become an even better deal.

I have been working with Illumina data all the time. I am thinking seriously of switching to Ion because of this. I am worried about Ion's read quality though. How does its data compare to data generated by NextSeq 500/550?

[GenoMax]

Do you know if people are buying Ion in your part of the world?

[ymc]

Do you know if people are buying Ion in your part of the world?

Not really. Just one or two machines in the universities as far as I know.

Previously, Ion was not on my radar because there remains gaps in performance. Now the gap seems to be gone and it seems like I am going to do quite a bit of amplicon, so Ion seems to make more sense now.

[GenoMax]

I have not seen any new ion around where I am either. I assume you are thinking of getting the sequencing done from an external provider then?