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Filed under: Storage

We have a strange feeling there’s more marketing hoopla here than anything else, but whatever the case, Samsung sure feels like its newest line of SSDs will work just great within low-cost laptops. The outfit has begun to sample “low-density, higher-performance solid state drives that are only 30-percent of the size of 2.5-inch SSDs and highly cost-efficient to manufacture.” The MLC-based drives only come in 8GB, 16GB and 32GB flavors, and read / write performance ranges from 90MB/sec to 70MB/sec, respectively. Mass production is scheduled to crank up next month, and while you’d expect SSDs aimed at netbooks to boast remarkably low price tags, Sammy doesn’t even bother spilling those beans.

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Storage

Intel’s keeping the announcements coming at this year’s IDF — today we got word that the company will launch its first SSDs in a month or so. The 1.8-inch X-18M and 2.5-inch X-25M drives will be targeted at laptops and MIDs and come in 80GB and 160GB sizes using MLC tech, while the 32GB and 64GB SLC-based X-25E is aimed at servers and will be out in 90 days. Intel hasn’t locked down pricing, but the M-series drives should cost about $8/GB, which would put the 160GB unit at a whopping $1,280 and the 80GB at $640. We’re hoping those estimates are skewed a little high — and Intel says there might be a cheaper 40GB unit on the way as well. We’ll see in a month, we suppose.

[Via Electronista]

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Original post by Nilay Patel

Filed under: Storage

Indilinx just recently caught eyes with its Barefoot solid state drive controller, which has reportedly shown a read speed of 230MB/sec. Merely days later, it’s already talking about the next best thing. Said firm, along with Mosaid, is preparing for a third-generation of the controller for the SATA 3 interface, which will provide a mind-boggling 600MB/sec. Unfortunately, no other details were provided, but just in case you were terrified that the internal drive you purchase in 2013 wouldn’t transfer files any faster than the one you’re using now, at least you’ve one less worry on your mind.

[Thanks, Johnny]

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Storage

Mere months after debuting its highly-desirable and smashingly-priced Core Series of SATA II SSDs, OCZ is back for more with the Core Series V2 of 2.5-inch drives. Sizes have been bumped to 30GB / 60GB / 120GB / 250GB, and access times are up to 170MBps read and 98MBps write. OCZ even crammed in a mini-USB port for applying future speed-enhancing firmware updates. No word on price yet, but hopefully OCZ will stay in line with its original Core lineup.

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Original post by Paul Miller

Filed under: Storage

Looks like Intel, the bid bad daddy of silicon, is about to unleash its first consumer oriented SSDs into the market. While Intel’s 1.8- and 2.5-inch 80GB and 160GB SSD plans were pretty thoroughly detailed in those May leaks, Expreview has slapped up an honest-to-goodness slide which looks like it came straight from the Intel deck. Assuming it’s authentic, then we now know that Intel’s 2.5-inch X25-M and 1.8-inch X18-M SSDs top out with a 240MBps sustained read and 70MBps write. That’s just a bit slower than the blazing Micron RealSSD C20 but still seriously quick and hopefully priced for the mainstream audience they are targeting. Dell, for example, sells a 128GB Samsung SSD for $450 — surely Intel can beat that cost per Byte… right Intel? We’re guessing that the enterprise-class 32GB and 64GB X25-E SSDs will feature some of that Micron co-developed “world’s fastest” SLC NAND in order to achieve that ridiculous 240MBps / 170MBps read / write speed at what’s expected to be an equally ridiculous price. The 80GB X25-M and X18-M are expected to launch in Q3 (so any day now) while the 160GB solid state slab should break free for consumers in Q1 (not Q4 2008) of 2009. Expect to hear more on these next week as Intel kicks off another International Developers Forum.

[Via TG Daily]

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Original post by Thomas Ricker

Filed under: Storage

First off, we just want to sincerely thank Intel for not making this confusing at all. Not only does the new mini-card Z-P230 PATA SSD boast the same model name and mostly the same specifications as the netbook-focused Z-P230 PATA SSD (scratching your head yet?), but as you’ve probably gleaned by now, it’s rocking the same name, too. The 8-gram device (compared to 11-grams on its similarly same-named sibling) was designed to fit into tiny laptops and comes in 4GB / 8GB capacities with a 16GB version landing in September. All angst aside, it is pretty cute.

[Via PCWorld]

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Laptops

It’s not as momentous as the new enterprise-focused Precisions and Latitudes, but Dell’s got a tiny little treat for consumers today as well: an available $450 Samsung SSD for the XPS M1330 and M1530. Sure, the benefits are debatable, but c’mon — you know you want it.

[Thanks, Justin R.]

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Original post by Nilay Patel

Filed under: Storage

With SSDs, there really is no “fast enough.” In the never-ending quest for more speed, Indilinx has just introduced its Barefoot solid state drive controller with 90-nanometer process technology. Said device has reportedly shown the “fastest read speed (230MB/sec) of all the products currently available in the market and supports the capacity up to 512GB with multi-level cell (MLC) NAND flash.” Additionally, it plays nice with SATA 2.0 and flash memory from Samsung, Toshiba, Hynix and Intel / Micron. Sadly, mass production isn’t scheduled until Q4 of this year, so now you can sit on that vanilla HDD even longer as you wait for the future to arrive. Ugh, what a tease.

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Original post by Darren Murph

Filed under: Storage

Seems everyone is coming out with a cheap, do-it-yourself SATA adapter to convert all your extra flash memory cards into a makeshift SSD. This time, we’re looking at the ¥10,000 (about $91) PhotoFast CR-9000. The 9.5-mm tall, 2.5-inch, 3Gbps SATA adapter accommodates up to 6x SDHC cards and should fit into most slim laptops. That’s enough slots to make a 192GB SSD (using 6x 32GB cards) for a bargain $900 or about $270 for a 48GB SSD based on a quick calculation of SDHC cards found on-line. While performance depends upon the weakest card of the lot, Impress Watch was able to squeeze a respectable 111.4MBps reads and 55.17MBps writes from their RAID 0 setup using class-6 rated, MLC-based, SDHC cards. That’s nothing like the performance of the latest MLC-based SSDs but not bad for what you pay. Still, with SSD prices in freefall, these DIY adapters are quickly becoming less and less attractive.

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Original post by Thomas Ricker

Filed under: Storage

It’s been a real roller coaster ride of emotions with SSD. The once lauded (at least in our hearts) savior of all things computing has, in real life, provided us with lackluster and even controversial performance gains, while battery improvements haven’t been revolutionary and the prices still aren’t exactly wallet-friendly. Most of that is unlikely to change in the next couple of years, but there’s still plenty to be fixed in the short term. Samsung is working with Microsoft to define optimum packet sizes and best practices for reading and writing files to SSD as a potential update for Windows Vista, which is particularly optimized to work best with traditional hard drives. Sun is also working to improve SSD support with its next-gen ZFS file system, which in addition to powering its Solaris OS should be making an appearance in Mac OS X 10.6 Snow Leopard, at least in the server version. There’s clearly still plenty of untapped potential in SSD, let’s just hope the powers that be figure this stuff out sooner rather than later.

[Via Mac Rumors]

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Original post by Paul Miller

Filed under: Laptops

That wasn’t fun at all, actually. Turns out the $-70 128GD SSD option for the ThinkPad X200 was not only a mistake, but the part isn’t even available. Eager orderers received the following e-mail from Lenovo this morning:

Dear Valued Lenovo Customer,

We are contacting you with regard to your recent Lenovo X200 order.

Please note that we recently experienced a web error which caused the price of the 128GB Solid State Drive to be erroneously listed at $0.
Unfortunately, we are unable to honor this pricing; in addition, the part is currently not available.

As a token of appreciation for your patience and understanding, we are pleased to offer you a substitute of either a 64GB Solid State Drive
or a 200GB Hard Disk Drive (7200rpm) free of charge in place of the 128GB Drive.

To accept this offer, please reply to this email and fill out the below fields by Monday August 11th with your selection.

*** If we do not receive a reply by that date, your order will be cancelled at that time.

We can’t exactly hate on Lenovo for not honoring the mistake, especially since they’re offering a 64GB SSD in exchange. We just hope whoever is responsible is getting the what-for. Sorry, people, move along on this one.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

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Original post by Joshua Fruhlinger

Filed under: Laptops

That wasn’t fun at all, actually. Turns out the $-70 128GD SSD option for the ThinkPad X200 was not only a mistake, but the part isn’t even available. Eager orderers received the following e-mail from Lenovo this morning:

Dear Valued Lenovo Customer,

We are contacting you with regard to your recent Lenovo X200 order.

Please note that we recently experienced a web error which caused the price of the 128GB Solid State Drive to be erroneously listed at $0.
Unfortunately, we are unable to honor this pricing; in addition, the part is currently not available.

As a token of appreciation for your patience and understanding, we are pleased to offer you a substitute of either a 64GB Solid State Drive
or a 200GB Hard Disk Drive (7200rpm) free of charge in place of the 128GB Drive.

To accept this offer, please reply to this email and fill out the below fields by Monday August 11th with your selection.

*** If we do not receive a reply by that date, your order will be cancelled at that time.

We can’t exactly hate on Lenovo for not honoring the mistake, especially since they’re offering a 64GB SSD in exchange for free.

[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]

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Original post by Joshua Fruhlinger

It’s almost certainly a mistake but if you head on over to the Lenovo store and plunk down an order for the 12.1-inch ThinkPad X200 ultra-portable with 128GB SSD, you’ll pay $70 less than the standard 80GB hard drive configuration. This isn’t just a misprint, we ran the config through Lenovo’s site and sure enough, the entry level X200 price drops from $1,434 to $1,364 after selecting the biggie SSD. Hell, you’d likely pay that much for the SSD alone as the 64GB SSD lists for an $830 premium. Reader Sunil already has his order in so you’d better hurry up and do the same — it won’t be long before Lenovo wises up to the situation.

[Thanks, Tobias W. and Sunil]

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Original post by Thomas Ricker

Filed under: Storage

Intel’s partner in solid state crime, Micron, just announced an update to its RealSSD lineup of SSDs. Based on the typically slower (and cheaper) MLC NAND process technology, the new 2.5-inch (up to 256GB) laptop and 1.8-inch (32GB to 128GB) ultra-portable storage slabs offer a 3Gbps SATA interface and ridiculous 250MBps read and 100MBps write speeds — yes, that’s fast, damn fast when you consider the 70MBps write and 90MBps read speeds of Samsung’s latest consumer oriented SSDs. They even best the listed read speeds of Samsung’s top-ender. Unfortunately, no prices were given though it’s said to be “balanced price to performance.” Expect ‘em to hit the market in Q4 under the Lexar brand, and maybe even Crucial, Seagate, and Intel for all we know.

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Original post by Thomas Ricker

Filed under: Handhelds

Say what you will about the attractiveness (or lack thereof) of WiBrain’s line of — shall we say, unique — UMPCs, but hardware wise, they’re hard to bang on. The B1 just recently saw an update that added in a succulent SSD, and the all new I1 looks to share in that joyousness while also including two more tidbits we’ve been longing for. According to early reports, the I1 will feature a tweaked B1 design with a mildly updated casing, but the real fun is within; we’re talking a 1.1GHz / 1.3GHz Intel Atom CPU, SSD options as roomy as 64GB, Windows XP or Linux running the show, 6-hours of battery life when browsing and a drool-worthy HSDPA module. Pricing has yet to be disclosed, but we are told to expect a worldwide launch (yes, including North America) in October.

[Via Pocketables, thanks Jenn]

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Original post by Darren Murph