solid-state drives

If you can't decide whether to get the Samsung 470 solid-state drive because it's so expensive, there's now another one that's even more tempting--the Vertex 3 from OCZ.

At around $500 for 240GB, the OCZ SSD isn't any cheaper, but it is much faster than the Samsung 470 and supports the new SATA 6Gbps standard (SATA 3). Most existing computers, however, support the popular SATA 3Gbps (SATA 2), which has data cap speeds of close to 300MBps.

SATA 3, available in computers powered by Intel's new Sandy Bridge chipset, on the other hand, offers twice that speed. And the Vertex 3 delivered in our testing, emerging as one of the fastest internal drives on the market.

Sharing the same design as a standard 9.5-millimeter, 2.5-inch internal hard drive, the Vertex 3 also includes a drive bay converter that helps it take the place of any 3.5-inch hard drive. This means it will work in any case where a traditional SATA hard drive, be it a 3.5-inch or 2.5-inch, would be used.

The OCZ Vertex 3 is also available in 120GB and 480GB capacities. The former costs around $250, and the latter is outrageously priced at more than $1,800.

To see if the drive is worth the investment, check out CNET's full review.… Read more

When upgrading from a spinning hard disk to a solid-state disk in your Mac, you may experience slower startup times than expected. Solid-state drives should be booting your system in 15 seconds or less--a considerable upgrade from traditional hard disks--but failing to set your newly installed drive as the default startup disk can keep your boot times slow.

Apple Discussions commenter "Luis Ortega" writes:

I just installed a 256gb ssd drive (from OWC) into my 2007 Santa Rosa 2.4 core 2 duo 17" macbook pro.

I had done a clone from my old hard drive (7200rpm … Read more

Intel has entered the high-capacity big leagues with a new series of solid-state drives that offer up to 600 gigabytes in capacity.

The world's largest chipmaker is tapping into its most cutting-edge manufacturing technology to get the larger capacities--with chip geometries shrinking to a mere 25 nanometers. Those geometries are a step ahead of its newest Core i series processors, which are built on a slightly "fatter" 32-nanometer manufacturing process.

Intel's third-generation SSD 320 Series comes in 40, 80, 120, 160, 300, and 600GB options.

And, of course, they're faster. The new SSDs deliver up to 39,500 input/output operations per second (IOPS) random reads and 23,000 IOPS random writes on its highest-capacity drives. Maximum sequential write speeds have doubled from its second-generation SSDs to 220 megabytes-per-second (MB/s) sequential writes. Read throughputs have been boosted to 270 MB/s sequential reads. These numbers are comparable to--and in some cases exceed--published numbers from Samsung, a leading SSD manufacturer and supplier. … Read more

Hard-disk drives are becoming so inexpensive that prices alone--seemingly improbable a couple of years ago--garner headlines. So, how will speedy yet pricey solid-state drives keep up?

Beyond the above-the-fold "2TB for $75" attention-getters, laptop hard disk costs have also been dropping like a rock, pushing mobile hard drives far below solid-state drives. The laptop market is one of the primary markets for flash memory-based SSDs, which are generally faster--in some cases much faster--than HDDs.

Case in point: the Hitachi Travelstar 7K500 HDD. The $64.99 price at Newegg.com not only gets you a 500GB capacity drive in … Read more

Micron Technology is unveiling four new solid-state drives at the Storage Visions conference in Las Vegas this week. One 256GB model will cost $425--pricey compared to a traditional hard disk drive but competitive for the speedy flash chip-based storage drives.

Micron's RealSSD drives--marketed under the Crucial brand name--will be available for laptops in 1.8-inch and 2.5-inch form factors--the former size typically goes into ultra-small laptops like the MacBook Air, while the latter is the standard size for mainstream laptop drives.

Micron, which runs a joint flash chip manufacturing venture with Intel, is making the flash chips (that … Read more

Intel has rolled out an ultrasmall solid-state drive, targeting dual-drive laptops that pair an SSD with a hard disk drive.

Intel's Solid-State Drive 310 Series delivers "full SSD performance in 1/8th the size," according to Intel's announcement today. The SSD contains 34-nanometer (one of Intel's most advanced chip manufacturing processes) Intel NAND flash memory and is available in an m-SATA form factor (see photo) in 40GB and 80GB capacities. It weighs just 10 grams.

In addition to dual-drive laptops, Intel said it is targeting single-drive Netbooks and tablets.

In a dual-drive laptop, an SSD … Read more

You know you've always wanted to stick a solid-state drive in your computer but just weren't willing to shell out the cash. Well, for this week's giveaway, we've got high-performance 80GB solid-state drive from Intel that works in notebook or desktop computers (anywhere a 2.5-inch hard drive does). It's official name is the Intel 80GB X25M Mainstream SATA II MLC Solid State Drive and it's pretty sweet.

Instead of using spinning platters like traditional hard drives, the X25-M uses flash memory for storage, which Intel says gives you "dramatically faster" data … Read more

On Friday, Intel introduced its most competitively priced solid-state drive yet and will be selling the drive to consumers through major retail outlets. Are SSDs finally becoming a worthy upgrade?

The Intel X25-M 120GB Solid-State Drive is set to be offered at Best Buy and Fry's Electronics for a suggested retail price of $249. Newegg is already selling the drive. Competitive SSDs would include a 128GB drive for $269 from Crucial.

Though still pricey by traditional spinning hard disk drive standards (1 terabyte desktop HDDs can be had for less than $100), it's a dramatic change from two … Read more

The hybrid hard-disk drive market is expected to reach 600 million units in 2016, according to market researcher Objective Analysis. This would mean an explosion of mainstream drives that integrate the performance-boosting benefits of flash memory.

The first generation of hybrid drive technology was "well conceived but poorly implemented," according to a report released on Monday by Objective Analysis. "Now that working versions have been implemented the hybrid drive promises to sweep the PC hard drive market."

"We expect the hybrid drive market to nearly double every year for the five years following its initial adoption, reaching 600 million units by 2016," said analyst Jim Handy, who authored the report, in a statement. "This blazing growth will result from hybrid drives replacing standard HDDs in mainstream PCs."

Hybrid drives, in their current form, add a small amount of flash memory to a traditional spinning HDD. But this pinch of flash can deliver a big boost to performance on certain tasks at relatively little extra cost, as CNET Reviews demonstrated with the 500GB Seagate Momentus XT and as other reviews of the Seagate drive have shown.

"The NAND [flash memory] in these hybrid drives will be pretty small. Seagate's Momentus XT does a really good job with only 4GB of flash, and Nvelo's Dataplex software accelerates HDDs very well with only 16GB of NAND," said Handy, responding to an e-mail query. … Read more