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May 26, 2008 2:12 AM PDT

Samsung develops 256GB solid state drive

by Brooke Crothers

Samsung has developed one of the largest-capacity and highest-speed solid state drives to date.

Samsung 256GB solid state drive

Samsung 256GB solid state drive

(Credit: Samsung)

CNET site ZDNet Korea reports that Samsung announced the development of a 2.5-inch, 256GB solid state drive (SSD) at the fifth annual Samsung Mobile Solution Forum in Taipei, Taiwan.

Typical solid state drives shipping in notebook PCs today have a storage capacity of 64GB.

With a sequential read speed of 200 megabytes per second and sequential write speed of 160MBps, Samsung is claiming some of the fastest SSD data transfer rates to date.

Like upcoming Intel SSDs, Samsung's drive will use multi-level cell (MLC) technology and a high-speed Serial ATA (SATA) II interface. Later this year, Intel is planning to announce high-capacity SSDs, which select PC vendors are expected to adopt in forthcoming notebook PCs based on the Centrino 2 "Montevina" mobile processor.

Samsung is slated to begin commercial production of the SSD by year's end, with customer samples available in September. A 1.8-inch version of the 256GB SSD is expected to be available in the fourth quarter, ZDNet Korea reported.

SSDs have no moving parts, which means they avoid both the risk of mechanical failure and the mechanical delays of hard disk drives.

Originally posted at Nanotech: The Circuits Blog
Brooke Crothers has been an editor at large at CNET News, an analyst at IDC Japan, and an editor at The Asian Wall Street Journal Weekly, among other endeavors, including co-manager of an after-school math-and-reading center. He writes for the CNET Blog Network and is not a current employee of CNET. Disclosure.
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by Mam00th May 26, 2008 8:41 AM PDT
200 MBps!!! Wow, that's blazing fast!
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by althebear972 May 26, 2008 9:03 AM PDT
I want one!!!!!!
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by Mam00th May 26, 2008 12:00 PM PDT
Imagine two of those in raid0
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by Brandon_Gruber October 29, 2008 10:20 AM PDT
Mam00th,
I just did... now I need new shorts.
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