DailyTech - CES: Toshiba Planning 32nm Update to SSD Product Line, Mulls Price Cuts to OEMs

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Hardware CES: Toshiba Planning 32nm Update to SSD Product Line, Mulls Price Cuts to OEMs
Jansen Ng (Blog) - January 6, 2010 7:55 PM

14 comment(s) - last by RU482.. on Jan 7 at 12:28 PM

Cheaper for OEMs, Cheaper for consumers

Toshiba is one of the leaders in NAND flash memory production, second only to Samsung in the amount produced worldwide. It produces its own series of Solid State Drives using a proprietary NAND flash memory controller, and has been fairly successful selling to OEMs.

Although Toshiba began mass production of its 32nm NAND in the third quarter, most of the drives sold by Toshiba are built using 43nm NAND. This means higher costs for OEMs, which are passed along to consumers.

The company is now announcing that it will begin sampling this quarter of two new SSD series using 32nm since it now has surplus capacity. Mass production of the new drives will begin in the second quarter, and OEMs are expected to offer these drives in desktops, notebooks, and netbooks in time for the back-to-school season.

The Toshiba SG2 SSD series will be available in the mSATA (mini-SATA) format, essentially a rebranding of the mini-PCIe interface. It features a maximum sequential read speed of 180 MB/s and maximum sequential write speed of 70 MB/s. The mSATA form factor provides greater design flexibility and saves space and cost compared to SSDs in traditional 2.5 inch and 1.8 inch hard drive form factors and cases. The 128GB modules are only one seventh the volume and one eighth the weight of 2.5-inch SSDs, and consume a fraction of the power. mSATA drives are typically found in netbooks.

Toshiba's third generation HG3 SSDs feature a maximum sequential read speed of 250MB/s and a maximum sequential write speed of 180MB/s. It will be offered in capacities of 64GB, 128GB, 256GB and 512GB in a standard 9.5mm, 2.5-inch case, or in a special 7mm thin 2.5-inch case in capacities of 128GB or 256GB. Smaller 1.8-inch drives are available in 64GB, 128GB or 256GB in a standard 1.8-inch disk drive case or as case-less or LIF-modules. These drives also offer AES data encryption.

Both series will support the new TRIM Command implemented in Windows 7, helping to boost efficiency and performance even after prolonged usage.

Live updates from CES are available via Twitter.

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affordability

By hellokeith on 1/6/2010 8:51:40 PM , Rating: 3

You don't have to convince people of all the benefits of SSD's. But it is still quite a hard sell compared to the cost of traditional platter-based hard drives. A quick perusal of xyzEgg shows HDD's in the 500-700GB range at 10-15 cents per gigabyte, and 1TB+ drives under 20 cents per gigabyte. The sweet spot of $100-$200 for HDD's just doesn't exist in large enough storage-bang-for-your-buck with SSD's.

RE: affordability

By dagamer34 on 1/6/2010 9:03:26 PM , Rating: 2

Not for laptop use anyway. In desktops when there can be a second drive used for storage, it does make more sense.

I expect seeing a few new laptop designs in the future which ditch the optical drive and replace it with an SSD (as a boot drive) and a larger battery. Internal optical drives aren't all that useful anymore when an external drive will often do.

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RE: affordability

By HrilL on 1/7/2010 12:00:22 PM , Rating: 2

I have to agree. The only time I use an optical drive is to install an OS. After that I use programs that can mount image files. Never need a optical drive after an OS install.

I do think that the average user would use them quite a bit more than me. I don't like the idea of burning a disk so I can install it. Waste of money and resources IMO.

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RE: affordability

By LANDRY1986 on 1/6/10, Rating: -1

RE: affordability

By androticus on 1/7/2010 12:04:34 AM , Rating: 2

Actually, I don't think it is the cost/MB per se that is most important, but rather that the cost/drive of "reasonable" capacity drives can match the price of "typical" platter drives -- because really, most people don't need the monster drives today, especially on laptops. For example I have a 160G drive in my MacBook and really can't replace it with less capacity, so what I need is a cheap 160G SSD, but I don't care if it is the same price as a hard drive with 3x the capacity.

But I think 2010 is The Year Of The SSD ;) 32nm flash and growing manufacturing capacity should result in price reductions to make "reasonable" drives have an accessible price.

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RE: affordability

By davepermen on 1/7/2010 2:22:12 AM , Rating: 2

the only thing you have to get people to understand is that they don't need that much storage. me and most of my friends life very well with 40-100gb storage. more is not needed in a lot of cases. and then, ssds are affordable, and worth every penny.

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RE: affordability

By blaster5k on 1/7/2010 9:47:46 AM , Rating: 2

Personally, I use an 80GB SSD on my laptop, which ends up being more than enough space. I have a home server with 2.5TB (not SSD of course), which serves my needs for storing larger files. This approach provides both blazing speed and lots of storage. It also avoids duplication of data between PCs and since the data on the server is mirrored, less risk of losing it.

SSDs don't yet make sense for large storage, but they're not bad for this type of setup.

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Pricing

By Suomynona on 1/7/2010 8:05:16 AM , Rating: 2

Any news on pricing for these drives? It would be great so see the cost come down with the new round of SSD announcements. Some competition in the midrange sector(OCZ agility) of drives would be great for consumers.

RE: Pricing

By Gungel on 1/7/2010 9:38:27 AM , Rating: 2

Check out NewEgg, they sell a 32GB SSD for $65:
http://www.newegg.com/Special/ShellShocker.aspx

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RE: Pricing

By RU482 on 1/7/2010 12:28:53 PM , Rating: 2

SOLD OUT!

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RE: Pricing

By riottime on 1/7/2010 9:54:21 AM , Rating: 2

pricing is important but also improved controller chips. hopefully, it's better than intel ssd drives.

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okay...

By meepstone on 1/7/2010 1:17:06 AM , Rating: 2

While SSD's keep getting better and better they still are way to expensive. When you could buy a laptop or a desktop for the same price as 1 SSD, things aren't right.

1.5TB hard drive for $110 or 32GB SSD for $100 ???

No brainer here.

RE: okay...

By semo on 1/7/2010 2:41:25 AM , Rating: 2

you can say the same thing about the Intel i7 and ATI HD 58xx or any of the premium motherboards.

SSDs are performance parts and are not meant for mass storage like HDDs. while HDDs have a good price/GB, they have an atrocious price/performance. that's because they have no performance to speak off when you compare them to SSDs (ignoring sequential IO). SSDs can get 20,000+ IOPS, HDDs can't.

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