DailyTech - CES 2012: Corsair Hopes to Win Over Customers with New SSD Cache Drives

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Hardware CES 2012: Corsair Hopes to Win Over Customers with New SSD Cache Drives
Brandon Hill (Blog) - January 10, 2012 2:11 PM

23 comment(s) - last by tastyratz.. on Jan 12 at 12:09 PM

Cache drives will start at $69 for 30GB

There's no question that solid-state drives (SSDs) have taken over the enthusiast and consumers markets. Many enthusiasts look to SSDs at least for a boot drive and many manufacturers are going "all SSD" when it comes to thin and light notebooks.

Corsair is pushing a different angle with its new line of Accelerator Series SSD Cache drives. The cache drives, available in 30GB, 45GB, and 60GB capacities, plug into a free SATA port and work with NVELO software to provide an immediate speed boost in a Windows environment. There is no direct involvement from the user in managing file storage on the device; the caching software handles it all.

Corsair says that users will see an immediate [up to] 5x boost in read/write speeds over an existing HDD in a system.

"It's ideal for consumers and enthusiasts who'd like to improve their PC's speed without investing the time and cost into a complete PC upgrade," said Thi La, Corsair's VP of Memory Products. There's no complex configuration involved, and their PC will work as it always has — just a lot quicker."

The Accelerator Series SSD Cache drives currently work in Windows 7 and will support the upcoming Windows 8 operating system when it is released. The 30GB, 45GB, and 60GB models will be priced at $69, $84, and $99 respectively.

Source: Corsair

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they need to hit the OEM market

By tastyratz on 1/10/2012 2:52:53 PM , Rating: 2

I have been saying that ssd should be hybridized for a long time now. That however is not what is done here. This is the kind of thing they needed to partner with WD on for example to combat the seagate momentus.

They also should sell the software packages separately for enthusiasts.

sadly I think they are too late to the party on this. The price of entry isn't enticing enough to get someone started on ssd compared to a new regular drive, and after the momentus launched there is fierce competition. The dual drive laptop market is minimal and someone installing a ssd in a desktop is far more likely at this point to just get a windows drive and have a separate storage drive.

Without a major OEM backer like dell selling them as economic
alternatives in new machines they will probably see fairly low adoption rates.

RE: they need to hit the OEM market

By nrhpd527 on 1/10/2012 3:17:20 PM , Rating: 2

I'm not so sure on the getting "a windows drive and have a separate storage drive." People who have small / medium businesses who do not want the hassle of reinstalling several (or even dozens) of desktops might use these as performance upgrades to avoid buying new machines if they already have Windows 7 machines with 4+GB of RAM and decent 7200 RPM HDDs. Since it is basically 2 cables, I could even walk my father in law through installing one of these in his desktop using his web cam, and he's not at ALL technologically skilled.

For me, I just did a clean install of Win7Pro64 and really don't want to redo it. Additionally, my Office 2010 has been put on that machine so many times over the various reformats (yeah, I should do images, I know...) that I have to call MS every time I want to do that now. Thus, this is a great idea to break the HDD bottleneck my desktop has now.

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RE: they need to hit the OEM market

By 0ldman on 1/11/2012 12:19:13 PM , Rating: 2

Ghost the drive. Partition it in Windows 7, copy partition.

Though I agree, this would be a slightly easier sell, but if I bother to describe the process to most of my customers they'll opt to have me image the SSD.

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RE: they need to hit the OEM market

By tastyratz on 1/12/2012 12:09:24 PM , Rating: 2

Prettymuch, I don't see this as a machine refresher in the business world. It does not perform the gains required for multi machine touch an deployment. SSD booster will not show the ROI in the cubicle world against labor cost. This is why I say bundle it from OEM's because a standard supported production model *could* apply to the business world as a modest upgrade. I don't see cases cracking open to shave 1/2 second off ms word launch times. Those people who would see the ROI would also be worth investing a full size ssd.

Great idea, but working in the business world what the IT department thinks is cool, and what the business thinks is a worthwhile investment often does not match.

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