Toshiba starts shipping 512 GB SSD's

Toshiba has started shipping a new line of solid state drives with a storage capacity of between 64 and 512 GB. With half a terabyte of fast SSD storage, the drive is no longer subordinant to regular 2,5" hard disk when it comes to capacity. Apart from the 512 GB topmodel, more affordable 64, 128 and 256 GB editions will be released, all based on modern 43nm MLC flash memory chips.

The entire line of solid state drives will be built in both a 1,8" and a 2,5" version, making it compatible with notebooks as well as small netbooks and ultraportables. In December last year, Toshiba already announced these series of SSD's, with recommended pricetags of $220 for a 64 GB model and $1.652 for the 500 GB top model. Toshiba emphasizes the fact that solid state technology can perform significantly better than conventional hard disks with platters. The drives are also to feature an improved life-expectancy and sturdiness due to the absence of moving components.

With reading and writing speeds of respectively 230 and 180 MB/s, Toshiba's new SSD's, are a decent competition for similar models, such as OCZ's Vertex, based on Inidilinx's Barefoot controller. It's still unclear which controller Toshiba uses to power the MLC memory chips. The cache size has also not been disclosed yet.

Toshiba starts shipping a new series of SSD's

Tags: netbook ssd

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