It's a line of SSDs for PCs that don't have SATA.
Buffalo announced today that it is launching a series of solid state drives (SSDs) that address the needs of users with older machines--namely those old-school notebooks without SATA connections. Arriving in a 2.5-inch form factor, the new SHD-NHPU2 line will instead offer Parallel ATA (Ultra ATA/133 UDMA mode 6) support and a USB 2.0 jack located in the back.
Along with 64MB of buffer cache, the drives are capable of up to 101.3MB/s through the PATA connection. As for storage capacities, the new SHD-NHPU2 line will be offered in three delicious flavors: 32GB, 64GB, and 128GB capacities. The 32GB model will cost consumers around $250, $360 for the 64GB version, and $630 for the 128GB version.
The drawback--at least for now--is that the SSDs are hitting the Japanese market. Still, it's only a matter of time before the SHD-NHPU2s line eventually hit stateside--at least through Newegg or other online venues.
to make grandma's blazing 1ghz Pentium III wicked fast :-P LOL
to make grandma's blazing 1ghz Pentium III wicked fast :-P LOL
This would be a good upgrade for several applications that aren't set up for SATA and can't be upgraded to SATA. Certain older servers that can't be replaced easliy or cost effectively, certain high end traffic shapers / routers / proxies that have internal hard drives (i've seen some 1U devices that use 2.5" drives), large high volume laser printers that have internal hdd's for storing print jobs for printing later, embedded PC's or industrial computers, the list really goes on and on. Or maybe for that guy that has an older gaming book that still plays the games he wants to play, but might not want to dump a truckload of cash on a new gaming book. Vote me down if you want, but even though parallel ATA is an older technology, it's not going away any time soon. You'll still see it in 5 years in certain niche markets, guaranteed. Look at the venerable old floppy drive, and how motherboards STILL have controlers for it on-board.
If your system is still running PATA, SSD-advances are not worth your while. Even if you can't upgrade the system to SATA, save your money and stick with HDDs. You'll need that money when you have to buy an old Pentium Pro or some old 133Mhz SDRAM dimms off eBay.
Modern HDDs might be significantly faster than the older ones but still suck in random read/write compared to SSDs. I thought about upgrading the HDD but after installing SSDs in all my desktops I'll never go back to HDDs for system drives. Ever.
They can still use the second controller to install a 256GB PATA HD or use an external USB drive of 2TB for storage!
True, but even then, I doubt this SSD is server/enterprise grade.
Or the countless Pentium 4 boxes sold for business with IDE drives in them. We've got a few 3GHz P4's at my office that are more than adequate after swapping an old non-NCQ 7200 RPM drive out for a SSD.
I have a Media Center running with a Pentium 3 1 Ghz... with a Sata HDD... connected to a PCI Sata card.... believe me, it's a lot more cost effective, and if you decide to move the HDD into a new computer with SATA, you just have to plug it in. With an SSD with a PATA connector first you have to check whether your board still has the connector, and if it does you will have an ugly cable impending your airflow.
However, that said, this DOES make sense for Laptops. If you have a Desktop however, it's just nonsense.