Toshiba announces the industry's first 2.5-inch 512 GB SSD.
Just weeks before CES 2009, a time when companies get to showcase their newest products side by side, Toshiba pulls an ace out of its sleeve by unveiling its new 512 GB SSD. The new drive has double the capacity of any previously announced 2.5-inch SSD, but unfortunately it seems the drive will be just for show right now, as mass production is not planned until the second quarter of 2009.
Alongside the new 512 GB SSD, Toshiba also announced today new 64 GB, 128 GB and 256 GB SSDs in 2.5-inch, 1.8-inch and flash module form-factors. All the new SSDs use Toshiba's second-generation SSD technology, featuring 43 nm Multi-Level Cell (MLC) NAND memory, along with fast sequential read and write speeds of up to 240 MB/s and 200 MB/s, respectively.
The new SSDs also include AES data encryption, a Mean Time to Fail (MTTF) of one million hours and are equipped with a serial ATA 3.0 Gb/s interface. Samples of the new drives will be available in the first quarter of 2009, but as for price, all we know is that Toshiba will be targeting consumers with these new drives. Toshiba expects SSDs to make up 10-percent of the notebook market by 2010 and 25-percent of the notebook market by 2012. With the introduction of high-performance 512 GB SSDs, the only advantage traditional notebook hard drives still seem to have any more is a low cost.
Please find below a chart comparing a select few high-capacity SSDs. Speeds are according to manufacture's specifications.
| Header Cell - Column 0 | Sizes | Max Seq. Read | Max Seq. Write | Form Factor | SSD Type |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Toshiba's New SSD | 64 to 512 GB | 240 MB/s | 200 MB/s | 2.5-inch | MLC |
| Toshiba's Previous SSD | 256 GB | 120 MB/s | 70 MB/s | 2.5-inch | MLC |
| Super Talent UltraDrive ME | 16 to 256 GB | 200 MB/s | 160 MB/s | 2.5-inch | MLC |
| Samsung SSD | 256 GB | 220 MB/s | 200 MB/s | 2.5-inch | MLC |
| OCZ Vertex | 30 to 250 GB | 200 MB/s | 160 MB/s | 2.5-inch | MLC |
| Micron SSD | 256 GB | 250 MB/s | 100 MB/s | 2.5-inch | MLC |
| Intel X25-E | 32, 64 GB | 250 MB/s | 170 MB/s | 2.5-inch | SLC |
| Intel X25-M | 80, 160 GB | 250 MB/s | 70 MB/s | 2.5-inch | MLC |
Tom's Hardware will be covering CES 2009 (January 8-11th), so be sure to check back then for more details and product photos.
