Colorful's new SL500 Mini SSD might be one of the most interesting SATA drives that we've seen in a long time. The minuscule SSD only is 26% the size of your conventional 2.5-inch drive. The SL500 Mini SSD weighs approximately 2 grams, and according to Colorful, draws less power than a 2.5-inch drive.
Adhering to the SDP (SATA Disk in Package) format, the SL500 Mini SSD measures just 26 x 68 x 7mm, which may be the same size or even smaller than some modern thumbdrives. The SSD comes with the same SATA power and data connectors as standard 2.5-inch SSDs and hard drives. Colorful crammed the SSD controller and 3D NAND chips onto a single module. However, Colorful didn't specify what kind of NAND is used. For reference, the normal SL500 drives leverage TLC (triple-level cell) NAND, so the mini-me version could use the same.
Colorful built the SL500 Mini SSD with industrial applications in mind. Therefore, the little guy can withstand high temperatures, extreme humidity and vibrations. In terms of capacity, the SL500 Mini SSD is only available with 256GB and 500GB of storage. Performance is right in line with what you expect from a SATA III SSD.
Regardless of capacity, the SL500 Mini SSD offers sequential write speeds up to 500 MBps across the board. Sequential read performance, on the other hand, varies from one model to the next. The 250GB variant delivers sequential read speeds up to 450 MBps, while the 500GB variant is good for 480 MBps.
The SL500 Mini SSD will arrive in the first quarter of this year. Colorful has put a $39.99 price tag on the 250GB model and a $59.99 price tag on the 500GB model.
