Zalman to Make Its Own Line of SSD Drives

We received a tip from Zalman HQ today that the company will make a formal entry into the solid state drive market, adding to its current line of PC-related products including power supplies, case fans, hard drive docking stations and more.

The new line will consist of the S Series and N Series, both featuring a 2.5-inch form factor and billed as shock-proof, vibration-proof, energy efficient and literally noise free. The drives will also utilize an anodized brushed aluminum housing for improved heat dissipation and weight.

According to the company, the S Series will be optimized for AHCI Mode, support Windows 7 TRIM command and use JMicron controllers. The series will consist of three capacities--32 GB, 64 GB and 128 GB--with sequential read speeds up to 260 MB/s. Additionally, the 32 GB model will have write speeds up to 60 MB/s, up to 120 MB/s for the 64 GB model, and up to 210 MB/s for the 128 GB model.

The N Series will only comprise of two capacities--64 GB and 128 GB, both of which offer up to 280 MB/s sequential read speeds and up to 270 MB/s write speeds. Like the S Series, the N Series will be optimized for AHCI Mode and also support TRIM, however this particular line will utilize SandForce controllers instead--which so happens to be the particular controller that rules the SSD roosts at the moment.

Although Zalman didn't provide a release date, the pricing is as follows:

S Series

SSD0032S1 - 32GB - $99.99
SSD0064S1 - 64GB - $149.99
SSD0128S1 - 128GB - $249.99

N Series

SSD0064N1 - 64GB - $169.99
SSD0128N1 - 128GB - $289.99

More information as it comes.

This thread is closed for comments

22 comments

Comment from the forums

Your comment

hellwig

Wow, up to 60MB/s on the 32GB drive? Way to release an SSD more expensive and slower than many 2.5" HDDs. Other than low-power applications, whats the point of that drive?

Now the N-series, those look pretty good, and with minimal price increase over the slower S-series.
icepick314

why call Sandforce-controlled model "N"?

shouldn't Sandforce controller model be "S" while J-Micron be called "J" or even "N"?
thejerk

Hellwig... access times and read performance (up to 260MB/sec) are more important on what, at only 32GB, is almost certainly a boot drive.
foscooter

Why even bother with the JMicron controllers? The Sandforce controllers rule!!!
TeKEffect

Zalman gets less relevant every year. They used to rule the heatsink market but now there are plenty of good ones. Their cases are overpriced and customer service is terrible. Intel and ocz have dads under control. Zalman need not apply
TeKEffect

Dads - ssds
ares1214

Look pretty nice, but i dont care if they dont bring some nice feature to the table. Every company has SF drivers within $10 of each other generally, they wont stand out if its just another.
Darkerson

At least they are getting into the game and accepting that SSD's are becoming more mainstream, unlike Seagate, which seems to have their head up their asses...
HavoCnMe

Damn,

darkersonAt least they are getting into the game and accepting that SSD's are becoming more mainstream, unlike Seagate, which seems to have their head up their asses...

You said exactly what i wanted to say.... +10 thumbs
tsnor

darkersonAt least they are getting into the game and accepting that SSD's are becoming more mainstream, unlike Seagate, which seems to have their head up their asses...

I'd like a mix of SSD and Spinning disk (I get this on my thinkpad, but need to use two 2.5 inch drives to get it). Seagate is playing with drives that combine SSDs and spinning. So far, maybe3 not a winner. But much better than "head up their... "

The Seagate® Momentus® XT drive is a solid state hybrid with Adaptive Memory™ technology, enabling the drive to deliver SSD-like performance along with higher capacity.
pythy

Wow, an SSD that's literally noise free!! Amazing!!
TeKEffect

why is everyone voting me down. The specs on these drives are not impressive
nebun

slow
Darkerson

Dont get me wrong, I genuinely like Seagate, even after some of their technical blunders and whatnot (I happen to own one of the notorious 7200.11 1.5TB drives), but lately their business tactics have left me scratching my head. I just dont want them to get left behind, because if they ever were to go out of business or become less of a player in the hard drive market, thats one less company to compete for our money.
But anyway, bravo again Zalman, even if you dont have the best line of SSD's out there, the extra competition should benefit us all.
agnickolov

ACHI is a typo - it's AHCI - Advanced Host Control Interface
wolfram23

More competition can only be a good thing for us consumers.
dEAne

I will wait for the review
chiral

Still waiting to see another controller that can compete with the Sandforce...

$289 for the 128GB is way too expensive to compete with OCZ, Mushkin, even Corsair.

I'm always confused when a company puts out a product that is nearly identical to other products at a heavy markup and 6 months late. Western Digital did this with their SSD drives also I believe.

If you're going to make a play, go all in or go home IMO.

*I make no claims to build quality or warranty, I have no idea if Zalman outpaces the other companies in these fields.
youssef 2010

let's hope this helps bring the SSDs to the mainstream user
luke904

good prices
100% I would love to get this noiseless super silent Zalman SSD.
Tassadar

Well to be honest, most if not ANY SSD is better than a 5.2/7.2k RPM SATA/IDE HDD. It's awesome, and a good investment, but the tech is pretty expensive still (talking about someone who pays for his living). In most parts of the world it's hard to get one of these without sacrificing something else. I'd like to get my hands on a SSD in the near future, still running on SATA2. Oh well, good job, really hoping to see more big players on the SSD market to improve and find ways to improve and make the tech cheaper for the end user.

Also, good luck to all contestants for the SSD contest!

Display All 22 comments