Intel Debuts the 520 Series SATA 6.0 Gbps Solid State Drives

Intel Corporation announced today its fastest, most robust client/consumer solid-state drive (SSD) to date, the Intel Solid-State Drive 520 Series (Intel SSD 520), a 6 gigabit-per-second (gbps) SATA III SSD produced using Intel compute-quality 25-nanometer (nm) NAND memory process technology. Aimed at delivering world-class performance for even the most demanding PC enthusiasts, gamers, professionals or small-medium businesses (SMBs), the Intel SSD 520 has fast throughput performance, new security features and unmatched reliability to meet even the most intensive user requirements.

Any consumer application requiring high throughput and bandwidth, low latencies and accelerated speed will benefit from the Intel SSD 520. Software developers, architects, accountants, engineers, musicians, media creators and artists are just some of the professionals that will find that the Intel SSD 520's full package of features can make a dramatic impact on their productivity. With faster performance for graphic renderings, compiling, data transfers and system boot-ups, users can speed through multi-tasking or once-cumbersome application wait times with an Intel SSD 520 Series.

"We tapped Intel engineering to create a client SSD that delivers performance on all fronts with obsessively high reliability," said Rob Crooke, Intel vice president and general manager of the Intel Non-Volatile Memory Solutions Group. "The Intel SSD 520 once again raises the industry bar on SSD performance, quality and reliability to dramatically improve user experience."

Unlike a traditional hard disk drive (HDD) with spinning disks and moveable parts, an SSD is based on silicon, NAND flash memory specifically, to create a lower power, more reliable and drastically faster storage solution that can keep up with today's most demanding applications, Internet streaming and intense multi-tasking. Based on its own industry-leading 25 nm Intel compute-quality NAND flash memory and a 6 gbps SATA III interface, the Intel SSD 520 uses an LSI SandForce Flash Storage Processor with an Intel co-defined and validated firmware release, to create an SSD that sets new industry performance benchmarks. The Intel SSD 520 delivers up to 80,000 maximum 4K random write Input-Output Operations Per Second (IOPS) and up to 50,000 4K random read IOPS to speed through every day operations. High sequential read performance of up to 550 megabytes-per-second (MB/s) and up to 520 MB/s sequential writes also markedly accelerate and improve user productivity. This is backed by thousands of hours of Intel testing and validation, including more than 5,000 individual tests, as well as a 5-year limited warranty.

"We worked closely with Intel to leverage their deep understanding of the NAND flash, ultimately providing a unique and optimized solution for client computing applications with the LSI SandForce Flash Storage Processor," said Michael Raam, vice president and general manager of LSI's Flash Components Division, formed by LSI's acquisition of SandForce. "Working through Intel's extensive validation process ensures the Intel 520 SSD will raise the bar in delivering top-tier performance and superior quality and reliability over the life of the drive."

The Intel SSD 520 will mark the high end of its client SSD offerings and include these new features: a wide range of user capacities from 60 GB to 480 GB, Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) 256 bit encryption capabilities and stronger password protection for added security in the event of theft or power loss. According to PCMark Vantage benchmarking, users of the Intel SSD 520 may see significant productivity gains through an up to 78 percent boost in overall PC responsiveness, and gamers will see an up to 88 percent jump in performance to enhance their gaming experience. IT professionals will not only provide this additional performance and productivity to their customers/employees, but find that the Intel SSD 520 also delivers on reliability, improved security, smoother operations and lower total operational costs.

"Our game development workflow involves a combination of large batch process and aggressive interactive pre-visualization, all highly parallelized to the point that the storage performance becomes a major bottleneck," said John Carmack, founder and technical director of id* Software, a gaming software developer and creators of Doom and Quake. "For many of our workloads, Intel SSDs have doubled throughput, and in some cases involving mapping tens of gigabytes of image data, we have seen an honest order of magnitude performance improvement, which is a rare and wonderful thing."

With a broad range of capacity choices, the Intel SSD 520 Series is priced as follows, based on 1,000-unit quantities: 60 GB for $149, 120 GB at $229, 180 GB at $369, 240 GB at $509 and 480 GB at $999. It comes with a 5-year limited warranty.

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Corsair Announces New Line of Solid-State Cache Drives

Corsair, a worldwide designer and supplier of high-performance components to the PC gaming hardware market, today announced the Accelerator Series solid-state cache drives.

The Accelerator Series is designed for desktop PC users who want to give their Microsoft Windows® based PC a dramatic performance boost with minimal cost and hassle. Corsair's new line of SSD cache drives includes premium caching software from NVELO, for improved boot times and lightning-quick file access. After connecting an Accelerator Series SSD cache drive to their computer's SATA port and installing the caching software provided with the drive, users will see an immediate speed boost. No drive mapping, no reinstallation of the operating system or applications, and no complex file management is needed — the Accelerator Series SSD cache drive works in tandem with the customer's existing hard drive to provide optimized performance. Customers may see an improvement in file read/write speeds of up to 5x their current hard drive performance after installing a Corsair Accelerator Series SSD cache drive.

"Our new Accelerator Series SSD cache drives have compelling price points and provide one of the most economical solutions for a quick system performance boost that doesn't require manual drive reconfiguration," said Thi La, Vice President of Memory Products at Corsair. "It's ideal for consumers and enthusiasts who'd like to improve their PC's speed without investing the time and cost into a complete PC upgrade. There's no complex configuration involved, and their PC will work as it always has — just a lot quicker."

Accelerator Series solid-state cache drives support Windows 7, with Windows 8 support planned, and are compatible with PCs with SATA 2 or SATA 3 ports.

Accelerator Series solid-state cache drives are backed by a three-year warranty and are expected to be available in February from Corsair's worldwide network of authorized retailers and distributors at a US suggested retail price of $99 USD for the 60GB model, $84 USD for the 45GB model, and $69 USD for the 30GB model. For more information about the products, visit this page. For performance data, visit this page.

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Zalman F1-Series SSDs Start Selling

Zalman's newest line of solid state drives, the F1-series, started selling in Japan. These drives are slated for launch tomorrow. These drives are a typical implementation of the SandForce SF-2281 controller, backed by MLC NAND flash memory. The F1-series is available in three sizes, 60 GB, 120 GB, and 240 GB; priced at 11,980 JPY (US $153), 19,800 JPY ($254), and 39,980 JPY ($513), respectively. The drives take advantage of the SATA 6 Gb/s interface, and are built in the 2.5-inch form-factor. The drives offer read speeds of up to 560 MB/s, and up to 530 MB/s writes. The 60 GB and 120 GB models offer 4K random write performance of 30,000 IOPS, while the 240 GB one offers 45,000 IOPS.

Source: Hermitage Akihabara

Kingston HyperX Beats Three World Records

Kingston Technology Europe Ltd, an affiliate of Kingston Technology Company Inc., the independent world leader in memory products, today announced that the Romanian overclocking team, Lab501 achieved three new world records with the world’s fastest dual channel memory kit, the Kingston HyperX KHX2544C9D3T1FK2/2GX, during a live overclocking session.

The three new records for RAM modules were set on the 3rd of December 2011, by Matei “Matose” Mihatoiu, Tudor “Monstru” Badica and Razvan “Micutzu” Fatu, the three Romanian overclocking champions from the world renowned Lab501 team. The records were achieved in an overclocking event organized in the eMAG showroom in Bucharest, Romania, in front of approximately 100 overclocking enthusiasts and two local TV crews.

The highest record was achieved with CAS 10 (Column Address Strobe Latency) 3600 MHz, now standing as the world’s highest memory frequency using DDR3 SDRAM. During the same event, the Lab501 team also managed to achieve the world records for CAS 9 with 3479 MHz and CAS 8 with 3275 MHz, using liquid nitrogen to cool the modules down to -196°C.

For more information, visit this page.

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Corsair Expands SATA 3 Support With New Performance Pro SSD Line

Corsair, a worldwide designer and supplier of high-performance components to the PC gaming hardware market, today announced the Performance Pro Series SSDs.

The Performance Pro Series, designed with the Marvell SATA 6 Gb/s SSD controller, delivers an impressive ATTO Max performance of up to 515MB/s Sequential Read and 440 MB/s Sequential Write, and can sustain very similar performance when reading and writing compressed and non-compressible data, such as audio, images, and video files. Additionally, the Performance Pro Series has built-in advanced background garbage collection to allow for consistently strong performance even with operating systems that do not support the TRIM command. This integral performance optimization makes Performance Pro SSDs an ideal solution for RAID configurations, which typically do not support TRIM.

Performance Pro solid-state drives provide fast SATA III connectivity that pushes the limits of the new SATA III 6Gb/s interface. They are also backward compatible with SATA 2 3GB/s, and include an 3.5" adapter for easy installation in both laptop and desktop PCs.

"We are pleased to provide a fast SATA 3 SSD that's designed specifically for real-world performance," said Thi La, Vice President of Memory Products at Corsair. "High-performance PC users work heavily with media files, and unlike some other SSDs, the Performance Pro can save, load and move music, photos and movies without significantly reduced performance. It offers consistent, reliable speed regardless of whether you're running Windows, OS X or Linux, and whether you’re using a single drive or a RAID configuration."

The new Performance Pro Series SSDs are backed by a three-year warranty and are available in 128GB and 256GB configurations from authorized distributors and retailers worldwide. Note that stated capacities are unformatted and actual capacities will vary depending on the formatting and operating system used. For more information on Performance Pro solid-state drives, please visit this page.

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Kingston Digital Targets Consumers with Next Generation SSDNow Solid-State Drives

Kingston Digital, the Flash memory affiliate of Kingston Technology Company, Inc., the independent world leader in memory products, today announced the next generation of its entry-level, budget SSDNow V Series. The SSDNow V200 helps consumers revive their current PC and extend the life of their investment. The SSDNow V200 brings value and performance to consumers who are looking for an inexpensive upgrade option to boost their computer's performance.

The SATA Rev 3.0 (6Gb/s) SSDNow V200 is nearly twice as fast as the previous V100 SSD* (figure 1). It is also up to 20 percent less in price than its predecessor SSDNow V100 drive making it one of the best price/performance SSD solutions in the marketplace1. With better performance and a lower cost, the value-driven SSDNow V200 is perfect for cost-conscious consumers who are looking to upgrade to Flash-based, hard-drive solutions for the first time.

The SSDNow V200 is available in 64GB, 128GB and 256GB capacities as either a stand-alone drive or as an upgrade kit to make installation easy. The desktop bundle kit includes the SSD, cloning software, DVD with step-by-step installation video, cables (SATA data and power), and 3.5" hard-drive mounting brackets and hardware. The notebook bundle includes the SSD, DVD with step-by-step installation video, cloning software and a 2.5" external enclosure for easy OS and data transfer from HDD to SSD during cloning.

Kingston SSDs are backed by a three-year warranty and 24/7 live technical support.

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Corsair Announces Major Advance in High-Capacity SSDs

Corsair, a worldwide designer and supplier of high-performance components to the PC gaming hardware market, today announced worldwide retail availability of the 480 GB Force Series GT SSD and 180GB and 480GB Force Series 3 SSDs.

As solid-state drives reach wider adoption rates, Corsair's new SSD models address growing market demand for fast, high-capacity drives. The 180GB Force Series 3 targets consumers and IT professionals who want an affordable step up from 120GB, and the 480GB models are ideal for high-performance notebook PC users who require massive SSD storage capacity in a single drive. The top of the line 480GB Force Series GT SSD is designed for video editing, competitive gaming, and other applications for which extraordinary performance is required.

"As one of the leaders in high-performance solid state drives, we're pleased to offer a full range of SSD models to address customers' needs for high performance, high-capacity storage.", said Thi La, Vice President of Memory Products at Corsair.

Force Series GT: Designed for enthusiasts who demand the fastest performance available
Force Series GT SSDs use the SandForce SF-2280 SSD Processor, with native support for SATA 6Gb/s (SATA 3), combined with ONFI synchronous flash memory. Force Series GT SSD upgrades deliver outstanding read/write performance and significantly faster system response, boot times, and application load times than SATA 2 solid-state drives, with out-of-box performance of up to 85K Random Write IOPS, read speeds of up to 555 MB/s, and write speeds of up to 525 MB/s. The use of synchronous flash memory makes the Force GT Series particularly adept at reading and writing non-compressible data, such as video and music files.

Force Series 3: Fast and Flexible SSDs for high-performance PCs
Force Series 3 SSDs use the SandForce SF-2280 SSD Processor combined with asynchronous flash memory technology to deliver strong value and SATA 6Gb/s performance. The Force Series 3 has out-of-box read and write speeds of up to 550 MB/s and 520 MB/s respectively, and up to 85K Random Write IOPS for measurably faster system response, boot times and application load times.

All Force Series 3 and Force Series GT models are also backward compatible with SATA 2, and include an easy-to-use 3.5" adapter for use in both laptop and desktop PCs.

The new Force Series 3 and Force Series GT SSD models are available from authorized distributors and retailers worldwide at a US suggested retail price of $249 USD for the Force Series 3 180GB, $799 for the Force Series 3 480GB, and $999 for the Force Series GT 480GB. Note that stated capacities are unformatted and actual capacities will vary depending on the formatting and operating system used.

For more information, visit the product pages of Corsair Force GT series and Force 3 series.

Corsair Announces Shipment of Force Series GT Solid-State Drives

Corsair, a worldwide designer and supplier of high-performance components to the PC gaming hardware market, today announced the first shipments of the Force Series GT line of solid-state drives.

The new Force Series GT is designed for enthusiasts who demand the fastest performance available. It uses the new SandForce SF-2280 SSD Processor, with native support for SATA 6Gb/s (SATA 3), combined with ONFI synchronous flash memory. Force Series GT SSDs deliver outstanding read/write performance and significantly faster system response, boot times, and application load times than SATA 2 solid-state drives, with out-of-box performance of up to 85K Random Write IOPS, read speeds of up to 555 MB/s, and write speeds of up to 525 MB/s. The use of synchronous flash memory makes the Force GT Series particularly adept at reading and writing non-compressible data, such as video and music files.

All Force Series GT models are also backward compatible with SATA 2, and include an easy-to-use 3.5" adapter for use in both notebook and desktop PCs.

"With the rapid adoption of systems with SATA 3 support, enthusiasts are demanding SSDs that can push the limit of SATA 3 bandwidth," said Thi La, Vice President of Memory Products at Corsair. "The new Force Series GT line delivers amazing speed under the most demanding conditions, making them ideal for high-performance systems."

Force Series GT SSDs are currently shipping to Corsair's network of authorized distributors and retailers worldwide and will be available in July at a US suggested retail price of $149 USD for the 60GB model and $279 USD for the 120GB model.

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Galaxy Introduces Its First Consumer SSD

Graphics card specialist Galaxy Tech is venturing into other kinds of gaming PC hardware. The company is ready with its first line of solid-state drives. The Galaxy SATA line of SSDs come in the 2.5" SATA 3 Gb/s form-factor, in capacities of 32 GB, 64 GB, 128 GB, and 256 GB. The SSD controller supports the TRIM garbage collection feature. Typically, these drives give read/write speeds of 240 MB/s (read) and 210 MB/s (write). The company did not give out any further information, but we hope to hear more at CES.