Intel announces 80Gb & 160Gb SSDs

Intel has announced that it will be launching two new solid-state disk drives this year, with 80Gb and 160Gb capacities. The X18-M and X25-M are 1.8in and 2.5in SATA drives, respectively, and Intel reckons they’re capable of increasing “storage system performance” over nine times, compared to a traditional hard disk.

Both the Intel X18-M and X25-M SSDs are only available in 80Gb capacities for now, with 160Gb capacities following towards the end of the year. Intel claims that the 80Gb drives achieve up to 250Mb/sec read speeds, up to 70Mb/sec write speeds and have an 85ms read latency. Both drives costs $595 for quantities up to 1,000 – that’s around £4.20 per gigabyte, compared to a typical 2.5in hard drive’s cost of around 43p per gigabyte.

Intel has also sat a couple of its execs on a Lazy Susan for its latest Channel Intel YouTube video that coincides with the SSD announcement. Pat Gelsinger, General Manager of Intel’s Digital Enterprise Group and Dadi Perlmutter, General Manager of the Mobility Group both spend a couple of minutes talking about how SSDs (and Intel’s SSDs, in particular) are the perfect combination for its high-performance processors, both in enterprise and mobile environments. Quelle surprise.

The Intel X18-M and X25-M SSDs will be available in a few weeks, and the full press release is below.

Update: Hot Hardware has already managed to test the two new Intel SSDs. The verdict?

In the mean time, in typical fashion, Intel has stepped up big behind SSD technology and once again upped the ante with a breakout product that literally leaves the current competitors folding at the table, at least for this round. 

[ Intel]

INTEL INTRODUCES SOLID-STATE DRIVES FOR NOTEBOOK AND DESKTOP COMPUTERS

New Intel® High-Performance SATA Solid-State Drive Offers Users Responsive, Rugged, Reliable and Low-Power Storage Solution to Replace Hard Disk Drive

SANTA CLARA, Calif., Sept. 8, 2008 – Intel Corporation announced today it has begun shipping Intel® X18-M and X25-M Mainstream SATA Solid-State Drives (SSDs) based on multi-level cell (MLC) NAND flash technology for laptop and desktop computers. The new high-performing data storage devices give computer buyers a new level of system responsiveness in a lightweight, rugged, low-power package that can replace traditional hard disk drives.

Validated for Intel-based computers, the X18-M is a 1.8-inch drive and the X25-M a 2.5-inch drive, offering several advantages over hard drives including faster overall system response, boot and resume times. With no moving parts, SSDs run cooler and quieter and are a more reliable option than hard drives. In addition, SSDs remove input/output (I/O) performance bottlenecks associated with hard disk drives that help maximize the efficiency of Intel processors, such as the company’s Core™ family of products. For example, lab tests show that the Intel X18-M and X25M increase storage system performance nine times over traditional hard disk drive performance.

“Validated by our rigorous testing and OEM customer feedback, we believe that we have developed an SSD that delivers on the promises of SSD computing,” said Randy Wilhelm, Intel vice president and general manager of the NAND Products Group. “By combining our experience in flash memory design with our processor and computing expertise, we have added advances such as our parallel 10-channel architecture, proprietary controller, firmware and memory management algorithms that address write amplification and wear leveling issues to redefine SSD performance and reliability for computing platforms.” 

The Intel X18-M and X25-M Mainstream SATA SSDs are available in 80 gigabyte (GB) capacities, with 160GB versions sampling in the fourth quarter of this year. The 80GB drive achieves up to 250MB per second read speeds, up to 70MB per second write speeds and 85-microsecond read latency for fast performance. The 80GB version is priced at $595 for quantities up to 1,000. These SSDs are available now and end-customer products containing the Intel® High-Performance SATA SSDs are expected to begin shipping in the next few weeks.

The company is also expected to introduce a line of single-level cell (SLC) SSDs for the server, storage and enterprise environments within the next 90 days. Called the Intel® X25-E Extreme SATA Solid-State Drive, these products are designed to maximize the Input/Output Operations Per Second (IOPS), which equates to higher performance and lower enterprise costs. Since SSDs lower energy consumption, maintenance, cooling and space costs, an SSD-based data center will reduce overall infrastructure costs while increasing performance-per-square-foot by as much as 50x.

Intel [NASDAQ: INTC], the world leader in silicon innovation, develops technologies, products and initiatives to continually advance how people work and live. Additional information about Intel is available at www.intel.com/pressroom and blogs.intel.com.