The SSD Improv: Intel & Indilinx get TRIM, Kingston Brings Intel Down to $115
by Anand Lal Shimpi on November 17, 2009 7:00 PM EST- Posted in
- Storage
Kingston Delivers the First Good Sub-$100 SSD (after Rebate)
I’m not sure what sort of sweetheart deal Intel inked with Kingston, but it’s paying off. Other than Hitachi, Kingston is the only company allowed to use Intel’s controllers in their SSDs. And today, it gets even more interesting. The Kingston SSDNow V Series 40GB Boot Drive is a 34nm X25-M G2 with only 40GB of MLC NAND Flash on it.
You read that right, Kingston gets to make a 40GB X25-M G2 under its own brand.
Kingston wants this to be specifically used for your OS and applications, where the speedy launch performance of an SSD is most useful. You’d keep your games, data and other large files on a separate hard drive. Why 40GB? To keep costs down of course. The Kingston drive goes on sale starting November 9th. The MSRP of the drive will be $115 ($130 with a 2.5” to 3.5” drive adapter), Kingston is offering a rebate through Newegg that will apparently drop the price to $84.99.
Kingston’s goal was to hit the sub-$100 price point and they did it, sort of. I’m not a big fan of mail-in rebates, and it remains to be seen if Newegg can keep the drive in stock at those prices, but the intention is good.
Only 5 devices means the Intel controller works in 5-channel mode, instead of 10-channel like the X25-M G2
While the drive uses an Intel 34nm X25-M controller and 34nm flash, it doesn’t have the latest firmware from Intel, which means it doesn’t support TRIM. Since it’s technically not an Intel drive you can’t update it using the firmware I linked to earlier. The drive will most likely eventually get TRIM support, just not now. Unfortunately it doesn't even work with Intel's SSD Toolbox, again, because it's technically a Kingston drive.
With only half the NAND flash of an 80GB X25-M (only five NAND devices on board), its sequential write speeds are cut in half - Kingston rates the drive at 40MB/s. Random performance suffers a bit, but sequential write performance sees the biggest hit.
If you've already got a large hard drive for games/data and don't have that many apps installed, the Kingston 40GB SSD is a perfect way to move to an SSD affordably.
Facebook
Twitter
RSS
162 Comments
View All Comments
The0ne - Monday, October 26, 2009 - link
No kidding. Early adopters really shouldn't complain, that's what you get for being the "elite." LMAO.As I've said before, just wait til early next to summer and the tech will be more mature. Yea, go ahead and make your argument that you can wait til next year but by then they'll be new products. That's cool...but I think ppl saying this have no clue about what's really happening around the technology.
Regardless, sounds nice to be saying it so woohooo be the first!
klil - Monday, October 26, 2009 - link
I dont think that you should lose the wiper and trim support for being an early adapter, it does not make senseThe only early adapter lesson i know of was that one from a intel processor that had a bug... pentiums from 1994: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentium_FDIV_bug">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pentium_FDIV_bug
If they were not able to put it in due to hardware problems its one thing... but those drives cost 665 dollars in the beggining. I bet that if you had one you would not be happy :|
pcfxer - Tuesday, October 27, 2009 - link
ADOPTER, A-D-O-P-T-E-R.I can't even fathom how you could read what someone posts, "early adopter this....early adopter thaaat" and you go and type ADAPTER.
Adapter -> Adaptation between two or more objects.
Did you not have coffee yet man?
chizow - Monday, October 26, 2009 - link
Agreed, Intel will certainly meet more resistance in the future for their emergent technologies and undoubtedly lost the support of many of their most dedicated supporters with this decision.If there were some technical reason or incompatibility behind the lack of TRIM support on G1 that'd be one thing, but from what has been published by AT and others, its nothing more than indifference on Intel's part preventing support.
Blur - Tuesday, October 27, 2009 - link
Eloquently stated, i bought two of the G1 drives. I won't be suckered into supporting any of intels new tech early again and I'll be taking a much closer look at their competitors products when purchasing more established tech.Zingam - Monday, October 26, 2009 - link
Is there a change that a newer better technology will replace Flash so that we can finally have real SSDs at affordable prices?Zingam - Wednesday, October 28, 2009 - link
Sorry about the spelling/grammar errors above!therealnickdanger - Monday, October 26, 2009 - link
Intel was working on some sort of phase-change technology, not sure where it is now. Probably still too expensive for mainstream:http://www.dailytech.com/searchresults.aspx?keywor...">http://www.dailytech.com/searchresults.aspx?keywor...
MS - Monday, October 26, 2009 - link
Nanochip went belly-up and the IP was auctioned off. Ovonyx turned into Numonyx and PCM is still an emerging alternative to other technologies. The biggest issues relate to the limitatios in process technology, i.e, at about 20 nm geometry, the required write currents are expected to actually melt the metal interconnects. There are other technologies such as resistive memory as developed by 4-d-s and organic memories such as the ones from Zettacore that may become very attractive.Souka - Monday, October 26, 2009 - link
phase-change technology?Sounds like vapor-ware to me! :)