S
olid-state drives are new to the
PC storage front, and they’re
making waves by off ering
blistering speeds and greater
reliability than traditional
hard disk drives. For that, you can thank
the NAND fl ash memory chips that make up
every solid-state device.
If you’re not familiar with NAND memory,
you need only look at your keychain. NAND is
the technology that powers the storage on your
USB thumb drive... and your mobile devices
and the memory card in your digital camera.
Whereas your tiny fl ash card might use but a
single NAND chip, SSDs use multiple chips to
achieve their higher capacities.
Storage that uses fl ash memory is quite
unlike the hard disk drives used to hold your
computer’s data. The latter rely on speedy
actuators to read and write information onspinning magnetic platters. SSDs use elec-
trical charges to read and write the state of
individual fl ash memory cells. An SSD’s fl ash
memory is nonvolatile: Unlike your com-
puter’s RAM, an SSD drive retains your data
when you switch the power off. And since
the handshake is electric, SSDs can access
that data in a fraction of the time it takes a
mechanical hard drive to do so.
Sounds ideal, right? Actually, the perfor-
mance potential of SSDs needs to be weighed
against some signifi cant drawbacks. We’re
going to outline the pros and cons of the
technology and how it compares to tradi-
tional hard disk storage. We’re also going to
put seven leading solid state drives to the
test and let the benchmark numbers do the
talking. At this stage in the storage race, an
SSD is a big investment; we want to help you
maximize your return.The market is suddenly awash in solid-state drives
thanks to the growing abundance and greater
reliability of flash memory. Here’s what you need to
know about today’s SSD storage BY DAVID MURPHY
flood
flash
http://www.maximumpc.com|NOV 08 |MAMAMAXIMXIMXIMXIMUUUUMMPPPCC|)&