Items tagged with X-25M
Intel's in the SSD market. Did you know that? Unless you're a hardcore tech enthusiast, there's a chance that you may not. Most people associate Intel with microprocessors and little else, even though the company is busy at work in a number of alternate markets. Like the solid state market. Intel has been producing SSD drives for awhile now, with the drives receiving general approval across the web. But as we said, actually finding an Intel-branded SSD has been a chore. They aren't just laying around like the hard drives in Walmart, Best Buy and other retail outlets. For most, they're a well kept secret. But now, Intel's changing things, and they're opening themselves up to the world by setting...
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Intel has just released a firmware update for their 34nm Gen X25-M solid state drives that not only boosts sequential write performance, but adds support for the TRIM feature as well. A performance optimization tool is also being release today, for users of Windows Vista and XP, who won't be able to take advantage of TRIM.We flashed one of our Intel 34nm Gen 2 X25-M 160GB SSDs with the new firmware and ran a handful of tests under Windows 7 to see what kind of affect it had on performance. Details of the update process and optimization tool are posted, as well as before and after benchmarks... Intel 34nm X25-M Gen 2 SSD Performance Update...
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In all of our recent solid state disk (SSD) coverage that featured one of Intel's X25-M drives, a common, underlying performance trend consistently emerged. The Intel drives were always amongst the top performers in read performance, and were unquestionably the best with regard to random writes. However, in sequential write performance Intel X25-M SSDs always seemed to trail competing offerings.While trying to gain some additional insight into the situation, we had a couple of off the record conversations with some folks at Intel , and asked if the company had any plans to optimize sequential writes on their SSDs, but we didn't get a specific answer other than the standard company...
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They're here. After months of rumors that Intel was working up a new line of solid state drives based on sub-40nm technology, the chip giant has in fact today introduced two new SSDs that rely on 34nm process technology. Unfortunately, Intel hasn't made it easy to distinguish between the new models and the previous editions, but that's what we're here for.For starters, you'll notice that the all new drives are labeled X25-M. If you're one for keeping tabs on Intel's wares, you'll realize that the previous version also boasts that same label. In fact, Intel decided to not change the model name of these new 34nm drives, which is apt to confuse some of you who go out hunting for the new and...
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We've certainly heard of Fusion-io's bleeding edge PCI Express-based SSD solution but to date haven't yet gotten the chance to check it out on the test bench here at HotHardware. In addition, though we've put Intel's wonderfully fast X25-M SSD through its paces in stand-alone testing, imagine what it would be like with up to four drives in RAID 0. You see where we're going here, a battle royal of what is arguably some of the fastest SSD storage technology money can buy right now. So the stage is set but before we get into ripping up benchmarks, let's expand on what we think might be one of the paths solid state storage of the future might take on its disruptive journey through...
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Disruptive technology; it's a term thrown around these days by industry marketing types and quite frankly it's just plain getting worn out as of late. In the mid 90s, a Harvard Business School Professor coined this phrase to describe a product innovation that breaks current convention and exceeds market expectations so vastly that market leaders might not see it coming and perhaps even the market itself doesn't know how to react. Since the term was brought forth, there were many innovations over the years that overzealous marketing types have hailed as "disruptive technologies," though obviously, in reality, this level of innovation is on a different scale all together. However,...
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Semiconductor process technologies keep on shrinking, and while we've heard of Intel and rivals talk up 32nm, it's 34nm making the news today. According to rumors that are getting harder and harder to ignore, Intel will soon be launching a new range of solid state drives based on its 34nm NAND chips. How soon, you ask? Within a couple of weeks? No actually, but read on...If you'll recall, Intel already has quite the following thanks to its speedy X25-M, and while earlier reports placed these newer SSDs on a Q4 release schedule, new whispers have them launching a bit sooner. Also, Intel had a bit of trouble with some of its existing SSDs; while fast, some users found that performance degradation...
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We know what you're thinking: "Sheesh -- another new SSD that I likely can't afford?" And we're here to say: "Well, sort of." Today, Kingston Technology is indeed offering up two new solid state drives, but not in the fashion you're used to. Rather than announcing the drives alone, the company is introducing its SSDNow M Series Bundles, which include an 80GB or 160GB M Series SSD drive, cloning software, 2.5" to 3.5" rails, a USB enclosure and all the SATA and data power cable extenders you'll need.In other words, this is a kit aimed directly at upgrader candidates, and it should help out notebook, desktop or workstation owners. Essentially, this allows HDD-based machines to switch to an SSD...
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A few weeks back, Intel took some flack for shipping its X-25M and X-18M SSDs with a syndrome that caused their performance to slowly degrade under certain conditions. Intel responded by saying it was highly unlikely that end users would be affected under real-world conditions, but they were still left wondering whether or not their solid state drive really was as durable and reliable as they were initially lead to believe.After toiling away in the labs, Intel's engineers have just released a fresh firmware for the drives that addresses those very issues. Firmware version 1.1, dated 04/10/09, weighs in at just over 3MB and applies to the following devices: Intel X18-M...
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