When are the new Intel SSDs ariving?

when are they supposed to come in, and when are the prices of these things ever gunna drop?

 

Supposedly the first few weeks of March. As for prices... who knows?

 

I'd imagine the prices of G2 SSDs will drop a bit once the G3 SSDs are broadly available, especially if the G3 SSDs demonstrate much better performance/power usage.

 

as long as people pay for it, prices won't go down. that's simple market behaviour.

 

March 11th, it was in a PDF in an earlier thread.

Hopefully the G3 will make the G2 drop like a brick.

 

I doubt prices will plummet quickly, especially if they stop production of G2's then they will just be eliminated from stock at current pricing. Considering the Intel 510 drives will be $279 for 120GB and 250GB for $580. 120GB is currently $229, already $50 cheaper. Although I bought mine for $169 and $189.

 

Well I work in a retail store, so they will see new models coming and will mark down old stuff, and fast or have promotions to clear out old stock.

 

Any chance for some special discounts for NBR Forum fellas?

 

Lol good one!
I would be in line too if he will gave us deal

 

If they were truly coming in the next week or so, I would think stores would have this information and start clearing out stock now.

 

Hey Guys,

The new Intel 510 series SSD's will be out 3/1. You don't see anyone clearing stock because nothing is getting replaced. They are in addition to the current model lineup. We have them in our configurators for our laptops right now.

 

great. cant wait.

 

So in other words, chances of prices dropping are pretty slim considering the $50 price difference as it stands (at least for 120GB)?

 

PCPer.com has posted initial test results of the 6GB/sec intel 510 SSD.
Full Review later today.

PC Perspective - Intel Releases 6Gb/sec 510 Series Solid State Drives

To quote: ">500MB/sec reads. >315MB/sec writes. Looks good."

Also, SSD Shocker!! They use Marvel Controlers!!!

 

Most interesting part is from that PCPer graph it's pretty obvious that things are being artificially limited to those speeds.

 

$284 per 1,000 unit quantities. This means cost to end user will be what, about $300?

 

Wow. Those are lightning fast speeds! Wish I had the money.

 

Very nice,would love the 250GB as an upgrade from my 160GB G2.

 

How so?
Graph for intel 510 ssd

 

Man that looks impressive. Intel G3 SSD here I come!

 

engadget just reported intels official press release so these must be coming soon.

anyone find a specific date anywhere?

also, are these the enterprise drives? i ask because that leaked intel roadmap shows 200, 400, 600gb drives along with a few others.

when are those expected?

 

something are best not to know. This burns serious hole in the pocket already!

 

The transfer rates all max out at ~500MBps, which looks like it is maxing out the SATA3 (6Gbps) bus. These numbers line up with what we saw on SATA2 (3Gbps) SSD's that maxed out at ~250MBps. SATA3 is double the theoretical bandwidth, and double the real-world throughput.

I have to agree with Pitabred. If we took the Marvell SATA3 controller that Intel put into these drives, and put it on something that wasn't bandwidth limited (like a PCI-E card), I'm sure that we could see that controller pushing out more throughput than 500MBps.

Supply/demand dictates price drops, and not technology shifts. The reason that you see price drops in things like CPUs, GPUs, RAM, and mechanical HDDs is because those areas are moving a lot of product and have a lot of competition.

By comparision to those larger parts markets, the SSD market is pretty tiny niche (Western Digital alone generates more revenue in one month than the entire SSD market put together in an entire year).

The textbook scenario that results in price drops is because of supply-side response to the commodotization of a product. It would something like this:

(1) System manufacturers start offering SSDs as standard parts in their systems. Demand for SSDs skyrocket.
(2) SSD and NAND flash memory prices will actually increase for a while, as those parts become in short supply because of the skyrocketing demand.
(3) SSD and NAND flash memory manufacturers respond, and begin increasing production volume to meet demand. Seeing opportunity, other competitors enter the market.
(4) Increased production volume from those manufacturers, and increased maturity of the market leads to SSDs becoming a commodity. Manufacturers now compete on price as their primary differentiator. THIS is when you'll see SSD prices drop.

 

These arn't the G3s, More like the G2.5

 

That is a shocker. So to the previous message, they aren't even Intel controllers anymore.

 

A review

Intel SSD 510 Review (250GB) | StorageReview.com

 

I can't wait to get my hands on this, once the new Envy 14's come out with updated CPU's this is going to be my first purchase. SATA 3 is a nice improvement over SATA 2 and will be a nice framework for whatever external Thunderbolt drives that hit the market this summer.

 

Amazon:
120GB
250GB

 

Not really much of an upgrade considering they use the same controller and memory as the C300, just special firmware. Also, SATA/600 isn't inherently better than SATA/300, it just lets you have the ability to handle higher sequentials, which isn't significant for most users.

 

up on newegg now too.

$315 for the 120

$615 for the 250

 

You also need a SATA 3 laptop to utilize the SATA 3 speeds or it will drop down to SATA 2 levels..

 

Review out:

The Intel SSD 510 Review - AnandTech :: Your Source for Hardware Analysis and News

 

Can't wait for G4!

 

lol. well i read on neogaf, and i know you post there, that the 510s arent the true G3s and that we should expect the good ones later on.

we'll see though.

 

Yeah, these are something in between. G3 seems to be a mystery.

 

Intel Third Generation X25-M SSDs Set to Launch in Mid-April - Softpedia

why...why...lower seq speed?but higher random 4k?
um...but i think i prefer faster random 4k (open many small things up faster? like faster window start up?)

any thoughts?

 

Whoa, good find. +1

Random 4k reads are supposed to be the most critical to windows desktop work.

probably opted for the 510 drives to give sequential users something to use and the G3 with higher 4k random. I'd go for the 4k myself, curious how pricing will go with those.

 

well i just canceled my G2 order after reading that.

really glad you posted it. thank you.

 

Great news... I always thought the recently released 510 series are the new gen SSDs from Intel, lol.

So the Intel SSDs which will be released in April are the better choice, specially if you have SATA-II?

 

They are the better choice for SATA II and also better IMHO for most users because 4k read/write is more important than sequential.

 

Ok, thanks... I guess I have to wait a bit longer for my long awaited SSD.. awww

 

Seeing that I'm going to get Intels 510 and after reading this:

" My biggest complaints about the 510 actually aren't about Intel's use of a 3rd party controller, instead they are about the drive's lackluster random read performance.."
By: AnandTech SSD 510 Review
The Intel SSD 510 Review - AnandTech :: Your Source for Hardware Analysis and News

After reading this review, it feels like I'm going to be wasting my money. Should I be worried about getting this drive or switch it out to a regular hard drive and wait for the G3?

 

Maybe you should consider a Crucial C300 (SATAIII)

 

Well, if it matters, the G3s won't take advantage of the SATA III interface (they're only SATA II (3 Gbps)). Random Read/Write _should_ be improved though (we hope; we'll need benchmarks to know for sure). If the Vertex 3 numbers remain the same for the production models, you may want to get one of those (well, probably the Corsair/Super Talent equivalent, given OCZ's bad press).

 

One thing for sure, I'd give the 510 a "pass". Not worth the trouble. Hope they do better next time around.

 

The Intel 510 is the same hardware-wise as the Crucial C300, except with special firmware.

 

If you visit the Crucial forums, there seems to be a lot of people with stuttering or freezing issues with the C300. I was going to get one until I started reading all the horror stories. Although buying a new tech Intel isn't much better because it hasn't been proven yet either.

I'll stick with my tried and true Intel G2's until this new wave of tech proves itself. Then I'll probably get a fast SATA III end of this year.

 

He also said:

The advantages over the V3 are many and include:

1) 510 available now.
2) Much, much higher total lifetime TB's written.
3) No LTWT issues.
4) No 'up to' speeds - what is advertised is what you get - with all types of data that you'll typically use.

I suggest re-reading the review more carefully.

What I took away from it was that the 510 is aimed as a true performance product that can take punishment continuously and consistently give a certain level of performance back - guaranteed.

The V3 is arguably the fastest 'on paper' - but it is guaranteed to be crippled (performance wise) with it's DuraWrite and LTWT 'tech' that is there to protect the nand and not give you the best performance possible (if it thinks that you're using it 'too fast').

I'm sure faster drives will come out - no doubt about it - but just as the G2's and even the G1's are still going strong today for many people (2+ yrs later), the 510 will be seen in the same light too: not the fastest in benchmarks, but certainly fast enough to have it in your system(s) for a long time to come - no matter what supposedly 'new' tech comes out in the meantime.

So, will you be 'wasting' your money with a 510? I don't think so. Unless Intel (who else? ) comes out with something better.

 

lol just making sure since this will be my first SSD. But once I get off work, I'll definitely reread the material.

 

Well, for what I think he's said he's going to be using his notebook for, he probably really wouldn't notice much of a difference between a Vertex 3 equivalent and the 510. The Vertex 3 will probably be slightly faster for him in general (absent LTWT, which we have no data for yet... supposedly it's improved, but we have no idea how much, if any). And, of course, historically (in the US), Sandforce drives tend to be much cheaper than Intel. I agree that he wouldn't be "wasting" his money, but I think any of the newer drives would be a worthwhile investment, barring any unforseen problems down the line.

Oh, and just for some back and forth; for your 2nd point, did you mean tested lifetime, or how many writes the drive should last for? If it's the second, the fact that Sandforce compresses data skews that data significantly, because even given that the 510 uses 34 nm NAND with 66% more rated life, if Sandforce can compress the data by that much (or more), then just going by P/E cycles, it's going to have better life. If it's the first, I'm not sure either of us could say for certain.

And as for the fourth point, even at the Vertex 3's worst, it's "only" 40 MB/s behind the 510 in sequential writes, and that's assuming incompressible data (which, unlike you, most of us don't deal with regularly ). I can't argue with your other 2 points, though, except that we don't know how bad LTWT is on these new drives yet.

As an aside, the basic principle of Durawrite is hardly crippling; the idea of compressing data on the fly to save NAND is a very good idea, doubly so because I'm sure it's part of the reason for the performance boost Sandforce gets. On the other hand, LTWT (which is admittedly part of the entire Durawrite scheme) is definitely quite crippling. Too bad there's no way to separate the two as of yet...

Edit - By the way, shouldn't this be in the new SSD section?