Intel 520 series SSD in Clevo/Sager

The 520 series SSDs have a SandForce controller.(speculation by thessdreview.com)

Up to now SATA III SSDs with SandForce controllers have not been recommended in Clevos and Sagers.

Intel SSD 520 Cherryville Launches This November, Curtains for SSD 510

SandForce Driven Intel SSD Gets Closer To Reality????

Intel's next enthusiast solid state drive series, the SSD 520, is codenamed Cherryville

This drive is said to use a SandForce controller and not a Marvell as used in the 510 series.

Fresh tips from our sources suggests to important bits of information, its launch date and market positioning.

The SSD 520 "Cherryville" family is slated for this November, the 4th of November(date reported by VR-Zone.com) to be precise. That is when one can expect market-availability. The second important bit of information is that SSD 520 is poised to displace the SSD 510 "Elmcrest" series, that's currently out in the market, available at 120 GB and 250 GB capacities.

SSD 520 series, according to fresh information, is built around the idea of providing more capacity choices to the consumer, higher throughput, and lower latencies, compared to SSD 510 series. The new SSD 520 series will be available in capacities as high as 480 GB and as low as 60 GB; provide trasfer rates of 520 MB/s sequential read, 500 MB/s sequential writes (compared to 500/315 MB/s on SSD 510), and 40,000 IOPS read/write 4K random access throughput.

In related news, we hear the codename of the successor to SSD 520 "Cherryville" is codenamed "King Crest", and is slated for the second quarter of 2012.

SandForce Driven Intel SSD Gets Closer To Reality - The SSD Review

Intel SSD 520 Cherryville Launches This November, Curtains for SSD 510 by VR-Zone.com

 

Good news, hopefully there can be some kind of update the SandForce controllers so we can readily ship them!

 

Just to give this a bump, the 520 series SSD won't have a sandforce controller in it. Trust me on that one. And i'm 99% sure that the date you said is wrong too. Its all under NDA but the 520 will be a beast.

 

There are a bunch of good SSDs coming out. The upcoming Samsung's look interesting as well, and they have a long enough history to expect decent quality.

I am forcing myself to wait for Black Friday deals.

 

I'm hoping that when the 520 comes out that the 510 series gets way cheaper. If it does, I think I'll have my first SSD.

 

When the 520 comes out the 510 will just go away as soon as they flush them out of the channel. So seeing how tight SSD's are right now, I bet there won't be much of a sale on them hehe.

 

So depressingly true.

 

If it has a Sandforce controller I probably won't care much. But if it has a breakthrough Intel controller or if the King Crest has an Intel controller, then I want it!

 

I don't think a lot of these new ones will make it by Black Friday. Maybe in January. Oh well..
_

 

Please hit the $1/GB ratio...please...

I'll even take it at $1.50/GB. (That 480GB SSD looks enticing)

 

I actually hope that the 520 won't be much better than the 510.. cause I just ordered a Malibal with the 510 Series

 

About a SandForce controller being used in the 520 series,thessdreview.com has this to say>

"This is ONLY an educated guess, however, speeds described by VR-Zone of 520MB/s read and 500MB/s write seem to resemble what we generally see from the SF-2281 processor now".

So it's only speculation,not fact.

New Intel SSD Chart

Intel has plans for the solid state drive (SSD) market that look deep into 2012. It is becoming increasingly clear that the company wants to give its SSD portfolio the breakneck product cycle its processor lineup enjoys, that of generation leaps every year or so. Looking into 2012, we see new models targeting pretty much every market segment.



To begin with, Intel will enter 2012 calendar year with many of the products it introduced very recently, some it hasn't even done yet. These include the SSD 520 "Cherryville", SSD 710 "Lyndonville", SSD 720 "Ramsdale", and "Hawley Creek" mSATA SSDs. Several of these will launch within the fourth quarter of 2011. Intel will then allow these products to lead the portfolio for the remainder of 2011 and the first quarter of 2012 (i.e. till the end of March 2012).

In the second quarter of 2012, Intel will launch "Ramsdale MLC". Simply put, this is a variant of "Ramsdale" Intel SSD 720 series PCI Express SSDs, which uses 25 nm MLC-HET NAND flash memory instead of SLC NAND flash found on the standard "Ramsdale". MLC-HET allows Intel to double capacities, while offering comparable endurance to SLC, and much higher price per gigabyte. It does, however, come at the cost of slightly lower throughput. Hence, Ramsdale MLC isn't really a replacement, but more of an expansion of the 700 Series PCI Express family.

Around the same time, Intel will launch "King Crest", a successor of SSD 520 "Cherryville" family. This is most definitely a successor, since it uses 25 nm MLC-HET NAND flash instead of regular 25 nm NAND flash found on SSD 520. We don't expect any leaps in terms of capacities, but endurance, sequential data-rates, and throughput can be expected to go up. Like the SSD 520, "King Crest" comes in the 2.5-inch form-factor with SATA 6 Gbps interface.

Some really big changes are reserved for the third quarter of 2012. Here, we find a new product taking shape, codenamed "Taylorsville". This one is slated to succeed SSD 710 "Lyndonville", with significant increases in capacities. "Taylorsville" will be available in capacities of 800 GB, 400 GB, and 200 GB. Like SSD 710, it will make use of MLC-HET NAND flash, the 2.5-inch form-factor, and SATA 6 Gbps interface.

Finally, there is "Lincoln Crest", a successor of SSD 320 series. These drives will mark the transition of Intel's mainstream-thru-value SSDs to the SATA 6 Gbps interface. It will make use of MLC-HET NAND flash, and hence will be a lot more durable, and speedy compared to SSD 320 series.

from VR-Zone.com

 

hi, question for someone a lot smarter than me on ssd's re: controller for 520 (which really doesnt exclude anyone):

from what i understand most people assuming it has to be sandforce controller in the 520, based mostly on capacity. but didn't the first intel roadmap leak from april show low end at 64? and the 510 has a 120 (as well as a 250 vs 256). i agree it seems most likely it's SF, but i guess three questions. 1, unless the first iteration of leak showing low end at 64 instead of 60 was a typo, could SF even be spec'd UP to above 60 (dont know, but would seem easier to spec down then up)? 2, the 120s the same for 510 and SF-driven SSDs, is there any reason the 250 couldnt now be a 240, maybe intel realizing people aren't giving us benefit of 10 extra gb when comparing to SF-driven ssd's, but we still have the cost and then finally 3, found the following in the techreport (link below) review of the crucial m4 that said." Of the drive's 256GB of flash capacity, 238GB is available to end users. The rest is dedicated to "spare area" used as temporary storage by the controller."

Crucial's m4 solid-state drive - The Tech Report - Page 1

is this just wrong? or is the 256gb m4 really a 240gb drive? or is there some reason SF rates a 240 b/c uses extra storage for controller but mrvl doesnt. (interestingly, if you go to SF site for 2200 specs, they say rated up to 512gb despite only marketing a 480gb high end, (link below). sorry for long post but would love some thoughts if anyone has any thoughts

SandForce - Products - Client SSD Processors

 

Not only storage, but you lose quite a bit by converting it into binary 1's and 0's. I'm not sure if you know this, but this happens for all drives.

Mr. Mysterious

 

appreciate the response. i didnt know. as my name suggest, new to this. i knew not all flash was usable, but thought that meant was more than 256gb in a 256 drive, not that a 256 became a 238. so that means a sf-240 is actually has 223 gb of usable capacity?

also, any idea on whether it would be as easy for intel to "de-flash" a 256 level controller to 240 rated capacity as it would be for them to use a sf-controller in a 64gb drive, assuming the april leak wasnt a typo? would seem to me easier to de-spec than up-spec just thinking of it simply (easier to not use all the horsepower of a controller, but harder to turn the volume knob to 11), but not sure if something about controller tech that would make both equally easy or hard.

again, much appreciated

 

To clarify what was said above, if you read the box of hard drives, they will note that 1 gb = 1,000,0000,000 bytes, when a gb is actually 1024 * 1024 * 1024 bytes = 1,073,741,824 bytes.

This applies to all hard drives, not just flash hard drives. For instance, I have a 1 tb external hard drive (just a regular spinning disk drive), but it only has 931 gb in windows.

If you go by the standard OS calculations, 1 tb should be 1024 gb.
But if you go by the hard drive manufacturer's measurements then convert it to windows' measurements, you'll get 1 tb = 1000gb * (1000/1024) * (1000/1024) * (1000/1024) ~= 931 gb. The first 1000/1024 accounts for the loss in gb, the second accounts for the loss in mb, and the third accounts for the loss in kb when doing the conversion.

There is actually more than 931 gb in the drive though, but the rest is the inaccessible "spare area" as mentioned.

 

Here's hoping the 520's will be out before black Friday!

 

520 confirmed with Sandforce controller SF-2281 can be seen here plus some benchmarks in the same thread.

 

This is going to be really odd then, I would imagine the problems with Clevo and Sandforce are going to be fixed, or else, Intel is going to lose a lot of business in the Clevo section...