34-Nanometer Flash Solid State Drives from Intel
The chipmaker announced its new consumer series of 34-nanometer solid stated drives (SSDs), resulting in a significant flash memory price reduction.
Like its 50-nm precedecessors, the X25-M drives come in 80-GByte and 160-GByte versions, in a 2.5" form factor. The price has changed dramatically. At its introduction a year ago, the 80-GByte X25-M cost $595 in quantities of a thousand; the price is now $225. The price of its bigger brother was reduced from $945 to $440.
The tiny NAND flash chip in the new SSDs reflects the combined effort announced May 2008 of Intel and Micron, called IM Flash Technologies (IMFT), with the goal of reducing the form factor to 34 nanometers. Reducing its size, they argued, would lower the price and energy usage while speeding up performance. Last October IMFT was hoping for 85-microsecond latency, but now achieved an even better 65. Hard disk drives, by contrast, have latencies in the millisecond range.
The Intel press release has fuller details on the new SSDs. Intel may also begin shipping the smaller 1.8" X18-M "later in the quarter."
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you've found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
PipeWire 1.0 Officially Released
PipeWire was created to take the place of the oft-troubled PulseAudio and has finally reached the 1.0 status as a major update with plenty of improvements and the usual bug fixes.
-
Rocky Linux 9.3 Available for Download
The latest version of the RHEL alternative is now available and brings back cloud and container images for ppc64le along with plenty of new features and fixes.
-
Ubuntu Budgie Shifts How to Tackle Wayland
Ubuntu Budgie has yet to make the switch to Wayland but with a change in approaches, they're finally on track to making it happen.
-
TUXEDO's New Ultraportable Linux Workstation Released
The TUXEDO Pulse 14 blends portability with power, thanks to the AMD Ryzen 7 7840HS CPU.
-
AlmaLinux Will No Longer Be "Just Another RHEL Clone"
With the release of AlmaLinux 9.3, the distribution will be built entirely from upstream sources.
-
elementary OS 8 Has a Big Surprise in Store
When elementary OS 8 finally arrives, it will not only be based on Ubuntu 24.04 but it will also default to Wayland for better performance and security.
-
OpenELA Releases Enterprise Linux Source Code
With Red Hat restricting the source for RHEL, it was only a matter of time before those who depended on that source struck out on their own.
-
StripedFly Malware Hiding in Plain Sight as a Cryptocurrency Miner
A rather deceptive piece of malware has infected 1 million Windows and Linux hosts since 2017.
-
Experimental Wayland Support Planned for Linux Mint 21.3
As with most Linux distributions, the migration to Wayland is in full force. While some distributions have already made the move, Linux Mint has been a bit slower to do so.
-
Window Maker Live 0.96.0-0 Released
If you're a fan of the Window Maker window manager, there's a new official release of the Linux distribution that champions the old-school user interface.