Intel on Tuesday introduced an 8G-byte solid-state storage drive and said it would make a 16G-byte solid-state drive available in the fourth quarter of this year.
The Intel Z-P230 PATA 8G-byte SSD is small enough to use with sub-notebooks and ultra-low-cost notebooks, Intel said. The drive, which comes in the form of a chip, is four times smaller than a traditional 1.8-inch hard disk drive and weighs 10 grams.
SSDs have no moving parts, making them more rugged than hard drives, according to Intel. SSDs also consume less power than hard drives, giving laptops more battery life. Intel is aiming this product at Netbooks and Nettops, a brand of low-cost PCs launched by Intel earlier this year that will carry the company's low-cost Atom processor.
The announcement was made at the Computex trade show in Taipei.
The drive will be available for US$45 in units of 1,000 in the third quarter of this year. Intel declined comment on the pricing for the 16G-byte SSD.
The company last month announced it would double the density of its 16G-byte drives to 32G-byte drives that will enable on-board storage capacity of up to 256G bytes of storage in a 1.8-inch form factor. The drives will be linked on-board via a standard PATA (parallel advanced technology attachment) interface.
The company will ship samples of the 32G-byte drive starting in June, with mass production expected in the second half of this year. Intel didn't comment on when it expects to formally ship the 32G-byte drive.
Intel introduced SSD drives late last year, announcing 2G-byte and 4G-byte drives. At the time, Intel said it would grow SSD storage modules to 64G bytes in two years.
The Intel Z-P230 PATA 8G-byte SSD is small enough to use with sub-notebooks and ultra-low-cost notebooks, Intel said. The drive, which comes in the form of a chip, is four times smaller than a traditional 1.8-inch hard disk drive and weighs 10 grams.
SSDs have no moving parts, making them more rugged than hard drives, according to Intel. SSDs also consume less power than hard drives, giving laptops more battery life. Intel is aiming this product at Netbooks and Nettops, a brand of low-cost PCs launched by Intel earlier this year that will carry the company's low-cost Atom processor.
The announcement was made at the Computex trade show in Taipei.
The drive will be available for US$45 in units of 1,000 in the third quarter of this year. Intel declined comment on the pricing for the 16G-byte SSD.
The company last month announced it would double the density of its 16G-byte drives to 32G-byte drives that will enable on-board storage capacity of up to 256G bytes of storage in a 1.8-inch form factor. The drives will be linked on-board via a standard PATA (parallel advanced technology attachment) interface.
The company will ship samples of the 32G-byte drive starting in June, with mass production expected in the second half of this year. Intel didn't comment on when it expects to formally ship the 32G-byte drive.
Intel introduced SSD drives late last year, announcing 2G-byte and 4G-byte drives. At the time, Intel said it would grow SSD storage modules to 64G bytes in two years.
