Intel and Micron produce first sub-40nm NAND device

Just a few months back, we all gave SanDisk a round of golf claps for moving towards 43-nanometer NAND production. Fast forward to today, and that "feat" doesn't look so mighty anymore. Intel and Micron have just announced the industry's first sub-40nm NAND flash memory device, the 34nm 32 gigabit multi-level cell chip. The process technology was collaboratively developed by the two firms' joint venture, IM Flash Technologies (IMFT)," and there's nary a hint of shame when they trumpet that this is the "smallest NAND process geometry on the market." Sample shipments are expected to leave the dock in June, while mass production should get going sometime in the second half of this year. Somehow, we get the impression this won't stay on top for long.

[IT-Accountant @ May 29th 2008 10:37AM]

WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!

um, what?

[David @ May 29th 2008 10:40AM]

32gb in less than the size of a thumbnail, I'm sold!

[ry @ May 29th 2008 11:04AM]

just in case you (or someone else) was confused by the nomenclature... that's 32 gigabits. Not gigabytes.

The chip holds 4GB.
A major step forward, but not 32GB.

[Charles Lee @ May 29th 2008 11:41AM]

> The chip holds 4GB.

The die holds 4GB... but the article states that 8 die can be stacked on top of each other to form 32GB in a single TSOP package.

Certain Flash card formats (CF, SD) can hold multiple packages... so the densities move up from that point. SSDs go even further with the amount of dies that it can hold (larger form-factor)... so seeing densities of 256GB (and higher) are very realistic.

[Adam Zey @ May 30th 2008 4:23AM]

We're already seeing 256GB SSDs. I believe Samsung has one coming out soon. After all, there is a heck of lot of room inside a 2.5" drive enclosure when it comes to flash. I'd imagine that space, in fact, isn't even a concern; cost is. Fitting multiple terabytes of flash in a 2.5" form factor is easy, it's just that a single terabyte might easily cost $7,000-10,000 or more.

[L.Rawlins @ May 29th 2008 11:14AM]

Meh, 16GB in a Micro SDHC card that's already less than the size of a thumbnail will do just fine for now.

Besides, I'm already petrified that I'll inevitably inhale my financial records, family albums and pretty much my entire digital existence and lineage.

...and there you were thinking losing the keys down the back of the sofa was frustrating. Haha.

[Liam @ May 29th 2008 3:10PM]

Well... they'll still use the same size enclosure. Yes, it does seem like memory cards are shrinking all the time, but given microSD cards are designed for phones... which devices need it to be smaller. It'll make the same amount of flash cheaper, but not necessarily smaller in practice.

[Mike @ May 29th 2008 11:54AM]

So basically now we could have 64gb flash drives really easily?

[Adam Zey @ May 30th 2008 4:23AM]

With these, you could probably fit 64GB in an SD card.

Of course, SDHC only allows for up to 32GB... A rather shortsighted design if you ask me. Especially considering that the theoretical limit of SDHC is 2TB, but they artificially limited it to 32GB for some reason.

[ethana2 @ May 29th 2008 12:00PM]

Two layers of that and I'm good to go. I'll consider picking one up if they offer 8 GB SATA 3.0 Gbps units to drag out battery life on the laptop I'm going to get soon.
...then I'll add a modular bay battery to the internal 9 cell, powertop it to heck, lock the CPU at 400 or 800 MHz, and look into undervolting the sucker.

....if I do decide that making my laptop wearable is worth the cost, which will be partially determined by whether or not I can pick up one of these things in a small capacity and half-reasonable price.

[Ian @ May 29th 2008 12:16PM]

im sorry... but what?

[Ferdinand @ May 30th 2008 1:34AM]

These will be used mostly in Intel's SSD drives.