Samsung goes after low-cost laptop market with new SATA II SSDs

We have a strange feeling there's more marketing hoopla here than anything else, but whatever the case, Samsung sure feels like its newest line of SSDs will work just great within low-cost laptops. The outfit has begun to sample "low-density, higher-performance solid state drives that are only 30-percent of the size of 2.5-inch SSDs and highly cost-efficient to manufacture." The MLC-based drives only come in 8GB, 16GB and 32GB flavors, and read / write performance ranges from 90MB/sec to 70MB/sec, respectively. Mass production is scheduled to crank up next month, and while you'd expect SSDs aimed at netbooks to boast remarkably low price tags, Sammy doesn't even bother spilling those beans.

[rob @ Aug 27th 2008 2:32PM]

second!

[xcrunk @ Aug 27th 2008 2:36PM]

That little thing looks so good, I just want to fill my cereal bowl up with a bunch of them and eat them for breakfast.

[Mustaine @ Aug 27th 2008 2:58PM]

For chips I'd recommend they be deep-fried. Wait until they're golden brown, drain, then spray with vinegar and add chicken salt to taste.

[OneLove @ Aug 27th 2008 3:08PM]

You can get salt from chickens?

[Jason @ Aug 27th 2008 3:43PM]

OneLove, you gotta be frum up north, am ah right?

[OneLove @ Aug 30th 2008 3:57PM]

down south, past the equator.

[Ellianth @ Aug 27th 2008 3:03PM]

Completely off topic: HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO MEEEE :D!!!

(you know you're a loser when this is what you choose to spend your bday doing)

[Synergy6 @ Aug 27th 2008 3:10PM]

You couldn't be a loser, you're an Engadget reader. (Oh, wait...)

[Dalcébolus @ Aug 27th 2008 3:31PM]

Happy birthday, man.

[Jason @ Aug 27th 2008 3:47PM]

I dunno man, maybe I'm just feeling nice, but +1 for your birthday.

[Flashpoint @ Aug 27th 2008 2:43PM]

I bet that 2 years from now, Winter of 2010, SSD drives will be so cheap, a 500GB will be in a computer that costs just $700.

...a Quad Core Trio Super 2 Duo Atom Pentio Murcielago (or whatever Intel thinks up to make buying a computer more confusing).

And thats assuming, Mccain doesn't win the election and the dollar doesn't slip even further. adjjusting for a weaker dollar, that same laptop might cost $2100

[tom @ Aug 27th 2008 2:58PM]

@Flashpoint

All agree except the McCain part, it is still a 50/50 game. Who knows.

But these cheapo SSD chips are such gonna make a HIT to the market.

[Michael @ Aug 27th 2008 3:42PM]

The reason the dollar has weakened is because of the budget deficit and out of control spending of the Bush administration. Barack Obama plans to increase our government spending by 500+ billion dollars a year, with no commitment to balancing the budget. John McCain has said he wants to cut 500 billion dollars a year from our budget, and has pledged to balance the budget. Under a balanced budget, our dollar will become stronger.

[Jason @ Aug 27th 2008 3:45PM]

John McCain is probably planning to use his new iPhone to balance the budget.

Whack. A. Doo.

[phanbouy @ Aug 27th 2008 3:56PM]

"Under a balanced budget, our dollar will become stronger."

too bad he's a liar and will spend another $2Trillion on the war.

Republican administrations have outspent Democratic ones since after Eisenhower.

either way both parties are in the pockets of Big Pharma, Ag, Oil, and Telecom.

[Meester Anderson @ Aug 27th 2008 3:57PM]

Oh yes, the whole "Republicans are more fiscally responsible" tack.
Lets see:

Last Democratic president (clinton): takes budget deficit and leaves with massive budget surplus

Last Republican president (Bush): takes budget surplus and leaves with record sized deficit.

Obama will spend more on health-care and education, but that would be more than made up for by cost savings from pulling out of Iraq sooner as well as eliminating the fiscally irresponsible Bush tax cuts. I'm a young tax payer, and love the extra cash, but know that the cost of this is a weaker dollar (sucks bc i travel a lot) and massive debt (which means fewer government services when I'm older). But go on with the "Republicans=Fiscal responsiblity" It was true in the 50's, it must be true now!!!

[Chuck @ Aug 27th 2008 4:05PM]

@Michael

It's not worth the try. Using anything that resembles logic and goes against popular theory will instantly get you a low rank.

[Chuck @ Aug 27th 2008 4:26PM]

Like clockwork...

I didn't even say I agreed with the guy

[steven @ Aug 27th 2008 5:07PM]

You do know that not just rich people invest in the so called "Big Oil"? (even though they spend billions and billions of dollars drilling.) Everyday investors own a very large portion of "Big Oil".

[Jon Doe. @ Aug 27th 2008 6:01PM]

Yah know. At some point the idiots in this country should wake up to the fact that you do actually need to spend money on this country. And no matter how much you ring out government spending the battle cry of "cut gov spend' ends up hurting the American public. Witness New Orleans and the 35W bridge. Both could have been prevented if appropriate funding had been given to update the levy in New Orleans and simply an overhaul for the bridge. Yet the morons in this country screech whenever a politician touts spending money on this country. Is it any wonder why the US is swirling the toilet? The US has some of the lowest taxes in the world and the end results are pretty obvious.
Its time to say enough of this shit and start putting real money back into this country. Back into infrastructure. Back into innovative programs in PUBIC schools. (Because no. Just throwing money at a problem isn't enough.) Back into our parks. Back into nuke plants. We can continue to ignore this until we really are screwed, or we can do something now. Guess which option I expect most tightwad American's are going to go with?

[Muhammed @ Aug 27th 2008 8:56PM]

I hate McCain

[Chris Taylor @ Aug 27th 2008 10:23PM]

This is so not true its laughable. We not only need to cut government spending we need to obliterate it.

IF I had a say in it I would lower the federal budget to 1/100th what it is now. Thats still 100 times too large maybe more but you have to go somewhat slowly on change like that.

DEA? Gone DOE (both energy and education)? GONE Federal Reserve? GONE

DHS? GONE TSA? GONE IRS? GONE Income Tax on wages? GONE (wages are not income!!)

The list goes on. These are all things the government is NOT legally permitted to do in the first place and has no business WANTING to do.

They are MONEY sinks. Its Stunning how If you how if you eliminate all these things from the government You can suddenly operate on a fraction of the current budget.

The Office of president will undergo changes. Signing letters that "excuse" gov from law? GONE. Any law that even HINTS at violating the constitution? GONE

The "pay" for president will be DRAMATICALLY increased as will the LIFELONG retirement income for president. The president will be forbidden from having ANY other source of income PERIOD. NOW this last one has a lot of HOLES in it big battleship sized holes. Its just the kernel of an idea. The idea is to make it so you remove as much "greed" motivation from the decisions the president makes.

If any member of congress VOTES "YES" for a bill without having READ the bill (random SPOT check testing will be done in the beginning to insure compliance) will be IMMEDIATELY impeached arrested and brought on on severe felony charges with MANDATORY prison time.

If a bill that is a CLEAR violation of the constitution is voted on any YES votes will be FIRED impeached immediately. No prison time or felony unless they ALSO did not read it them DOUBLE the prison time.

The party system will be ELIMINATED. The people will learn to educate themselves and vote on the INDIVIDUAL not the party ALL worthy candidates will be given equal time and EQUAL resources.

Money in any form and support in any form not from an individual is FORBIDDEN

The FCC will undergo some changes.

The airwaves and the "infrastructure" in this country BELONG TO THE PEOPLE.

Companies (radio tv satellite cable ALL OF THEM) are GIVEN exclusive access to the PEOPLES infrastructure so they must PAY the people. Here is how this will work.

Politicians will be GIVEN free of charge NO questions asked (short of normal decency) AIRTIME and ACCESS to network in quantities EQUAL to any other local politicians.

ANY politicians who successfully excell to the state level will use state rules (to be created) to also gain EQUAL access to networks airtime etc..

So on and so forth to the national level. SUPPORT from corporations or networks is FORBIDDEN.

100% EQUAL ACCESS PERIOD END OF DISCUSSION.

THis is not about FREE SPEECH for networks this is about FREE SPEECH AND FREEDOM for the people over THEIR AIRWAVES AND NETWORKS!!!

YOUR FREE SPEECH CAN NOT TRUMP MY FREE SPEECH! Networks can not HIDE behind "free speech" in order to VIOLATE MY Free Speech!!

Have a problem with this? GO INVENT YOUR OWN DAMNED Electromagnetic Spectrum and build the infrastructure to Use it on your own.

ALL ADVERTISING will be provided FREE OF CHARGE as a COST of gaining exclusive access to MY AIRWAVES AND NETWORKS

The cost will be ZERO and the GOVERNMENT will alot airtime EQUALLY to all politicians who make it to each level.

If you are found to LIE intentionally to slander another competitor in an advertisement YOUR DONE. GONE. Disqualified.

No Billboards. Video and Audio ONLY and all gov regulated to be 100% unequivocally equal.

McCain is out of his frelling mind and Obama lost any chance of me voting for him when he THREW AWAY my 4th amendment rights illegally when he ILLEGALLY voted YES for the FISA bill. Ticks me off cause I was starting to like him. But such a blantant violation of the constitution can not be tolerated.

McCain is even worse. HE KNEW he would have to vote YES so he "abstained" from voting. Stinking coward.

GRRRR IT MAKES ME SO FRAKING MAD. WHEN ARE PEOPLE GOING TO WAKE UP AND YES I AM SCREAMING AT THE TOP OF MY LUNGS!

Grrrrr I could go on for DAYS on the changes I would make. No more fee simple title on land ALLOIDAL TITLE ONLY. No more "certificate of title" for Automobiles. No more having to sign over ownership of your car to the state to get a license plate etc.. etc..

Owe and low cost SSD would rock. I have many machines where 16gb would be PLENTY of space but 32gb would defiantly be more than enough for most of my machines!

Lets just pray they are vaguely in the realm of affordable to us average mortals.

[steven @ Aug 27th 2008 10:32PM]

That post is WAAAAAAAAY too long. I'm not reading that.

[PowerPaul86 @ Aug 27th 2008 2:45PM]

Just put two of these suckers in your laptop and enable RAID-0!
Then you have a nice fast laptop, but don´t forget regular backups ;D

[OneLove @ Aug 27th 2008 3:12PM]

That's if companies like HP give you raid in the bios. :( dv9700t wtf?

[Andrew @ Aug 27th 2008 2:46PM]

I can't wait.. I absolutely HATE wasting a new (500GB+) hard drive as a boot drive for my *nix servers. USB disks cause headaches, CF->IDE adapters are only good enough if you have an extra IDE slot (sata ones are very pricey and bring unncessary overhead), and old harddrives are either unreliable or slow and LOUD. I'm sure these will come into a very nice price bracket as SD cards are comparable in size (maybe not in speed though).

I for one welcome the new SSD overlords

[BigD145 @ Aug 27th 2008 4:46PM]

You forgot to mention how hard it is to find a decent CF to IDE that can house two CF cards in a native RAID. CF are cheap, but only around the 4GB range. After that the price goes up exponentially.

[Malikye @ Aug 27th 2008 2:48PM]

What is this? A laptop for ants? How can we be expected to use a laptop... if we can't even see the screen without using a magnify glass? - Zoolander

[no, thank you @ Aug 27th 2008 2:52PM]

can i put it in my hp mini-note?

[iEye @ Aug 27th 2008 2:53PM]

Time to make my own Eee Pc out of an old Laptop...

[Castaa @ Aug 27th 2008 2:56PM]

How does these SSD read/write speeds compare to the magnetic media HD speeds found in current generation netbooks?

[404 @ Aug 27th 2008 3:00PM]

Great, now someone needs to design mini-SSD-HDD caddies.

[aquatsr @ Aug 27th 2008 3:52PM]

Samsung is awesome *drools*

[Chris @ Aug 27th 2008 4:17PM]

Only problem I see here is that most netbooks don't use a standard interface like SATA for their storage media. The Aspire One for example uses a ZIP connection.

[Chris @ Aug 27th 2008 4:17PM]

ZIF connection, I mean.

[Bill Jenkins @ Aug 27th 2008 4:21PM]

Hey Moonbat Anderson: You have no idea why there was a "budget surplus" during the Clinton administration or you wouldn't be so boastful that it is all Clinton's doing.

Clinton was president when the economy was BOOMING. The government was taxing in more taxes than it was spending (SURPLUS). The economy under Bush didn't expand so rapidly and isn't hardly moving at all. Some question if sustained growth can even take place... regardless, his congress provides him with a budget that he signs and it is obvious they are spending more than they are taking in on taxes (DEFICIT).

The republicans under Clinton didn't let him get away with pissing that money into some wasteful entitlement programs. If you remember at the time, all kinds of states had massive budget surpluses and only 1 or 2 actually gave the money back to its citizens (Minnesota is one I know that did.)

The next president, whether Obama or McCain, seriously needs to adjust government spending drastically. This means painful cuts and modifications to programs that democrats will continue to refuse to fix just like they won't allow drilling for oil, nuclear power, and other things that make sense to everyone else but them. Do you think Obama will do this? Hell no.

[phanbouy @ Aug 27th 2008 4:38PM]

"The republicans under Clinton didn't let him get away with pissing that money into some wasteful entitlement programs."

you mean like repealing the estate tax and other giveaways for the ultra-rich under the Bush regime?

[Chris Taylor @ Aug 27th 2008 10:28PM]

Well Estate Taxes by there very nature are unconstitutional. They are double taxation. THAT money was already taxed (BTW I am almost literally poor I bring home around $200 a week 95% of which goes to bills)

but its still wrong no matter who it benefits.

Income tax in general is wrong. WAGES are not income. Wages are an equal exchange of TIME for MONEY. NOTHING is gained there is no INCOME generated.

Most of our taxes are downright WRONG and NOT NEEDED if the government only did what it was constitutionally permitted to do.

[Bill Jenkins @ Aug 27th 2008 5:40PM]

Seriously folks, if you can't recognize simple economics and the difference between budget surplus/deficit and national debt...you don't need to go around praising Clinton like he was the greatest thing since sliced bread. I know all people who do are either lying or stupid. The national debt increased under Clinton, though at a much slower rate than GW Bush. I'd give Reagan and Bush Sr. a pass because they rebuilt our military to be modern and put the final nail in the coffin in the cold war. But I don't give GW a pass for wasteful spending and I won't give the next president a pass for continuing down this road.

The president doesn't write the budget, congress does. So the folks to blame are generally congress first... they seem to really get over because all the idiots out there will just peg everything that happens bad to the president. It is modern democrat politics... politics of idiots. Bush derangement syndrome and the like.

If Obama were to be elected, how would you like him to be blamed for natural disasters? Bumper stickers with "not my president" on cars or "buck farack!"??? Liberal Democrats have no class.

[Jon Doe. @ Aug 27th 2008 5:47PM]

Bill you are so full of shit I can somehow smell it through my screen. Are you sure your last name isn't O'Reilly? The President has budget proposals which guide government spending. http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/fy2009/

[Minilap @ Aug 27th 2008 4:28PM]

"write performance ranges from 90MB/sec to 70MB/sec"

What is the average speed of a 2.5" 7200rpm Hard drive? I just want to get an idea if it's faster or slower and by roughly how much.

Thanks

[LondonConsultant @ Aug 27th 2008 5:08PM]

"read / write performance ranges from 90MB/sec to 70MB/sec"

Actually, that should be corrected to "read performance is 90MB/sec and write performance ranges from 25MB/sec to 70MB/sec"...

[Jon Doe. @ Aug 27th 2008 5:41PM]

Shit for that size put the thing in along side a traditional hard drive. HD == normal storage and OS. SSD == critical data that can't be lost.

[Spam @ Aug 27th 2008 6:06PM]

Cant wait till these things are the standard in computers....
I wonder if that means bigger flash drives, sd, xd and all cards...

[RYan @ Aug 27th 2008 8:10PM]

Those are the sizes of the ipod touch currently right? - maybe cheaper, and smaller ipod touches are coming?

[Dorville @ Aug 27th 2008 11:07PM]

Ahhh yes cheap... They are thinking to get the market, is not like Nvidia, they was sticking in our minds that expensive means better.