You know, making that jump from HDD to SSD still costs an arm and a leg, so how about somewhere in between that gap? That's what
Lenovo's offering
as an option for the IdeaPad Y460 and Y560 coming in March. The idea with this RapidDrive technology is that you can have a 32GB or 64GB PCI-Express SSD installed alongside your regular HDD (up to 500GB option), and the two drives will effectively be combined into one. Sounds like a tribute to the
hybrid hard drives that seem to have quietly disappeared. The guys at
Lenovo Blogs claim that "this is not
Intel TurboMemory" as RapidDrive implements a "more automatic" algorithm to dynamically pool and manage the hybrid drive, thus giving up to 66 percent increase in Windows 7 boot speed as well as everyday performance. Regardless of this jab at Intel, we've seen this demoed at
CES and it looked as good as the video demo after the break. Just don't let us down with the SSD prices, Lenovo.
posted January 20th 2010 6:04PM
I thought I had read about this type of technology a while ago?
@ElCapitan been around for a while, but I guess this one has more SSD
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hybrid_drive
@ElCapitan
Yeah Samsung had this idea three years ago.
http://www.engadget.com/2007/03/07/samsungs-hybrid-hard-drive-hhd-released-to-oems/
@ElCapitan That's why I mentioned hybrid hard drives in the article, even though it's of a different hardware.
Let's just hope the premium is not too high.
@pontelon
The 16GB SSD I got for my netbook was $45, and that was a year ago. I think they can keep it down to below $50 for the 16gig and $90 for the 32gig. Honestly, they can probably go quite a bit lower than that as well.
@DrDream on...
@DrDr If you look at a GOOD SSD implementation, its more expensive than that. The RunCore Pro IV's used Indilinx controllers and the PCIe cards for the Dell Mini 9 run $169 for the 32GB and $259 for the 64GB. I would think those are the sort of prices you'd LIKE Lenovo to charge for something like this. I suspect the premium will be higher than that though...
Even if they kept the SSD and HDD as separate logical drives, I'd be game.
No seriously that was really fast.
@(Unverified)
Unless something is off here, that looked much higher than 66%.
Isn't HP doing this with the Envy 15/13 ???
You can upgrade your HD option to having a HDD and a SSD...
Whats the big deal anyway?
@User42
HP didn't combine two drivers as one.
@User42
That's just two separate drives. It's not like it's never been done before.
Think of this as being in RAID 0.
@User42
On the Envy15 you can get RAID0 SSDs though. 500MB/s read speeds. Ridiculously fast.
Sorry to be a skeptic but the one on the left loaded Media Center to the main screen and the one on the right loaded Media Center to the setup screen. Call me crazy but they need to take a good hard look at the quality of their demo...
@JonathanRN
Could it be that the one on the right just didn't get that far in the 30 second demo?
It looks like the one on the left does about 10 different things in the blink of an eye... while the one on the right has to sit and think about each one.
I would hope they wouldn't intentionally fake the demo... considering this video will be watched millions of times on tech blogs.
I love you Lenovo. I'm so incredibly satisfied with my Y550 IdeaPad. Definitely buying all my future laptops from them. Incredible quality and performance for a great price. Don't stop impressing me Lenovo.
@Solidstate89 I love them too. They come in 3rd in my heart after Asus and Apple, as far as computer manufacturers go.
@Solidstate89
Thank you dad for your IBM Employee discount...
So what?
They keep the OS and programs on the SSD and the files on the HDD? Hasn't that been done for a while now?
@Deaf Mute: Not in this way.
This is more of a two drive (SSD for OS, HDD for storage) setup for completely computer illiterate people. Your average person has no idea what to do with a 2 drive setup, as they will never know to, for example, install large programs to the HDD when their SDD is running out of space, or maintain their large movies and pictures on the HDD since the SDD should be dedicated to OS and programs.
What this does is give everyone the benefits of an SSD with the OS and programs being dynamically cached on the SSD, while keeping only one drive letter to maintain, so when you save a video, you save it to the C: and let the Lenovo hardware figure out if it should be cached to the SSD for faster access.
I, and many others, personally dont need something like this, but considering I have had to deal with many computer illiterate people, this would be a god send for them.
@Deaf Mute Agreed. Computer manufacturers COULD quite easily set up such a system for people though, with the desktop and My Documents folders on the spinning disk, and the program folders and OS on the SSD. Would mostly work as long as the SSD was a reasonable size, say 64GB or 80GB.
With many laptops though there isn't room for two 2.5" disks. Sure some 15" and up laptops have two bays, notable some of the Thinkpads, and lots of 17" laptops do, but lots and lots of laptops have only one 2.5" bay. Using a PCIe card for the SSD keeps the size down, and is fine as long as the SSD is kept somewhat small. Makes the combo solution of SSD for OS and programs plus spinning disk for media doable in a lot more laptops.
With or without the Lenovo driver magic, this should be more and more common this year.
@Deaf Mute You're probably missing the key here: it's the algorithm which automatically determines when to move certain files to and from the SSD for optimal performance. Like Ruben said, it means this is less work for the end user, but sure, some hardcore users prefer to do things the old way. ;)
@Ruben
Exactly, but even though I am computer literate, I like things to just work as simple as possible so I would be interested in this if it didn't cost much extra over a split drive setup (which it shouldn't being just software).
So... which one was which?
Gimme.
This is a great idea, and should be implemented on all computers with combo ssd/hdd drives; no more need to think about what to put on which drive.
just a side note... what happened with sideshow?
Make this platform-neutral, then you've got my attention.
@Suigi Feel free to contribute your efforts to a Linux version...
@Fanfoot Whoops, wrong choice of words. I meant make it work on other OEM systems - Acer, HP, Dell, etc.
@Suigi
Adaptec MaxIQ uses similar technology, I think it should be platform neutral.
Lenovo puts mind control devices on the SSDs so that eventually we will be receptive to our Mandarin speaking Han overlords. I have ben using Thinkpads and IdeaPads for years and I am ready to submit to their superior cultural and historical dominance. OBEY!
How would defrag work if the two are combined?