Need a little more proof that Intel's got some fly SSDs about ready to roll? We have confirmation from Micron that it's working on new and improved 34nm chips in capacities of 8, 16, and 32Gb. These lovelies are 17 percent smaller than the previous rainbow colored flash delights, and are faster too, offering 200Mb/s transfer speeds and when combined into an SSD, able to keep up with SATA 6Gb/s transfers. This press release confirms the chips will show up in flash memory from Lexar, but we're guessing that official Intel announcement can't be far off now.

Rumor has it that Intel is prepped to launch its new SSDs in the next two weeks. According to sources speaking to the The Inquirer, the new solid state disks will feature that smaller 34nm NAND Flash developed by Intel and Micron. As usual, the smaller manufacturing processes should allow for higher density SSDs (as high as 320GB) at a reduced cost to manufacture. In fact, INQ says, "there will be drives big enough to replace the HDDs in most, if not all laptops." With Intel already cutting SSD prices we remain optimistic that this rumor is true.

[Via TrustedReviews]

When it comes to claims of being the world's first or fastest, there's a big difference between announcing product and actually delivering it for retail. So let's be clear, SanDisk might be announcing the world's fastest 32GB SDHC card today, but it won't be shipping until August. It's not even the first 32GB class 10 SDHC card announced since Panasonic did its unveiling more than a month ago -- and this is where SanDisk's speed claims get confusing. That "class 10" logo is supposed to be a standard means of identify the card's speed as rated by the SD Association. Yet SanDisk claims a max read/write speed of 30MBps whereas Panasonic claims a max of just 22MBps. Guess we'll have to see head-to-head benchmarks to know the truth. Regardless, it is fast and that makes it suitable for capturing 160 minutes of full HD (1920x1080 pixels) video recorded at 24Mbps.

Think the megapixel race is bad? Now we've another to worry about, with both Toshiba and Intel hastily approaching 0.01nm technology in order to make chips faster, more nimble and smaller. According to undisclosed sources at Digitimes, Intel has actually canned production plans for its 45nm Havendale processors, which were originally slated to slip into machines later this year. The cause? It's heading straight to 32nm, reportedly hoping to ship its Clarkdale line in Q1 2010 with entry-level prices ranging from $60 to $190. In related news, Toshiba is joining the likes of IBM, Samsung and Globalfoundries in an effort to dish out chips based on 28nm process technology. Needless to say, the move is being made in an effort to "stay relevant in an area dominated by the likes of Intel Corp and Texas Instruments." Now, if only we could get one of these potent, low-power chips inside of a netbook, we'd be pleased as punch.

Read - Intel cans Havendale in move to 32nm
Read - Toshiba speeds to 28nm

When the Jasper motherboards started showing up in Xbox 360 consoles late last year there was reason for excitement -- quieter fans, more efficient design, and 256MB of internal storage to set gamers free of overpriced memory cards. Now the systems are receiving an unannounced storage boost, with an XboxHacker forum member braza noticing that his Japanese Arcade model sported a 4GB 4Gb Samsung NAND chip. That's twice the size of the old one, giving the equivalent of a 512MB internal memory unit. That first system was manufactured in April, and they're starting to hit US Arcade units as well. As of now we're not sure if there's a way to tell from outside the box whether you have this beefier revision of Jasper, but we're sure your local retailer wouldn't mind if you just bought their entire stock of consoles and ripped them all open to see.

Update: Oops, that's a 4Gb (gigabits) NAND chip, allowing for roughly 512MB (megabytes) of internal storage.

Truth be told, SSD prices have been declining at a noticeable tick since way back in 2007, but the reality is that the average consumer still can't afford one -- or, at least they aren't willing to pay the lofty premium for the decent increase in speed. If a bold claim from JMicron is to be believed, all that could change in the run-up to CES 2010. A new report has it that the aforesaid company will be demonstrating its new NAND flash controller next week at Computex, with the JMF612 aimed specifically at a "new generation of NAND flash chips built using smaller process geometries that will be entering the market soon." If all goes well, the cheap single-chip controller could lead to SSD prices falling by around 50 percent by Christmas, but after years of waiting for these things to really get priced for Joe Sixpack and his gaggle of siblings, we're still cautiously skeptical. Not that we wouldn't love to be proven wrong or anything.

[Image courtesy of HotHardware]

Remember the halcyon days of 2007, when Beyonce's "Irreplaceable" rocked the charts and Samsung revealed its 30-nm manufacturing process, promising a 128GB memory card in every digicam? We're still not quite there yet, but the company is finally releasing the first cards to utilize that manufacturing process, the biggest offering 32GB of storage goodness. That's twice the capacity of its 40nm cards, which never made it past the 16GB mark. 30nm moviNAND chips are in production now in 4GB, 8GB, 16GB, and 32GB sizes, and hopefully will hit retail before that 33 megapixel Mamiya we've had on order finally ships.

Remember that then-named S256 we saw sneak out right around a month ago? Yeah, that bad boy's finally on sale, and it's shipping as we speak from a number of trustworthy e-tailers. Said SSD -- which now goes formally by P256 -- packs specially selected Samsung MLC flash memory and a sophisticated Samsung Controller IC, coupled with 128MB of cache memory and Native Command Queuing (NCQ) support for stutter-free performance. By the books, this one can reach speeds of up to 220MB/sec (read) and 200MB/sec (write), though you can bet you'll be paying for the haste. We're seeing it on sale for around $658 online, though Dell's listing shows a wicked steep $851.99. Either way, ouch. Full release is after the break.

Man, talk about a lightning quick turnaround. Just over two months ago, Toshiba was caught showing off 32 nanometer NAND flash chips, and now the firm's gloating about being the world's first to hit the "ship" button. Er, it will be should everything continue as planned. As the story goes, Tosh will start mass production of 32Gb NAND flash memories in July 2009, while 16Gb products will begin to ship in Q3 of this year. The point to this madness? To get more memory into smaller devices, which ought to make future smartphone / MID / UMPC buyers quite jovial.

[Image courtesy of Tech-On]

With SSD prices still well above the point of affordability, we're thrilled to see more entrants joining the burgeoning market. Big players like Western Digital and Corsair are being greeted by small timers such as PhotoFast, Fusion-io and SandForce, the latter of which has just escaped "stealth mode" in order to launch its first solid state drive processor family. The chips utilize DuraClass technology and promise to address "key NAND flash issues allowing MLC flash technologies to be reliably used in broad based, mission critical storage environments." More germane to our discussion is the nice boost in transfer rates and lower cost of production; we're told that the SF-1000 crew sports a standard 3 gigabit-per-second SATA host interface connecting up to 512 gigabytes of commodity NAND flash memory, and that it delivers 30,000 IOPS and 250MB/s performance (sequential 128KB read or write transfers) with 100 micro-second latency. If all goes well, select OEMs will be launching SSDs based on this processor later this year, so we'll definitely be keeping our eyes peeled.

[Via GadgetMix, thanks Kamal]

In terms of affordability, solid state drives still have quite some ways to go before they can actually be considered as viable replacements for most consumers. That being true, Super Talent is still doing its best to narrow the gap with the lower-priced UltraDrive families. Both the ME and the LE crews began shipping today, with the former arriving in 32GB, 64GB, 128GB and 256GB flavors and the latter in 32GB, 64GB, and 128GB capacities. The LE lot rolls a touch faster at 230MB/sec (maximum read) and 170MB/sec (maximum write), while the ME editions are rated at 200MB/sec write and 160MB/sec read. There's no mention of the LE prices, but the UltraDrive ME drives can be snapped up now for $128 (32GB), $205 (64GB), $379 (128GB) and $645 (256GB) from NewEgg.

[Via HotHardware]

Apple and Samsung have a long history of locking up large-scale flash memory deals, and it looks like these two lovebirds are at it again -- word is that Cupertino's bought up all of Sammy's output until April of this year. That's an awful lot of memory -- Samsung manufactures some 40 percent of the world's flash -- so if we were the betting sort we'd say Apple's planning on making a bunch of new flash-based devices around that timeframe, potentially in preparation for a June launch. Hm, what could those possibly be?

[Via All Things Digital]

While HDD vendors are still pushing areal density limits, SSD manufacturers seem to be kicking back and soaking in the profits associated with a cutting edge technology. Unsatisfied with the lack of innovation in the space, a team from Keio University has developed an inductive coupling wireless communication technology, which is used within a solid state drive composed of "three-dimensionally layered 64 NAND flash memory chips." The development is being highlighted at ISSCC 2009, and it's bruited that drives constructed using this tech can operate with 50 percent less power compared to traditional SSDs. Additionally, the wireless communication that goes on enables the amount of wires within to be cut down significantly (from 1,500 to 200 in one example). We can only imagine that those involved with the process are pushing hard to get it implemented by SSD makers, and while we're still looking for overall prices to drop before we start focusing on anything else, we'll certainly take a performance boost (and energy savings) while they're at it.

[Via HotHardware]