Intel's partner in solid state crime, Micron, just announced an update to its RealSSD lineup of SSDs. Based on the typically slower (and cheaper) MLC NAND process technology, the new 2.5-inch (up to 256GB) laptop and 1.8-inch (32GB to 128GB) ultra-portable storage slabs offer a 3Gbps SATA interface and ridiculous 250MBps read and 100MBps write speeds -- yes, that's fast, damn fast when you consider the 70MBps write and 90MBps read speeds of Samsung's latest consumer oriented SSDs. They even best the listed read speeds of Samsung's top-ender. Unfortunately, no prices were given though it's said to be "balanced price to performance." Expect 'em to hit the market in Q4 under the Lexar brand, and maybe even Crucial, Seagate, and Intel for all we know.

Seagate has already made its intentions about jumping into the SSD game pretty clear, and one analyst now says he sees two clear options at the company's disposal if it wants to seriously make a go of it, each of which involve Seagate shelling out a good chunk of cash. According to Lazard's Daniel Amir, one option would be to buy out Intel's 49% stake in the IM Flash Technologies joint venture it has with Micron, which would reportedly cost anywhere from $1 to $2 billion (not to mention put Seagate on the outs with Intel). More likely than that, Amir says, would be an acquisition of or partnership with SanDisk, which he says would be an ideal fit given Seagate's expertise on the enterprise side and SanDisk's retail knowhow. Amir doesn't put a price tag on that option though, but you can be sure it wouldn't be cheap.

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.

As evidence begins to amass around the imminent launch of Intel's consumer oriented High Performance SSDs, we finally get model numbers, dates, and capacities from Taiwan. According to DigiTimes and its "sources at PC makers," Intel is prepping a 2.5-inch Client X25-M SSD and 1.8-inch Client X18-M SSD for launch in Q3. Both of the SATA drives will initially launch in 80GB capacities before hitting 160GB by the end of Q4 -- 250GB and beyond in 2009. We'll guess that they'll be sporting the "world's fastest" SLC NAND co-developed with Micron making the drives tres cher fo' sho'. However they come, they'll likely be snuggled up to Intel's new Centrino 2 laptops when they do arrive.

P.S. We dug up a promo video which we've bunged into the page after the break.

SSDs definitely seem like the boldest new frontier in computer electronics these days, and Intel, which lately has been making some solid developments in the NAND memory department, is apparently still on track to do that whole SSD thing they've been talking about. According to CNET, Intel's NAND marketing manager Troy Winslow supposedly said the company would be coming up with some 80 - 160GB capacity drives in Q2, and 128GB capacity drives in Q3. Sounds to us like someone got something wrong, but there's no denying Intel and its respective partners Micron and STMicroelectronics are out to make a dent in the hard drive market of tomorrow.

How do 200MBps reads and 100MBps writes in a storage device sound to you? Pretty sweet if you ask us. That's the upper spec for Micron's new highspeed 8Gb (Gigabit not Gigabyte, kids) SLC NAND co-developed with Intel on a 50-nm processes node. Once slapped together in an SSD, you can expect performance to easily outshine any existing SSD or mechanical drive on the market while easily kicking the SSD bugbear -- random read/writes -- to the curb. The rub, of course, is that SLC NAND is more expensive than MLC so you can expect to pay dearly for that performance. Watch for the speedy Micron flash to pop in cellphones, camcorders, SSDs (and pretty much every portable consumer electronics device out there) sometime in the second half of 2008 -- sampling now to manufacturers.

Check it -- we've got a new entrant in the ever-expanding solid state disc market, and it goes by the name Micron. The firm's first SSD lineup (dubbed RealSSD) will feature a native SATA II interface, a rugged, lightweight plastic casing, and suck down less than two-watts of power while active. Furthermore, the units will come in both 1.8- and 2.5-inch iterations, with a 32GB and 64GB flavor to be available in each size. The newly launched family is expected to slip into mass production in Q1 of next year, and on a related note, the 1GB to 8GB RealSSD Embedded USB range -- which is slated to ship en masse next month -- was also introduced. We know, you've hung around this long just to get the low down on pricing, but unfortunately, Micron has yet to dole out that oh-so-crucial information.

HD video is becoming more and more prevalent, but most people are still snapping those grainy VGA flicks with their digital cameras, which might be plenty for YouTube, but it won't win you any videophile cred. We can't guarantee stuffing a HD sensor into your consumer cam is going to do much for that cred either -- maybe you and cred were never meant to be -- but it's a fun spec to have for specifications sake, and Micron is bringing just that kind of love with their new HD sensor. The new CMOS unit can handle 60fps 720p, or 30fps 1080p videos, and Micron hopes to start sampling the sensor this fall. Micron also has a new sensor with similar specs, but designed for camcorders, so hopefully we'll be seeing some price drops and spec bumps for those in '07. We're guessing this first wave of such consumer "TrueHD" tech might leave a bit to be desired in the quality department, but it's a good step towards putting a whole lot more pixels in every pocket.

So, it's not going to power your car anytime soon, but a new micromotor developed by Japan's National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology could have all sorts of potential other than lugging our lazy asses around town. The new motor measures a mere 20-microns in diameter, with 6 blades that each have a foot sitting in a 0.5-micron deep groove sketched in silicon. The groove and the feet are treated with some proteins that cause bacteria in the trench to move in a certain direction -- horse and carrot style. Researchers are banking on the tech to power microdevices of the future, including micromachines and miniature pumps for medical purposes. We're just proud to be members of a human race that has brought even micron-sized bacteria under its iron rule.