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Apple said to be in talks with Samsung to buy $7.8 billion worth of components
It's not clear if it's related to that mysterious $3.9 billion "strategic investment" or not, but it looks like Apple could be about to throw some serious cash in Samsung's direction. According to a report published in the Korea Economic Daily, Apple is expected to purchase some $7.8 billion worth of components from Samsung this year, including displays, applications processors, and NAND flash chips -- all intended for use in iPhones and iPads. As the paper notes, Apple would become Samsung's single biggest customer if the deal goes through, although the two obviously aren't strangers to massive deals -- Apple has already famously run Samsung's flash memory supplies dry a few times.
Apple to become Samsung's biggest customer
A report from the Wall Street Journal suggests Apple is about to become Samsung's biggest customer in a deal estimated to be worth US$7.8 billion. As part of its purchase, Apple will be securing LCD displays, NAND flash memory and mobile chipsets from the Korean manufacturer. Each of these components will be used to build Apple's popular iPad and iPhone. Samsung is not the only parts supplier to receive a big check from Apple. An earlier rumor from iSuppli suggests Apple has invested $3.9 billion in pre-payments to LG display, Sharp and Toshiba Mobile display for LCD technology related to its iOS devices. Instead of direct unit supplies, some of this latter investment may be used to help build out factories and increase production of LCDs for upcoming products. In the past, securing an ample supply of NAND Flash memory was a problem for Apple and the industry at large. During the early boom of the iPhone, NAND flash memory supply was seriously constrained due to the demand of the iPhone. Both Samsung and Hynix, the #1 and #3 memory manufacturers in 2009, struggled to meet Apple's growing orders. At one point, Samsung was thought to have set aside its entire supply of NAND chips for the Cupertino company.
HTC HD2 gets a stable stock Android build for internal storage
Running Android on HTC's venerable HD2 is old hat -- but historically, you've had to run it off microSD storage, which isn't an optimal situation for an operating system you might hope to use as your primary. Now we've finally got what appears to be the first solution allowing you to drop a nearly stock build of Android on the HD2's internal NAND memory, freeing up external storage for your usual collection of family photos, showtunes, and PowerPoint presentations left over from your WinMo 6.5 days. We've no doubt that this hack is a little dicey -- especially considering the herculean level of hacker effort that went into making it happen -- but if you've got an HD2 lying around that needs a new lease on life, it might be worth a shot. [Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
Toshiba outsourcing semiconductor production to rival Samsung
'Tis the season for manufacturing deals? Sure seems it. Merely hours after Sony announced its intentions to buy back Cell chip fabrication facilities from Toshiba, it looks as if Tosh is about to enter into yet another agreement. In this case, it'll be outsourcing the unprofitable production of semiconductors to rival Samsung, which will be responsible for churning out the brains behind a number of smartphones, televisions and digital home appliances. Numerous sources have explained that Toshiba is interested in realigning its focus onto the blossoming memory chip business, and moreover, its hoping to evade costly facility upgrades that would be necessary to remain competitive in the system LSI business. In other words, the company is dodging investment costs and placing a greater emphasis on a sector that's already profitable (NAND flash production, for those curious), and after the Oita plant is handed off, it'll be used to make image sensors in digital cameras. The Nagasaki plant, as we heard earlier, will be handed over to Sony. Toshiba's stocks were sent northward after investors welcomed the news, but of course it remains to be seen what kind of consumer impact this will have. Whatever the case, we certainly hope Toshiba never runs into any trouble with Sammy -- it's not like its top brass can be touched, regardless of infraction.
Micron embeds error correction in flash memory chips, calls it ClearNAND
Solid state storage is fantastic stuff, durable and lightning-quick, but it's got its fair share of quirks -- bits fail, pages fill up, and cells deteriorate over time. Typically, the onus is on a beefy controller to take care of your drive and make sure it lasts a good long while (which is why brand names like SandForce can make or break an SSD) but it looks like Micron is planning to usurp some of that responsibility with its new ClearNAND chips. Simply put, each ClearNAND memory module has a built-in 24-bit error correction engine, so your drive's host controller doesn't have to shoulder that load, and can focus on the good stuff -- like getting your data delivered at speeds that would obliterate traditional hard drives. Micron says the new chips are available right now in 25nm sizes. Want a more technical rundown? Hit up our more coverage link to hear what this might mean for the error-prone future of the medium. PR after the break.
Toshiba rolls out Blade X-gale SSD modules, makes MacBook Air storage look a little less proprietary
One of the most impressive aspects of Apple's recent MacBook Air redesign was undeniably the shift to ultrathin flash storage modules that could cram your gigabytes of data into picoliters of space. Needless to say, that's the sort of storage we could all do with in our lives and today Toshiba's doing us a solid by introducing its Blade X-gale SSD line to the wider world. It's basically the same stuff as in the Airs, sans Apple's bombastic marketing, and while the new SSD modules are not yet readily available to buy by consumers (who wouldn't have anywhere to put them in their laptops anyhow), system integrators are all free to start building around them as of today. The 64GB and 128GB modules are only 2.2mm tall, while the double-stacked 256GB option is 3.7mm in height, and all three can reach speeds of 220MBps while reading or 180MBps when writing. Full PR after the break.
Kingston debuts 96GB SSDNow V+100 solid state drive, complete with 25 percent performance boost
Another week, another SSDNow drive. This go 'round, Kingston's trotting out a midrange 96GB version of the SSDNow V+100, which promises to offer a 25 percent increase in performance over existing V+ units. Furthermore, this guy has an enhanced 'always-on' garbage collection feature, which purports to clean redundant data from the drive to prevent performance degradation and maintains the drive over its life cycle. Thankfully for you dual-boot users, the garbage collection scheme operates independently from the OS -- in other words, it works with both modern, TRIM-supporting systems such as Windows 7, as well as older legacy OS' such as Windows Vista and XP that do not support TRIM. The 96 gigger carries an MSRP of $290, while a 64GB unit can be had for as little as $220 and a 512GB version for a staggering $1,900.
Intel, Samsung, Toshiba form consortium aiming for 10nm chips by 2016
There isn't much to say here, so let's just get on with the facts: Intel, Samsung, and Toshiba are joining forces and pooling R&D efforts in a consortium funded in part by the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry (an expected 50 percent, or 5 billion yen / US $62 million) and the rest from the members. The goal? Semiconductor chips nearing 10nm by 2016. Ten more companies are expected to be invited once things get sorted out, so major chip-related corporations, please keep checking your mailboxes daily.
Iomega serves up adorable 1.8-inch External USB 3.0 SSD pocket drives
Some might say that you have somewhat of a problem when calling a solid state drive "cute," but what do they know, anyway? Iomega's newest batch of external SSDs are easily the most adorable we've seen, as these 1.8-inchers can just about slip into any oversized Fifth Pocket that you may have. Available in 64GB, 128GB and 256GB sizes, the diminutive drives support USB 3.0 and are built to be lugged around and occasionally dropped, stepped on or used as a stress-relief tool. Specifically, the metal enclosure is engineered to handle drops from up to ten feet, and the 256-bit hardware encryption ensures that only you and your cronies will see what's inside. The company's also tossing in its Protection Suite (loaded with anti-virus, cloning and backup applications), and it'll be hawking these in early November for $229, $399 and $749 from least capacious to most. Oh, and that noise you hear? A hundred million USB 3.0 flash drives getting all sorts of perturbed. %Gallery-105158%
SanDisk's 32GB microSDHC card falls below $100, is actually in stock
Holding out on upgrading that paltry 2GB microSD card that shipped in your Android device of choice? Hold no longer. Amazon is now stocking SanDisk's oh-so-capacious 32GB microSDHC card for just $89.73, which is notably lower than what it retailed for at launch. It's also readily available elsewhere on the web for around the same amount, with the "readily available" part equally as impressive as the "for really cheap" part. Of course, it's slower than molasses crawling uphill on a winter day (read: Class 2), but it's not like you'll be throwing this in your D3S and firing off 11 shots per second. Right?
Hitachi-LG unveils 2nd generation hybrid optical drive with flash-based storage to boot
The Hitachi-LG Data Storage joint venture has itself fostered yet another mixed product, combining both an optical disk drive and flash storage into a single form factor. The 2nd generation of its Hybrid Drive uses Micron's 25nm NAND flash memory in 16GB, 32GB, 64GB capacities (with those figures to rise in later iterations, naturally) and can be united with either DVD or Blu-ray players -- perfect for laptops and other portable devices with just one drive to spare. (The one stretched out on display, pictured above, was a 12.7mm slim DVD-RW tray type). Hitachi housed samples of the drive at its CEATEC booth and even showed off a few example products (first generation drive, too). Care to see what could be under the hood of a future purchase? Pictures below. %Gallery-104372%
OCZ Ibis touts 2GBps High Speed Data Link, vanquishes SSD competition
What's after ludicrous speed? If you ask OCZ, the answer is HSDL speed, which is the company's new interface idea for bypassing the bandwidth limitations of standard SATA/SAS interconnects. Using a high-quality SAS cable to hook up its new Ibis drive to a PCI Express host card, OCZ has managed to deliver a cool 2GBps of total bandwidth -- that's one gigabyte up and one gigabyte down... every second. In order to feed this massive data pipe, the company's gone and stacked four SandForce SF-1200 controllers inside the Ibis and RAIDed them together for good measure too. The upshot isn't too dramatic for desktop applications, where'll you'll see performance that's merely world-beating -- reading at 373MBps and writing at 323MBps -- but if you throw in some deeper queues and enterprise-level workloads you'll be able to squeeze out 804MBps reads and 675MBps writes. Needless to say, the Ibis scooped up many a plaudit in early reviews, and though it may be expensive at $529 for 100GB, it still seems to represent good value for those who have the workloads to saturate its High Speed Data Link.
Toshiba sends 24nm NAND flash memory chips into mass production
Let's take a moment to congratulate Toshiba on a fine feat of engineering. It was only last year that the company started shipping 32nm NAND flash memory, and yet today its factories are starting to churn out 24nm chips. Unsurprisingly, this comes with the boast of offering "the world's highest" density and capacity per single chip, an honor going to the 2 bits-per-cell 64Gb parts. That newfangled Toggle DDR transfer-acceleratin' technology is also supported, naturally, leaving us only to wonder who'll be picking up the earliest deliveries of these minuscule data stores.
Elpida and Spansion move from 'it's complicated' to 'engaged,' look to conquer NAND universe
The more the merrier, right? Cutesy sayings aside, the world is gearing up to say "hello" to yet another player in the NAND flash memory market, as Japan's own Elpida Memory (which currently specializes in DRAM) will be joining the fray in the coming months. Said outfit stated this week that it has entered into an alliance with Spansion (the former flash memory joint venture between Fujitsu and AMD), with Spansion licensing its NAND flash intellectual property to Elpida as part of the deal. If all goes to plan, Elpida will begin producing flash chips at its western Japan plant "as early as next year," with some of the output being funneled directly to Spansion. 'Course, with the explosion in smartphone popularity, it's not shocking to see a DRAM stalwart looking for ways to dip its toes in that high-demand NAND stuff, and as consumers, you certainly won't find us kvetching about the competition.
Samsung and Toshiba double-down on 400Mbps DDR 2.0 NAND flash memory standard
Our Peter Cetera album collection isn't exactly getting any larger, yet despite the progress of technology every time we get a new smartphone pulling over all those soothing hits never seems to get any faster. Even a fool can see laggy NAND flash memory is the culprit, and Samsung and Toshiba have a fix with a new DDR NAND flash standard. It offers 400Mbps transfer rates thanks to what they're calling "toggle DDR 2.0," similar to the tech in Samsung's latest SSD, effectively boiling down to a 30nm asynchronous design that's three times quicker than current DDR 1.0 NAND chips. Both companies are opening this standard for others, and hoping that their work will be the inspiration for faster devices and SSDs worldwide.
SanDisk's 1GB WORM SD card stores evidence longer than your prison sentence (video)
You can think of SanDisk's latest WORM SD card like a mini time capsule... for criminals. As the name implies, these write-once-read-many cards are tamperproof slivers of flash storage that can only be written to once by an SD WORM-compatible device like, say, those security cameras, witness voice recorders, and photo cameras used by the police. SanDisk claims that the data will still be readable after 100 years, long after you and your crimes have been forgotten. Why the fuss after not hearing about SanDisk's SD WORM ambitions since 2008? Well, Sandisk just announced that Japan's police force will use the SanDisk SD WORM card "as the storage media of choice for tamper-proof forensic image archiving." We suspect that the Yakuza will be getting right on that "tamper-proof" claim just as soon as they finish viewing the video embedded after the break.
Samsung's high-speed 512GB SSD to begin volume production next month
Does jargon like "Toggle-mode DDR NAND" mean anything to you? No, but a maximum sequential read speed of 250MBps and 220MBps sequential write speed scampering past a SATA 3.0Gbps interface should. Samsung claims that its new SSD is just as power efficient as its 40nm-class SSDs thanks to 30nm-class 32Gb chips and a low-power controller designed specifically for the toggle-mode DDR. Encryption? You betcha: 256bit AES. Expect to see the 512GB SSD hit production lines next month for an unknown (but not cheap) price.
SanDisk works it harder, unveils G4 and P4 solid state drives
Still haven't dropped a speedy solid state drive into your PC? SanDisk might just tempt you with its latest batch. At Computex 2010 the memory manufacturer announced its fourth-generation SSD lineup, consisting of the laptop-sized SSD G4 and the diminutive SSD P4 -- those tiny mini-SATA netbook boards you see chilling outside Jefferson's posh, nickel-plated mansion. The former will arrive in up to 256GB capacities with 220MB / sec read speeds and 160MB / sec writes (a sizable bump from prior numbers) while the latter range in size from 8GB to 128GB. Both feature the usual set of marketing buzzwords indicating speed and reliability, and both are slated to enter the OEM market in Q3 2010. That said, considering SanDisk's recent track record here, we wonder if the company meant third quarter next year. PR after the break.
Hitachi-LG teases HyDrive: an optical reader with loads of NAND (video)
Want a speedy, drop-proof SSD in your laptop? In all but the largest of 'em, you've got just two choices: pay through the nose for a reasonable amount of storage, or settle for a cheaper boot drive at the expense of capacity. Hitachi-LG Data Storage is pulling a Monty Hall by opening door number three -- an optical drive with a built-in 32GB or 64GB SSD. Dubbed the HyDrive and currently being showcased at mysterydrive.net, the product is presently being labeled a "concept," but a set of impressive demo videos already show the ODD / SSD combo booting, multitasking and error-correcting Keanu Reeves like a trained pro. We'll have more details at Computex, at which point we'll let you know whether to be hesitantly expectant or gravely disappointed. Personally, hybrid HDDs be damned -- we want one of these suckers yesterday. Videos after the break.
OCZ pushes Agility 2 and Vertex 2 SSD families to 480GB, us further from HDDs
It's one thing to have to choose between an ultra-capacious, relatively sluggish hard drive and a cramped, relatively speedy solid state drive, but it's another thing entirely to get the best of both worlds. OCZ Technology is finally pushing laptop SSDs to the 400GB+ range, giving road warriors a fair chance at swapping out their existing HDD without taking a hit in the capacity department. Both the 2.5-inch Agility 2 and Vertex 2 lines are seeing 400GB and 480GB models added, with 250MB/sec read and 240MB/sec write rates promised. The new spinners are slated to hit shelves any moment now, and frankly, we're terrified to even look for pricing.
