Toshiba 512GB Solid State Laptop Drive: Come to Papa

256GB SSDs were a possibility in my mind as storage in a fantasy rig. But a 512GB 2.5-inch laptop drive is big enough to dream about from the depths of my storage fanboy heart-of-hearts.

TOSHIBA LAUNCHES INDUSTRY’S FIRST 512GB SOLID STATE DRIVE and NEXT- GENERATION SSD FAMILY USING 43nm MLC NAND
New SSD Family Achieves High Levels of Performance, Endurance, Capacity and Reliability to Meet Market Requirements for Notebook Computers, Gaming and Home Entertainment Systems
512GB SOLID STATE DRIVE
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IRVINE, Calif., and TOKYO December 18, 2008 — Toshiba Corp. (Toshiba) and Toshiba America Electronic Components, Inc. (TAEC)*, its subsidiary in the Americas, today announced the expansion of their line up of NAND-flash-based solid state drives (SSD) with the industry's first 2.5-inch 512-gigabyte (GB)1 SSD and a broad family of fast read/write SSDs based on 43 nanometer (nm) Multi-Level Cell NAND. The new drives provide a high level of performance and endurance for use in notebook computers, gaming and home entertainment systems, and will be showcased at International CES 2009 in Las Vegas, Nevada from January 8 – 11, 2009.

In addition to the 2.5-inch, 512GB drive, the 43nm NAND SSD family also includes capacities of 64GB, 128GB, and 256GB, offered in 1.8-inch or 2.5-inch drive enclosures or as SSD Flash Modules. Samples of the new drives will be available in the first quarter (January to March) of 2009, with mass production in the second (April to June) quarter.

Toshiba's second-generation SSDs bring increased capacity and performance for notebook computers. They utilize an advanced MLC controller, which is also compatible with further advanced processes, that achieves higher read/write speeds, parallel data transfers and wear leveling to optimize performance, reliability and endurance. The drives enable improved system responsiveness with a maximum sequential read speed of 240MB per second (MBps)2 and maximum sequential write speed of 200MBps enabling an improvement in overall computing experience, and faster boot and application loading times. The drives also offer AES data encryption to prevent unauthorized data access.

"The solid state drive market is evolving rapidly, with higher performance drives to meet market requirements, and differentiated product families targeted for appropriate applications," said Mr. Kiyoshi Kobayashi, Vice President of Toshiba Corporation's Semiconductor Company. "This new 43nm SSD family balances value/performance characteristics for its targeted consumer applications, through use of MLC NAND and an advanced controller architecture."

Toshiba and many market analysts expect SSDs to begin to gain significant traction in the market in 2009, growing to approximately 10% of the notebook market by 2010, and 25% of the notebook market by 2012. Toshiba expects the value/performance of its MLC NAND-based SSD line-up to help speed the acceptance of solid state storage.

Toshiba will continue to promote innovations that widen the horizons of the NAND Flash market and support its continued leadership in that market. The company will spur demand for SSDs in notebook PCs, netbooks, laptops and digital consumer products by enhancing its lineup, offering products with different densities and interfaces in a range of packages, while advancing device performance. For more information on Toshiba SSDs, please visit ssd.toshiba.com.
Outline of the new products:
Form Factor Capacity Product Number Samples Start of Mass Production
2.5-inch
Serial ATA-2 512GB THNS512GG8BB 1Q, 2009 2 Q, 2009
256GB THNS256GG8BB
128GB THNS128GG4BB
64GB THNS064GG2BB
1.8-inch
Serial ATA-2 256GB THNS256GG8BA
128GB THNS128GG4BA
64GB THNS064GG2BA
1.8-inch Flash Module
Serial ATA-2 256GB THNS256GG8BM
128GB THNS128GG4BM
64GB THNS064GG2BM
Product Specifications:
2.5-inch Serial ATA-2 1.8-inch Serial ATA-2 1.8-inch Flash Module Serial ATA-2
Size 69.9 (W) x 9.5(H) x100(D) mm 54.0(W) x 5.0(H) x78.5(D) mm 53.6(W) x 3.0(H) x 70.6(D) mm
Mass 66g (Typ.) 44g (Typ.) 15g (Typ.)
Interface Serial ATA-2 (3Gbps3)
Voltage 3.3V (Module, 1,8-inch type), 5V (2.5-inch type)
Reading speed Maximum speed 240MBps (sequential mode)
Writing speed Maximum speed at 200MBps (sequential mode)
Temperature 0 to 70 degrees Celsius
MTTF4 1 million hours

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