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Apple Rumored to Be After Samsung Flash Memory

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the we-wants-it-it's-precious-to-ussss dept.

Steve Nixon writes "An unconfirmed report today from Reuters quotes an industry analyst firm iSuppli as saying that Apple plans to buy as much as 40 percent of Samsung's second-half flash memory output. The NAND flash memory cards will be used in a new, 4 GB iPod Mini, which Apple would release in time for the holiday shopping season, the report stated. The current version of the 4 GB mini contains a hard drive. Apple's iPod Shuffle uses flash memory."

4 of 274 comments (clear)

  1. More info by i_should_be_working · · Score: 5, Informative

    More info here

    Looks like Samsung is wooing Apple with a price reduction. Samsung also makes mp3 players. Seems like they would hoard the memory for themselves. Maybe they have figured out the sweet spot, in terms of profit, of how much to keep for themselves and how much to sell to the best selling brand.

  2. Re:Finally by Golias · · Score: 5, Informative

    I call FUD. I jog with my 20GB iPod every day, and I've never had a problem.

    --

    Information wants to be anthropomorphized.

  3. A long, long time by ColdWetDog · · Score: 4, Informative

    This has been brought up in photography circles for quite some time. A surprising number of people were adverse to flash based Compact Flash (CF) cards because of this.

    BUT - you get unlimited reads, lots and lots of writes (about 10^6 with modern cards) and the write longevity can be improved by buffering algorithms. I wouldn't use flash for a swap file, but unless your taste in music changes every 30 seconds, flash memory should be just fine.

    --
    Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  4. Re:how will it change the price? by TrippTDF · · Score: 4, Informative

    ...which is exactly what Apple does, doesn't it?

    Apple almost never drops their prices, they just make things better at the current price point... remember, $300 5 years ago got you a black and white 5 GB iPod... look what it gets you now.

    I bet it will be redesigned a little, but the price is going to stay where it is.