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Flash Memory to Rival Hard Drives

Posted by CowboyNeal on from the solidly-stated dept.

Skal Tura writes "Samsung will start producing 16 gigabit Nand Flash chips this year, nudging the memory technology towards use in notebook PCs and maybe even edging out hard drives in some products in the next few years."

8 of 407 comments (clear)

  1. Gb or GB? by TripMaster+Monkey · · Score: 5, Informative

    Some more information about the NAND flash memory can be found here.

    One nice thing about this article is that it clearly explains the difference between a gigabit (Gb) and a gigabyte (GB)...something the article referenced in the story seems confused about.

    From the article referenced in the story:
    Samsung will start producing 16 gigabit Nand Flash chips this year...

    Gartner estimates that 16GB Flash drives will cost from about $90...

    And from the article referenced above:
    Memory chips are measured in gigabits, or Gb, but consumer electronics manufacturers talk about how many gigabytes, or GB, are in their products. Eight gigabits make a gigabyte, so one 8Gb chip is the equivalent of 1GB.

    Sorry to be picky, but I'm a stickler for detail.
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    1. Re:Gb or GB? by penguinoid · · Score: 5, Funny

      The difference between gigabit and gigabyte needs to be explained on Slashdot about as much as the difference between the Moon and the Sun needs to be explained to astronomers.

      Judging by that +5, insightful, I'm tempted to make a snide remark about the ruling class (moderators). Why yes, I do have karma to burn.

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    2. Re:Gb or GB? by Firehed · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Doesn't stop the article from using the wrong one, though. I always question something that seems a bit out there. So they will indeed be 16 gigabyte flash drives? My uncle keeps going on and on about his "80 Gigabit" hard drive. Boy could I nail him on ebay reselling 4Tb hard drives. And eight gigabits of ram on one module. And... oh, why not... the 11.5 megabit floppy disk.

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  2. Flash is ready even now by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Insightful

    There are linux distros that happily run on flash. Damn Small Linux comes first to mind. It's possible, in fact many people have done it, to build a computer with no hard drive; just flash.

    The current problem is that you get only a limited number of writes to flash. TFA doesn't mention that. It is a problem but not an insurmountable one.

  3. Congratulations! by dbucowboy · · Score: 5, Funny

    Good job Samsung. I've got to NAND it to you...

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  4. Flash is a complementary technology, not a rival by BadAnalogyGuy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Hard disks may be physically larger and slower for random access, but they are faster than Flash for large sequential reads, much in the same way that the hare is faster than the turtle in that old fable.

    We'll most likely see Flash storage grow in cell phones and PDAs, not in notebook computers. If you were a pilot, you wouldn't just have the mechanic swap out the propeller for a Rolls Royce jet engine. You'd want the whole plane overhauled to handle the increased stress on it. Better to have a system designed from the ground up that could handle the new engine rather than try to bolt it onto an older, proven design.

  5. Re:One Thought... by BadassJesus · · Score: 5, Informative

    Flashdisks are much more reliable then any conventional harddrive. They claim >5,000,000 write/erase cycles and unlimited reads. Unites States defence department is using them for reliability issue alone.

    M-Systems (top flash disk producer) states this:
    (copied from the website)

    Top Reliability & Endurance
    ** 99.999% reliability
    ** >1,400,000 hours of actual (in the field) MTBF
    ** Embedded EDC/ECC, based on BCH Algorithm
    ** Data integrity under power-cycling
    ** TrueFFS® technology: bad blocks mapping-out and dynamic wear-leveling algorithms
    ** >5,000,000 Write/Erase cycles; Read unlimited
    5-year warranty


    Source link:
    http://www.m-systems.com/site/en-US/Products/IDESC SIFFD/IDESCSIFFD

  6. Re:One Thought... by cdrudge · · Score: 5, Informative

    MTBF isn't absolute. It's a statistical estimate. A hard drive may have a 500,000 hour MTBF. That particular model of drive wasn't tested for 57 years to see if it failed.

    Any type of failure rate is also representive of the collection of all products being tested, not a single one.

    Read the Failure Rate Wiki entry for more information.