Intel Updates SSDs, Supports TRIM, Faster Writes

MojoKid writes "Intel has just released a firmware update for their 34nm Gen X25-M solid state drives that not only boosts sequential write performance, but adds support for the TRIM command as well. A performance optimization tool is also being released today, for users of Windows Vista and XP, who won't be able to take advantage of TRIM. After being flashed with the new firmware update, Intel's 34nm Gen 2 X25-M 160GB drive offered increased performance in a myriad of benchmarks shown here, and sequential write performance was increased on the order of 30%."

Comments

OSX ?

[CrackedButter]

What is the state of OS X in relation to TRIM? Anybody?

call me bitter

[nimbius]

but this is intel. i suspect the new found performance in SSD's is directly proportional to market and revenue factors. this company has been burned in the past using tactics that amount to "some ingenious breakthrough in technology" thats obviously been squandered and secluded for 7 months.

hang the customers out to yank away at them like cash cows, and another AMD will come along and punish you accordingly.

Re:call me bitter

[AmiMoJo]

Actually Intel are pretty good on the tech side, but in true Dilbert style their marketing department screws the customers.

The P4 is a good example. For marketing reasons they built a CPU that could be clocked really high at the expense of performance. The P4 was a consumer product as it defined the headline speed of a PC. Motherboard chipsets, on the other hand, are never mentioned in consumer marketing blurb so those stayed mostly about the technology.

Intel NICs, chipsets and mobile CPUs have all been pretty good down the years. Anything designed with the minimum of interference from marketing has had pretty good performance and reliability, and these SSDs are no exception.

Re:Kingston

[MartinSchou]

Considering that the cheapest Kingston 80 GB edition is 267 and the cheapest Intel X25-M G2 80 GB is 259, I don't see why you would prefer Kingston's version.

Anandtech's article clearly shows that it is severely lacking compared to the other drives, primarily because it is limited to a 5-way internal raid vs 10-way for Intel's own.

Now, if the Kingston was significantly cheaper or offered better performance, it would make sense, but here you're paying more for a much worse product. That makes no sense to me.

Re:TRIM

[maxume]

I fall into the 'only storage for extended periods' category, prefer the convenience of having everything 'inside' the laptop, do not particularly need the performance, and am somewhat budget oriented (in that I don't have a huge amount of money that I want to spend on computer stuff). So I guess the biggest problem I have with SSDs at the moment is just the cost, mostly regardless of the size. After that, the fact that cost/GB is still falling quite rapidly is a big consideration, as is the ongoing increase in available capacity; 300 GB for something like $350 is where those considerations go right out the window, so I only probably need to wait through 2 or 3 more product cycles.

I certainly don't doubt that the performance is great, I'm just a cheap ass.