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NAND Flash Shrinks To 15/16nm Process, Further Driving Prices Down

Posted by Soulskill on from the smaller-better-faster-cheaper dept.

Lucas123 writes: Both Micron and Toshiba are producing NAND flash memory based on 15 and 16 nanometer process technology, which reduces die area over a 16GB MLC chip by 28% compared with previous die technology. Additionally, Micron announced its upcoming consumer USB flash drives and internal SSDs will also use triple-level cell NAND flash (a technology expected to soon dominate the market) storing three bits instead of two for the first time and further reducing production cost. The advancement in NAND flash density has been driving SSD pricing down dramatically over the past few years. In fact, over the last year, the average price for 128GB and 256GB SSDs have dropped to $50 and $90, respectively, for system manufacturers, according to DRAMeXchange. And prices for consumers have dropped to an average of $91.55 for a 128GB SSD and $164.34 for a 256GB SSD.

60 comments

  1. single, multi, triple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

    Whadayamean, "for the first time"? We've had three bits per cell for a while.

    Note how the prices sink while the fabs get ever more expensive. Can't be much margin left in that game. Also note that the number of available cycles per cell drops with the process density AND with the number of bits per cell. You can try and paper over it with ever more clever wear leveling tricks, but the basic problem remains the same: It's not good for data longevity.

    1. Re:single, multi, triple by ShanghaiBill · · Score: 2

      Whadayamean, "for the first time"? We've had three bits per cell for a while.

      Indeed. Samsung has had TLC flash (3 bits or 8 levels) since at least 2012.

      Note how the prices sink while the fabs get ever more expensive. Can't be much margin left in that game.

      The fab cost goes up, but as the density increases, so does the capacity of the fab. So they make it up on volume.

      Also note that the number of available cycles per cell drops with the process density AND with the number of bits per cell.

      In general, it is better to have dense, yet unreliable, storage, and then fix the reliability problems with higher level error correction and redundancy. This will often give you more capacity, and more overall reliability.

    2. Re:single, multi, triple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Whadayamean, "for the first time"? We've had three bits per cell for a while.

      Nerds, at least of the slashdot variety are not known to be well informed. Unless it's about politics.

    3. Re:single, multi, triple by swb · · Score: 1

      Doesn't improved density and lower cost also mean that they can just add more spare cells to make up for any reliability issues?

      Obviously the math has to work out in terms of the reliability decline being smaller than the increases in density and cost/GB.

    4. Re:single, multi, triple by phoenix_rizzen · · Score: 3, Informative

      Reading comprehension fail.

      The sentence clearly states that Micron will be using TLC for the first time. Not that the SSD industry will be using TLC for the first time ever.

    5. Re:single, multi, triple by phoenix_rizzen · · Score: 1

      Also note that the number of available cycles per cell drops with the process density AND with the number of bits per cell.

      In general, it is better to have dense, yet unreliable, storage, and then fix the reliability problems with higher level error correction and redundancy. This will often give you more capacity, and more overall reliability.

      Or, you can do things better, and move to vertically-stacked, 3D NAND, like Samsung. Each individual NAND chip is built on a larger process (28 nm I think) providing better yields and endurance, but you stack 20+ chips vertically to provide more storage in the same die area. Best of all worlds: more P/E cycles, better yields due to mature processes, more storage in less space.

      Planar NAND will be hitting a brick wall soon and won't be able to compete with 3D NAND. Samsung started the migration, but Toshiba and IMFT aren't far behind.

    6. Re:single, multi, triple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The sentence clearly states that Micron will be using TLC for the first time

      For sufficiently small values of "clearly".

    7. Re:single, multi, triple by PRMan · · Score: 1

      First time for Micron is how I read it.

      --
      Peter predicted that you would "deliberately forget" creation 2000 years ago...
    8. Re:single, multi, triple by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1

      The fab cost goes up, but as the density increases, so does the capacity of the fab. So they make it up on volume.

      Are NAND fabs much easier than IC fabs at the same mask size? There are companies offering interesting IC's that are hampered by their 60/90/130nm parts, and it seems interesting that the profit is falling out of NAND while those are still on the larger fabs.

      --
      My God, it's Full of Source!
      OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
    9. Re:single, multi, triple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      Die shrinks will be coming to 3D NAND too. It's true that the flash cell longevity decreases as the process tech gets "smaller" but the increase in density makes it worth it. Any problems are mitigated with advanced wear leveling available in modern controllers, and increased provisioning of spare cells.

    10. Re:single, multi, triple by mlts · · Score: 1

      There are always tricks to getting more bits stuffed in a cell. Each bit doubles the capacity, so (for example) if one bit causes more errors per cell, with ECC, it might be a net win.

      I do agree, eventually moving to 3D NAND storage is going to be a must, but shrinking dies is another way to increase capacity at this point and time.

      This is how Moore's law keeps up. Once one technology starts having diminishing returns, another can be used to keep things going.

    11. Re:single, multi, triple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Much easier isn't really correct, but say that you make a CPU at 16nm and a transistor doesn't work, you can probably just downgrade it from an 8 core to a 6 core and sell it anyway.
      If you make an 1TB NAND flash drive and get a manufacturing defect you mark that 4k page as dead in the wear leveling and say that it is decimal terabytes. You already have plenty of spare pages for the wear leveling to work better anyway.

    12. Re:single, multi, triple by unixisc · · Score: 1

      Whadayamean, "for the first time"? We've had three bits per cell for a while.

      Note how the prices sink while the fabs get ever more expensive. Can't be much margin left in that game. Also note that the number of available cycles per cell drops with the process density AND with the number of bits per cell. You can try and paper over it with ever more clever wear leveling tricks, but the basic problem remains the same: It's not good for data longevity.

      All the belly-aching we read about all the time about reliability, data retention, wear leveling, et al - are due to the multi-bit per cell - be it 2, 3, 4 or whatever. When you have only 2 voltage levels - VIH, VIL, VOH and VOL where V*H == VDD and V*L == 0, it's easier to get more reliable memory. Note that with each of the shrinks that we've been having, internal voltage levels too have been dropping - from 5V to 3.3V to 1.8V to.... where is it now? In other words, it's far more difficult to have finely calibrated multiple levels of voltage to describe various states like 10, 101 and so on. Yet, that's what the memory companies are trying, and what is imploding.

      I also think that Moore's law is dead, and that we are past the point where die shrinks translate into cost savings. They no longer do. In their most current iteration, they translate into power savings, or performance enhancement at the same power consumption levels, or greater memory capacities, but no longer cost savings. And I hate to think of the depreciation rates on these brand new sub 20nm fabs - it would be enough to drown the company in red ink, and in the event that it's publicly traded, it would have sinking stock prices pretty often. Only reason Intel stays afloat that they can manage not to transmit those perceived cost 'savings' downstream - something Toshiba or Micron are apparently unable to do here.

      I am reluctant to touch even 2-bit per cell memory w/ a bargepole, let alone 3. Only thing I had some hope in was Spansion's MirrorBit and its attempted ORNAND, but I have no idea whether that still exists today.

    13. Re: single, multi, triple by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Each bit does NOT double the capacity. The capacity is measured in bits. Each bit doubles the complexity, not capacity. It takes two voltage levels to represent one bit per cell, four voltage levels to represent two bits, and eight voltage levels to represent three bits. Going from MLC to TLC is a 50% capacity increase at the expense of a 100% complexity increase. Going to four bits per cell, that's a 33% capacity increase over TLC, with yet another 100% increase to complexity. It is not scalable.

    14. Re: single, multi, triple by mlts · · Score: 1

      Thanks, I was still thinking crypto keys, thus the brain fart.

      It definitely hits diminishing returns, but it is a way to gain capacity, although where it will hit a wall is when the losses due to ECC are more than the capacity gained.

  2. Cheaper than that by pushing-robot · · Score: 3, Insightful

    I just picked up a Samsung 850 EVO 500GB for $149, and prices could be driven down further in the coming months as 32-layer and 48-layer chips show up.

    It's getting harder to justify spinning disks at home, especially as the traditional data hogs (backups, videos) are largely moving to 'the cloud'.

    --
    How can I believe you when you tell me what I don't want to hear?
    1. Re:Cheaper than that by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Where did you find that? The lowest price I found is $176.97 for the Samsung 850 EVO 500GB.

      For your reference:
      NewEgg
      Amazon
      eBay

    2. Re:Cheaper than that by chuckugly · · Score: 1

      Yeah I built a NAS with 'disks' and all the new machines just get SSD for local stuff. If/when I am faced with having to be in scenarios where I'm disconnected or poorly connected for long periods of time again I'll have to reconsider, unless we're all sporting 4tb SSDs by then.

    3. Re:Cheaper than that by BenJeremy · · Score: 1

      I got the same deal, it was on eBay a week or two ago, actually offered by NewEgg.

      I just upgraded my son's boot drive from an Adata 120GB to this EVO drive. He's very happy with it so far. He's been doing more game and mod development with his "team" (lots of friends around the world) and the 120GB for the boot wasn't cutting it, even with a large data drive.

      I had been considering only upgrading him to 240GB, but at the $0.30/GB price point, I couldn't justify a stopgap measure.

      My own PC has 2x256GB Samsung 830 drives in a RAID-0 array for boot, and was quite pricey when I did it.

      I expect prices to get below $0.25/GB soon, and probably below $0.20 by Black Friday.

    4. Re:Cheaper than that by trparky · · Score: 1

      The prices fluctuate wildly from day to day. One day it can be low and the next it's up by $25 to $30. You have to watch the price on a daily basis. If you think you see a good price, grab it; it might be more the next day.

    5. Re:Cheaper than that by larryjoe · · Score: 1

      It is pretty incredible how the larger capacity SSDs have come down in price. $149 is in the affordable range. However, 500GB used to be sufficient to store multimedia, but that is no longer the case. Each of my daughter's school performance videos is a 30-50GB file, and they quickly add up. The cloud is okay as a backup, but for primary file storage it's more costly, higher latency, and less convenient. For non-multimedia storage, we already had affordable SSDs in usable capacities, so I'm not sure I would get a $149 500GB over a $70 128GB SSD plus $90 3TB HDD.

    6. Re:Cheaper than that by hairyfeet · · Score: 1

      Considering the fact that Tiger was offering 3TB for $89 the other day? I think HDDs will be around for quite awhile yet, especially with both WD and Seagate already reaching 10TB and talking about hitting 20+ soon.

      As for "the cloud".....BWA HA HA HA HA HA HA...oh you were serious? BWA HA HA HA HA HA...in case you ain't got the memo, the magic word at ISPs is "caps", can you say assrape the customer for every byte boys and girls? I think you can. You now have smartphones with 13MP+ cameras able to do 720P FMV, DSLRs are getting damned cheap, and camcorders are everywhere. Where do you think all that data is gonna go? If you live in the USA it certainly ain't "the cloud" so that leaves good old spinning rust.

      And I'm sorry but 500GB ain't shit anymore, sure its fine for laptops where you keep things "thin" but I've been slapping 500GB drives in the refurbs I sell simply because I've gotten so many from folks upgrading to 1TB, 2TB, 3TB, the second you start taking vids and pics you'll find 500GB goes like shit through a goose!

      --
      ACs don't waste your time replying, your posts are never seen by me.
    7. Re: Cheaper than that by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Caps are the least of my issue. My upload bandwidth is too slow to consume even half my small cap if it's running maxed out 24/7. It would take over a year to push my data to the cloud.

    8. Re:Cheaper than that by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A storage device with no moving parts. The fucking thing should be designed to last 100 years with continuous use without even the slightest worry of failure. Yet, they fail, a lot. And when they do there's rarely any warning. The market should reject this flawed technology, but thanks to idiots like you they're going to push for larger, faster, and cheaper drives without doing a god damn thing about the reliability. Fuck you.

  3. Call me when... by JMJimmy · · Score: 1

    Call me when prices reach $90 for 2TB+

    1. Re:Call me when... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Spoiled brat. I remember buying RAM at $30 per meg. Before that the metric was pretty meaningless as we were happy with just a few kilobytes. $100 per TB for flash memory would have been a nerd's wet dream back then.

    2. Re:Call me when... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      A Sharp EL-377T would have been a nerd's wet dream back then too. Just saying.

    3. Re:Call me when... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Call me when you figure out how to configure a machine with a boot and a data drive (or NAS, or any other more reasonable solution for bulk data storage).

    4. Re:Call me when... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I jerked off to a lot of copies of Computer Shopper in my day.

    5. Re:Call me when... by JMJimmy · · Score: 1

      Spoiled brat. I remember buying RAM at $30 per meg. Before that the metric was pretty meaningless as we were happy with just a few kilobytes. $100 per TB for flash memory would have been a nerd's wet dream back then.

      I remember those days too. The reality is though at this very moment I can get a platter drives at $0.03/GB so $0.70/GB does not seem attractive in the least. There are performance considerations and platter drives have fewer uses which is why I think a reasonable price should be $0.04-0.05/GB for NAND.

    6. Re:Call me when... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Flash costs more but it's worth it for certain applications. You don't need or want flash if you're unwilling to buy it at today's low low prices.

      Hard drives are probably going to be cheaper than flash for a very long time, and thus flash will never "seem attractive" to you based on the relative price.

    7. Re:Call me when... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      What's you phone number?

    8. Re:Call me when... by robi5 · · Score: 1

      Tape is even less expensive, yet the mainstream moved away from it. A disk is just tape that's been wound up into a smaller space.

    9. Re:Call me when... by JMJimmy · · Score: 1

      Tape is even less expensive, yet the mainstream moved away from it. A disk is just tape that's been wound up into a smaller space.

      Tape is great for archival purposes where you're dumping/retrieving streams of data that can be stored sequentially. That's not exactly useful for the needs of an active HDD.

    10. Re:Call me when... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      The new huge capacity HDDs with shingled-magnetic recording are almost going to behave like a robotic tape library. Obscene capacity but in large chunks that are only writable sequentially. As a benefit, they can "change the tape" much faster than a real tape robot, and they can do something much closer to random access for read-back.

  4. Driving prices down, sure... by blind+biker · · Score: 0

    but also driving reliability down.

    --
    "The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
    1. Re:Driving prices down, sure... by TheDarkMaster · · Score: 1

      Well, the drive only needs to work the time needed for you cannot demand your money back.

      --
      Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
  5. Not a Fraction by VorpalRodent · · Score: 1

    I thought - where the heck have I been that we've gotten down to sub-nanometer processes? Then I read the summary.

    --
    Take it to the limit, everybody to the limit, come on, everybody fhqwhgads.
    1. Re:Not a Fraction by ArcadeMan · · Score: 1

      Gotta love that 0.9375nm process!

      --
      Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
  6. Man, TLC. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    With the trouble Samsung has been having with it's TLC NAND, I'm going to be wary of any TLC SSD that hasn't been put through the consumer testing gauntlet for at least a year.

  7. Re:Wear leveling tricks by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I wouldn't call it papering over it, or wear leveling "tricks." It's a valid solution to the problem. Why are you trying to spin it as anything else?

  8. There's prices and then there's Apple prices by cerberusss · · Score: 1

    FTFS: "prices for consumers have dropped to an average of $91.55 for a 128GB SSD and $164.34 for a 256GB SSD"

    Perhaps I'm missing something, but why would an additional 256 GB flash cost $300 and an additional 768 GB cost $800 when you buy a 15" MacBook Pro? Or perhaps there's a boardroom in Cupertino where they're laughing and shoveling money the whole day :D

    --
    8 of 13 people found this answer helpful. Did you?
    1. Re:There's prices and then there's Apple prices by ArcadeMan · · Score: 1

      You usually shouldn't get your RAM or storage upgrades directly from Apple, but since they've started integrating both directly in the hardware, you can't do that anymore on some of their computers.

      --
      Get free satoshi (Bitcoin) and Dogecoins
    2. Re:There's prices and then there's Apple prices by tlhIngan · · Score: 2

      FTFS: "prices for consumers have dropped to an average of $91.55 for a 128GB SSD and $164.34 for a 256GB SSD"

      Perhaps I'm missing something, but why would an additional 256 GB flash cost $300 and an additional 768 GB cost $800 when you buy a 15" MacBook Pro? Or perhaps there's a boardroom in Cupertino where they're laughing and shoveling money the whole day :D

      Well, the MacBook Pro doesn't use SATA SSDs, because SATA is bottlenecking SSD performance. SATA3 SSDs are only getting 540MB/sec - a really magic figure because every SATA SSD is hitting it these days. They're basically at the point where there's so much excess performance in an SSD that you can cut back on stuff like capacitors and use performance killing modes to operate safely without them.

      The SSD in the MacBook Pro is hitting speeds of 2GB/sec reads (nearly 4 times SATA) and 1.5GB/sec writes (nearly 3 times SATA).

      So part of the justification is well, you're getting really freaking fast SSDs. I think they actually tried it - copying an 8GB video file from that SSD to itself took around 15 seconds (which included all the filesystem overhead). That';s 4 seconds to read, 6 seconds to write, and 5 seconds for the OS to mess about or inefficiency in its buffers or whatever.

    3. Re:There's prices and then there's Apple prices by DigiShaman · · Score: 1

      Bullshit. Apple rebranded drives and RAM are expensive because they can get away from it. Pure and simple.

      Did you know that unless the a SATA SSD drive is tagged as Apple, TRIM doesn't get enabled. There were hacks to re-enable it up until Yosemite started signing device drivers. It's still possible to hack the OS, but each time a major update installed, you have to go into some recovery mode to hack it again. In short, a huge fucking PITA!!!

      --
      Life is not for the lazy.
    4. Re: There's prices and then there's Apple prices by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      You need the official Apple SSD if you want TRIM support without disabling kext signing.

    5. Re: There's prices and then there's Apple prices by tepples · · Score: 1

      Why can't a third-party SSD maker ship its own driver that supports TRIM on its own SSDs? Or does Apple use kext signing to exert veto power over third-party storage drivers?

    6. Re:There's prices and then there's Apple prices by tepples · · Score: 1

      Did you know that unless the a SATA SSD drive is tagged as Apple, TRIM doesn't get enabled.

      Is this only with Apple drivers or also with third-party drivers? Or does Apple lock SSD makers out of being able to make and sign their own drivers?

    7. Re:There's prices and then there's Apple prices by DigiShaman · · Score: 1

      TRIM will only work in Apple branded SSD drives. The "hack" clears out a portion of the driver in OSX to treat all attached drives as TRIM enabled if the feature exists; and it does with Intel, Samsung, OCZ drives etc. In addition, Apple will not allow 3rd party SATA drivers. This means Samsung and Intel can't release apps to manually TRIM a drive.

      With regards to Yosemite, read about it here https://www.cindori.org/trim-e...

      --
      Life is not for the lazy.
    8. Re:There's prices and then there's Apple prices by tepples · · Score: 1

      Apple will not allow 3rd party SATA drivers.

      In that case, someone who cares about storage performance ought to use something other than a Mac for every app that isn't called Xcode.

    9. Re: There's prices and then there's Apple prices by DigiShaman · · Score: 1

      Starting with the 2015 MBP units, the internal SSD drives bench around 1300MB/s in reads. I presume they're using the new M.2 SSD standard.

      Apple will provide the performance, but you have to play by its rules. If you want a open system, you'll have to build your own or a Windows based business laptop for a comparible price/performance target and install your own OS of choice. I think some newer PC motherboards offer an M.2 slot or two. You can also drop in a PCIe SSD card too if you must bust way past SATA3 speeds.

      --
      Life is not for the lazy.
    10. Re:There's prices and then there's Apple prices by DigiShaman · · Score: 1

      Update as of today! el capitan (10.11) might offer TRIM support with a disclaimer of dataloss and not to hold Apple accountable for it. Linky below!

      http://forums.macrumors.com/th...

      --
      Life is not for the lazy.
  9. So you want to look at biology... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This bio microscopy method can produce 63 megapixels per second:
    http://www.sciencemag.org/content/322/5904/1065.full

    This one has 300nm resolution in 3D, makes 10-15 Terabyte image files daily:
    http://www.nature.com/nmeth/journal/v8/n5/full/nmeth.1586.html

  10. die area reduction by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It reduces the die area over a 16GB MLC chip by 28%. ? By what percentage does it reduce the die area for an 8GB or 32GB MLC chip ?

  11. completely wrong prices by slashmydots · · Score: 1

    I can get, at very low volumes from Silicon Power, 120GB for $47 and 240GB for $77. The "average" price on newegg out of the 500 or so SSDs I bought there in 2014 was $60 and $105.

  12. SSD beat the HELL outta my 10k Raptors by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ASUS B85-E Motherboard

    Intel Core I7 4790k CPU (vs. my last CPU Core I7 920 -> http://www.anandtech.com/bench... )

    EVGA/NVidia GeForce 970 GTX video OC stock-oem (+140mhz) 4gb GDDR5 RAM (vs. my last vidcard 470 GTX -> http://www.anandtech.com/bench... )

    Intel 530 240gb Flash SSD (SATA 6) - strictly OS & Program disk - latest 3.0 firmware & trim tools (vs. my
    WD Velociraptor -> http://www.anandtech.com/bench... )

    Western Digital 10,000 rpm 8mb buffer Velociraptor 150gb (SATA II) - strictly for backup & programming data

    Promise Ex-8350 128mb ECC ram caching raid sata 1/2 controller (SATA 1/2) - for backup WD Velociraptor

    GigaByte IRAM 4gb DDR2-Ram based SSD (SATA I) - strictly for PageFile placement

    Western Digital 7,200 rpm 8mb buffer 1tb (SATA 6) - strictly for downloads

    HP DVD+-RW Dvd 1265i Burner (SATA 3)
    8gb Kingston DDR-3 RAM (1gb for 64-bit NTFS
    Compressed Software RamDrive = webbrowser cache, hosts file location, print spooler, %TEMP% ops, + %COMSPEC% location)

    ---

    ALL disks = timestamp logical NTFS filesystem data = off + perf counters + excess services off & TCP/IP parameters = security & performance tuned.

    Less work done on MAIN OS & Programs bootdisk = faster main drive doing less bs vs. REAL work + reduced fragmentation on it.

    I also place my custom hosts file onto it via redirecting where it's referenced by the OS in the registry (for performance + security):

    HKLM\system\CurrentControlSet\services\Tcpip\Parameters

    (Via the "DataBasePath" parameter there which acts like a *NIX shadow password system)

    I lastly increased hosts' priority assigned to its loads/reads too:

    Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

    [HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\services\Tcpip\ServiceProvider]
    "Class"=dword:00000008
    "HostsPriority"=dword:00000005
    "DnsPriority"=dword:00000006
    "LocalPriority"=dword:00000007
    "NetbtPriority"=dword:00000008
    "Name"="TCP/IP"

    * OS = Windows 7 64-bit fully patched & performance tuned + security "hardened" via CIS Tool (95% SCORE).

    APK

  13. Cap by tepples · · Score: 1

    It's getting harder to justify spinning disks at home, especially as the traditional data hogs (backups, videos) are largely moving to 'the cloud'.

    This is true so long as your home Internet connection either lacks a monthly cap or has a cap so high you're never likely to run into it. For example, people who don't torrent or stream HD video to multiple devices are unlikely to hit cable's 300 GB/mo cap. But people who rely on satellite, cellular, or Iowa DSL have to pinch their megabytes.

  14. For watching or for editing? by tepples · · Score: 1

    Each of my daughter's school performance videos is a 30-50GB file, and they quickly add up.

    Is that a copy for watching or for editing? An extended DVD is 8 GiB, and it uses an obsolete codec (MPEG-2). I'll grant that video production needs more disk space, but I imagine that "most" people won't be doing that. Besides, I was under the impression that external interfaces (USB 3, eSATA, Thunderbolt) have become fast enough to support editing video, so you could leave the SSD inside the case and plug in the HDD only when needed.

    1. Re:For watching or for editing? by larryjoe · · Score: 1

      Each of my daughter's school performance videos is a 30-50GB file, and they quickly add up.

      Is that a copy for watching or for editing? An extended DVD is 8 GiB, and it uses an obsolete codec (MPEG-2). I'll grant that video production needs more disk space, but I imagine that "most" people won't be doing that. Besides, I was under the impression that external interfaces (USB 3, eSATA, Thunderbolt) have become fast enough to support editing video, so you could leave the SSD inside the case and plug in the HDD only when needed.

      Yes, I could transcode the video to something much more compact. I don't have a camcorder with a newer interface, so I wouldn't want to use it as a storage device. However, the main reason I don't do either is convenience. I already have an HDD, so I can simply copy the file. Why go to all the hassle just to fit the file into a smaller device?

    2. Re:For watching or for editing? by tepples · · Score: 1

      I already have an HDD, so I can simply copy the file. Why go to all the hassle just to fit the file into a smaller device?

      So that you can carry the smaller device with you and leave the external HDD at home.