Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drives

[hailstorm]

I'm surprised I haven't seen this mentioned here yet. According to The Inquirer Intel will be launching new SSDs on Tuesday 21st.

http://www.theinquirer.net/inquirer/news/1433725/intel-ssds-launch-tuesday

I expect it will be a while before they are available in stock in the UK but I'm still excited that we may finally see prices that are a bit more affordable for Intel. It will be interesting to see if the new drives will support the TRIM command.

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Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drives Now In Stock At Overclockers:

Despite the announcements below, Overclockers have got these drives in stock:

*****Intel 34nm SSD In Stock*****

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Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drive Reviews:

Intel X25-M 'G2' 34nm 160GB SSD Review - PC Perspective

Intel X25-M G2: Dissected and Performance Preview - Anandtech

Intel's second-generation X25-M solid-state drive - More than just a 34nm die shrink - The Tech Report

Intel X25-M 160GB 34nm MLC G2 SSD Benchmark Review - LegitReviews

Intel 34nm X25-M Gen 2 SSD Performance Review - HotHardware

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Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drive Pricing:

Hankering for an SSD that's as big as your traditional HDD? So is Intel, or so we hear. In fact, we've been hearing whispers that a capacious 320GB solid state drive was in the works since January, and now those whispers have been upgraded to library-like voices. According to the generally reliable Golum, Intel's so-called Postville SSD family is well on its way to reality, and with them should come much needed price drops. The new series should top out at 320GB, with an 80GB and 160GB version falling underneath. Word on the street has it that both of the smaller two will be around $100 cheaper than the same-sized X25-M drives, though there's been no leaks on the 320GB model's MSRP. Still, Intel has a golden opportunity here if it'll just get these things to market -- a cheap(er) SSD with a brand name like Intel could blow the solid state market wide open.

Intel's 34nm-based 320GB solid state drive creeps closer to reality

The smaller flash die results in lower prices, the 80GB model will sell for $225 while the 160GB version should sell for $440.

Intel's 34nm SSD Preview: Cheaper and Faster?

The prices are in dollars but it should translate into about £180 for the Intel X25-M G2 80GB model and around £340 for the 160GB model.

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Intel announcement regarding a problem with the current Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drive firmware:

***Public Service Announcement***

Intel has informed me of a bug in the X25-M G2 shipping firmware (02G2). This bug is specific to setting a hard drive password in your BIOS. If you have set a BIOS HDD password, then subsequently change or disable that password, the SSD may become inoperable. Intel is correcting the issue in firmware and will be posting a fix shortly. In summary:

* DO NOT set a BIOS HDD password on an X25-M G2.
* If you already have, DO NOT CHANGE OR DISABLE the BIOS HDD password.

It will be safe to do either of the above once the X25-M G2 is flashed to a newer firmware to be released by Intel shortly. Firmware, when available, can be reached by this not-yet-live link.

***End Public Service Announcement***

Intel X25-M 'G2' 34nm 160GB SSD Review

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Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drives pulled back:

Due to the above announcement, Intel have pulled the Intel X25-M G2 Solid State Drives so they won't be available for around two weeks:

Online retail outlets including Newegg have pulled Intel's brand-spanking-new 34nm X25-M G2 "Postville" SSDs from their websites just days after becoming publicly available, according to a blog from OEM system builder Puget Systems. The company said that removal of the SSDs stem from a firmware defect discovered in the first batch shipped last week.

Unfortunately, consumers who already purchased the new 34nm SSDs may experience data corruption when adding, deleting, or modifying the drive's password in the system BIOS. "Initially we were told this might require a complete reworking of the drives, and that those we had gotten in were effectively unusable, but Intel was able to work out a firmware fix for the problem," the said Puget's William George. "That won’t be available immediately, but should be showing up in about two weeks."

Currently Intel has halted shipments of the Postville SSDs until the problem is resolved. However, for consumers who have already purchased the drive with no plans to use a BIOS password on the drive, there ultimately should be no problems. Still, Intel advises consumers not to alter, delete, or create BIOS passwords until the drive is flashed with the update firmware.

"It made sense to pause shipments and implement the changes ourselves and via customers versus asking consumers to do so," Intel told Tom's in an email earlier today. "Keep in mind the fix has been identified and validation is undergoing completion this week."

The firmware can be downloaded here when it eventually goes live.

Intel Halts Shipments of 34nm SSDs

 

[Glaucus]

Interesting I wonder how much and how fast these will go for.

Seeing as XXX company want to put i in all of there machines they must think prices will full considerably by 5th of November. I would imagine around 50% fall if they had any chance of getting it in there entire range.

 

[explicit4u]

im waiting for these to be released, if there cheaper then the Gskill Falcons i might consider buying some.

 

[clocka]

80GB is the perfect size for me, can triple boot XP Pro SP3, Win7 x64, Ubuntu 9.04 and have all my apps installed.

POSSIBLE part numbers:

80GB: SSDSA2MH080G2C1
160GB: SSDSA2MH160G2C1

Hopefully we will see tons of reviews out on monday.

 

[nomadd]

80GB is the perfect size for me, can triple boot XP Pro SP3, Win7 x64, Ubuntu 9.04 and have all my apps installed.

POSSIBLE part numbers:

80GB: SSDSA2MH080G2C1
160GB: SSDSA2MH160G2C1

Hopefully we will see tons of reviews out on monday.

Just what I was thinking, until I saw the - admittedly early - performance numbers: http://nueda.main.jp/blog/archives/004532.html

Not looking too great. Sure, it's pre-production firmware, and the smaller capacity drives are always slower, but it's not looking a stunner in the price/performance stakes. OCZ and others already seem to offer better price/performance, and of course they will all have new drives out before Win7 ships.

I'll reserve judgment for now, until I've seen some final reviews. But I can't say I'm ready to jump just yet.

Nomadd

 

[Bob Wya Jnr]

Hi all,

Any thoughts on timescales for real review or two (especially AnandTech of course) - August 2009 I guess?

I would be interested in getting one for a guy at work if an 80Gb model is @180.00GBP and the performance is on a par with the Vertex series (trim support would be good as well as I plan to migrate him to Linux-Mint 7).

Bob

 

[mosfet]

Don't forget that read/write speeds aren't the ultimate guide to performance. The X25-M was (significantly) slower in terms of sustained throughput than some of the other drives on the market, but its real-world performance was greater thanks to very high IOPS scores.

I've been waiting for the price of these to fall, and £180 seems just about bearable for the best MLC drive on the market, although something between the two price points would be nice (120GB?).

Any word on OCUK getting these in?

 

[nightmare99]

POSSIBLE part numbers:

80GB: SSDSA2MH080G2C1
160GB: SSDSA2MH160G2C1

Those are the correct part numbers.

 

[clocka]

mofset, i presume there must be an NDA on these until monday when they are released otherwise we'd see reviews by now and full specs and official benchmarks etc. Roll on tomorrow

 

[Gills]

Looking forward to seeing some spec and benchies with these.

These new SSD's are part of the Postville range. Those part numbers posted are indeed correct.

 

[yashiro]

Intel SSD - Over £2 per Gig. (2.175)
WD Veloci - 50p per Gig.
WD Black - 7p per Gig.

Cheaper than before, yep. Cheap enough, nope.

 

[Gills]

I think a couple of Vertex Turbo's will do for a couple of years, after that we'll have cheaper, faster and bigger SSD's that will be worthwhile seriously buying. Then we'll have no SataII bandwidth bottleneck for those raiding using onboard controller as SataIII will be well out by then, maybe even SataIV.

 

[JaseUK]

I am wanting to order a 120/128GB SSD tomorrow as I feel there is no point waiting for the new ones as they will be far too expensive.

Am I right in thinking any of the following are okay to go for: -
Gskill Falcon 128gb
OCZ Vertex
Corsair P128

Some advice will be great

 

[Gills]

I am wanting to order a 120/128GB SSD tomorrow as I feel there is no point waiting for the new ones as they will be far too expensive.

Am I right in thinking any of the following are okay to go for: -
Gskill Falcon 128gb
OCZ Vertex
Corsair P128

Some advice will be great

Vertex Turbo out of all of them, why not get x2 60GB's and make em a Raid 0 array ?

 

[JaseUK]

Vertex Turbo out of all of them, why not get x2 60GB's and make em a Raid 0 array ?

Arent we looking at some high prices for these Turbo's?

 

[Gills]

Arent we looking at some high prices for these Turbo's?

10% more roughly.

 

[miniyazz]

Vertex Turbo out of all of them, why not get x2 60GB's and make em a Raid 0 array ?

Because there's no point RAIDing SSDs. And SATA4 won't be out for years, it takes ages for a new standard to be developed, and there's no need anyway, sata3 will be more than capable.

 

[Zarf]

IOPS are king, 4k Crystaldisk mark on that link was over twice as good as a Vertex, plus Intel has the best firmware (since the recent release) with regards to wear levelling and sustaining performance without TRIM.

At £180 for 80GB i'm very tempted to get one.

 

[clocka]

it might be 22nd (weds) that these are released btw.

 

[Duke]

http://www.engadget.com/2009/07/18/intels-34nm-based-320gb-solid-state-drive-creeps-closer-to-real/