Intel ships $125 budget SSD
updated 01:35 pm EDT, Mon March 15, 2010
Intel X25-V said 4X faster but cheap
Intel catered to the rapidly growing budget SSD realm today by launching the X25-V. The 2.5-inch SATA II drive is meant alternately for netbooks and for dual-drive systems where a fast and more reliable OS drive is crucial. The SSD isn't as fast as the M or X series, at 135MB per second reads and 35MB per second writes, but is still about four times faster on average than a 7,200RPM rotating hard disk.
Like other modern Intel SSDs, the X25-V uses 34nm flash memory and supports the TRIM command to keep the speed up on Windows 7 PCs. Price is the selling point, however, as a single 40GB capacity is available at a low $125 in bulk. Resellers should have it today, though actual prices for end users will likely be higher.
