Indilinx, the company responsible for designing the Barefoot SSD controller, has today agreed to hand its future over to the capable lads and ladies of OCZ Technology in exchange for million in common OCZ stock. The companies have announced a definitive agreement for the chipmaker’s acquisition, which OCZ performed in order to gobble up a set of 20 yummy patents and patent applications while also expanding its presence in embedded, hybrid storage and industrial markets. Indilinx will continue its current operations, including providing controllers and firmware to other OEMs, and OCZ too will continue to use others’ wares, namedropping its long-term partner SandForce as among the outside companies that will continue to supply it with SSD wares. So it’s business as usual unless and until this partnership spawns some lightning-fast combination of software and hardware that forces us to hear that cursed “exclusive” word again. Ah well, best of luck of luck to them.

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Generally the rule is to have several smaller DIMMs rather than one or two big ones. High density modules have a higher risk of errors and are slower in general, having longer latencies and forcing more data through the same interface. Big DIMMs are the leading cause of RAM bottlenecks. Or not, I don’t know. The new modules are 1333Hz but also have 9-9-9-20 timings, which is a bit slow.

If you’re a RAM freak, these 4GB modules will be available soon, although no pricing information is available right now. As Tech Report points out, 2×2GB kits cost a little under $120 right now, so you’ll probably see it debut at somewhat more than that, though probably below $150.

Just like the previous three generations, the Z-Drive R2 is designed for high-speed enterprise usage and not for your average enthusiast – that’s why the Velocripator exists. But think about how fast you’ll be able to move you 8.5GB MKVs with the Z-Drive RS p88 1 or 2TB drive that features 1400MB/s read and write speeds. The smaller Z-Drive RS p84 still zips right along at 850MB/s read and 800MB/s write speeds.

These speeds are achievable with 8 PCI-E lanes along with an eight-way RAID 0 configuration. The drives are bootable and even feature interchangeable memory modules making the drive truely field-serviceable and upgradeable.

The word is mum on pricing just yet but seeing as the older and smaller 256MB PCI-E drive commands $1,335 from Newegg right now, chances are these drives are probably going to cost more than a used Honda.

By Evan Ackerman

Less than $100 probably means $99.99, but that doesn’t change the fact that the 2.5″ Onyx SSD from OCZ is actually in the realm of casually affordable, a first for SSDs. We’re used to seeing SSD drives that offer incredible performance, but at a price point that makes most of us just sigh sadly. The OCZ Onyx, while offering only modest speeds (125 MB/s read and 70 MB/s write) relative to other SSDs, is still fast enough that you’d notice a significant difference in load times if you stick your operating system on it. Unsurprisingly, the drive only has a capacity of 32 gigs, so your operating system may be the only thing you can stick on it, but that’s okay.

Even if the speed and size aren’t that impressive, don’t forget about the other benefits of SSDs: they’re light, shockproof, durable, and use up a heck of a lot less power than conventional drives since they don’t have anything inside them that needs to be kept spinning at several thousand RPM all the time.

$100 is not going to get you some kind of incredibly awesome SSD drive. But it will get you this SSD drive, which, for the cost, is way better than no SSD drive at all.

[ Press Release ] VIA [ HotHardware ]

So there’s a problem in general with buying an SSD, like any other component. You order it, the big brown truck arrives, you open the box and BAM! Press release announcing a newer, better, version of the drive you just bought. Not shocking, I know, but it makes doing this round-up thing a bit difficult.

Let’s take a look at the drives that got my attention:

Name: OCZ Vertex, with the SandForce
Capacity: 100GB
Cost: $438 (Cost per GB: $4.38)
What looks good: OCZ has been pushing these things out at an incredible pace. The Vertex is the latest, and the fact that they claim to have a maintenance algorithm and increased durability really appeals to me. One of the concerns I have about an SSD product is the reliability, so this helps. It’s also, like most high capacity SSD drives, very expensive. This is the review I looked at when I was researching this unit.

Name: Micron RealSSD C300
Capacity: 256GB
Cost: $799 (Cost per GB: $3.12)
What looks good: Crucial knows memory, no doubt there, and the review that I read on this product was very positive. It’s a good all around performer, supports SATA III, and has great performance. Unfortunately it’s still silly expensive and it’s not out yet.

Name: OCZ Agility
Capacity: 60GB
Cost: $199, (Cost per GB: $3.31 after rebates)
What looks good: The price made me really have to think about this drive. For my project, I don’t need a ridiculously large drive, I’m just going to put the OS on there to try and squeeze out a little more performance. The OCZ has adequate speed, adequate transfer rates, and some more of the lovely algorithm that’s supposed to keep the drive running smoothly. The reviewer liked it too, and described it as a great drive for exactly what I have in mind.

Name: Kingston SSDNow V
Capacity: 40GB
Cost: $159 (Cost per GB: $3.97)
What looks good: Reasonable size, decent performance, lower price. The SSDNow V seems to have it all. There’s a reason for that though, it’s actually a relabeled Intel X25-M. That’s actually a good thing, as Intel’s controller chipset does provide a serious performance boost.

So which one would I buy? Well, I’ve decided to go with the Kingston. I don’t have $500 to spend on a drive so it’s within reach, and the reviews were good. Now I just have to reorganize my system so I’m ready to upgrade when the drive gets here.

The OCZ Colossus uses the standard 3.5″ SATA chassis, meaning it’s an easy plug-in for contemporary desktops. Unfortunately, that’s too big for most laptops, which usually accept only 2.5″ drive modules. The relative heftiness of the Colossus has something to do with its built-in RAID 0 architecture, implying that there are actually multiple SSDs working in tandem inside the unit to boost read and write speeds.

Unfortunately, you have to pay to play. Prices are $438, $820, and $1530 for the 128GB, 256GB, and 512GB variants respectively. The 1TB version retails for a whopping $3837, according to XBitLabs.

Post from: The Gadget Blog

Available in 120GB, 250GB, and 500GB and 1TB capacities, the Colossus marks the first time that SSD drives have reached the storage sizes that users have come to expect these days. The bad news is you can expect to spend a small fortune for these drives. The 1TB sells for $3397, the 500GB for $1530, the 250GB is $820, and the 120GB will set you back $438. Ouch!

Here are the parts used in this build, all available from NewEgg. Prices are current as of this writing (September 24, 2009):

	Type	Component	Price
	CPU	AMD Phenom II X2 550 Black Edition 3.1GHz Socket AM3 80W Dual-Core Processor	$102
	Motherboard	GIGABYTE GA-MA790X-UD4P ATX AMD Motherboard	$110
	Memory	OCZ 4GB (2 x 2GB) 240-Pin DDR2 SDRAM DDR2 1066 (PC2 8500) OCZ2G10664GK	$70
	Video Card	Two (2) SAPPHIRE Radeon HD 4850 100245HDMI Video Cards	$100 each
	Hard Disk	Western Digital Caviar Blue 500GB 3.5″ SATA 3.0Gb/s Internal Hard Drive	$57
	Power Supply	Antec EarthWatts EA650 650W Continuous Power “compatible with Core i7″ Power Supply	$85
	Optical Drive	SAMSUNG Black 22X DVD Burner Black SATA Model SH-S223B	$32
	Case	Rosewill Wind Ryder Black Dual 120mm Fans Computer Case	$40
Total			$696

Yes, I said Tom’s set out to build the PC with a $650 budget, but it seems prices have changed, bumping up the total of the parts above to $700—a figure exclusive of any relevant shipping charges and taxes. However, seven hundred dollars is still a very affordable figure for quality gaming. The two ATI Radeon HD 4850s were able to achieve a 3DMark Vantage 1.02 GPU score of 12,470. Compare that figure to the 16,813 score of the GeForce GTX 295, a high-end video card that costs at least $500.

In other words, for significantly less, this $700 PC represents enough power for the latest and next-generation PC video games. As the folks from Tom’s conclude:

If you look over our SBM articles from the past year, you’ll notice we continually strive to add more graphics muscle to our budget gaming rig. As prices drop, we have stepped up from the GeForce 8800 GT to the Radeon HD 4850, the Radeon HD 4870 512MB, and the GeForce GTX 260 Core 216, and now finally to a pair of HD 4850 512MB cards. While we did see instances where more graphics memory would have been useful, this was still by far the most potent graphics solution we have squeezed into our lowest SBM budget.

Source

Post from: The Gadget Blog

When you think about upgrading your computer, the first things that usually come to mind are the processor, memory, and if you’re a gamer, the graphics card. In the days where you only had spinning hard drives to consider, you didn’t really gain much from upgrading to a new one, except more storage. Sure, a few extra MB of cache didn’t hurt, but it really didn’t make a huge difference. With solid-state drives becoming increasingly popular, we thought we’d take a look and see just how much you would benefit from upgrading to one.

OCZ was kind enough to send us one of their new Summit series drives to test out. Specifically, the 64GB version. Yes, 64GB doesn’t seem like very much storage, especially when we’re already hearing whispers of 2.5TB hard drives. Then again, I stream my music and videos from a network drive, so aside from a few games and applications, I don’t need tons of space. I might feel more comfortable with a 128GB or 256GB one, which is why they have those options available.  Hit the jump for my full review.

Features

The Summit series are OCZ’s performance-level SSD’s. They’re recommended for high-end gaming, business applications and even some enterprise setups. The drive we have boasts read speeds of up to 220 MB/s, write speeds up to 125MB/s and a sustained write speed of up to 120MB/s. (The larger versions feature 200MB/s write and sustained write speeds.) Other features include 128MB of onboard cache, and seek times of less than .1ms.

First Look

The drive itself looks much like any other SSD that you’ll see on the market today. It is packed into a 2.5-inch enclosure, which makes it perfect for a laptop. Unfortunately without the inclusion of any sort of mounting brackets, you may find it difficult to install in your desktop. Some newer cases feature 2.5-inch bays, but most still don’t. My computer doesn’t generally move around too much, but just having a drive sitting loosely isn’t something I’m fond of.

Test System

CPU: Intel i7 920
Motherboard: Asus P6T
RAM: 6GB OCZ DDR3 PC3-12800 Blade Series (CAS 6-6-6-24)
GPU: MSI Radeon 4890 OC Edition (1GB DDR5)
HDD: Western Digital 320GB 7200RPM 16MB Cache
OS: Windows 7 RC1 (Build 7100)

CrystalDiskMark

The results of this first synthetic test really speak for themselves. The OCZ Summit SSD is clearly a superior drive. It’s nothing that we’re really surprised to see, but it’s nice to have these hard numbers to look at.

ATTO Disk Benchmark

Here’s another great synthetic benchmark if you love crunching numbers. There’s really no point here that the older HDD is superior in any way. Enough with the boring numbers though. How does it affect my gaming?

Crysis/World in Conflict

If you were hoping to see something special here, sorry to disappoint. Since most games tend to load everything they need beforehand, you don’t tend to run into a lot of bottlenecks at the hard drive. Granted, you might notice some improvements during play here and there, but nothing that will blow your mind.

Crysis Island Level Load Time

Here’s where you’re going to see the biggest improvement on your gaming. Thanks to the Summit’s ability to read data faster than the old spinning disk hard drive, you can almost chop your load times in half, which can be a pretty big deal on some games that usually take forever.

Copying 5GB Of Mixed Data

This is probably where most of you are going to fall in love with SSD’s. If you work with a lot of large files, you’re going to soon find yourself waiting around a lot less. To be specific about this test, copied a folder with 5.1GB of video, music, documents and pictures to a new folder on the same drive.

Windows Boot Time

I have to say that I’m unimpressed with my Asus board’s slow boot times, but that’s another story. The OCZ Summit shaves a cool 19 seconds off from a cold boot.

Verdict

The OCZ Summit clearly outpaces the older hard drive, as I suspected. If you do a lot of work with large files, or just like your computer to run a bit more efficiently, then I’d definitely suggest keeping the Summit in mind. $225 is still a bit steep for only 64GB of storage, but the performance is definitely worth it.