The SSD Price Wars has Started?!?!?!

[Destiny]

According to this Digitimes article:

http://www.digitimes.com/news/a20120425PD202.html

Kingston Technology, Intel, OCZ and Crucial are identified as the ones lowering SSD prices to force out their smaller competitors that usually sell commodity memory products including flash drives and memory cards, and only recently began to offer SSDs, the sources observed.

I'm no longer waiting for HDDs to return to normal pricing...

I wouldn't mind picking up a few more larger Samsung 830 for lower prices as this SSD price war continues...

 

[ShadowVVL]

I hope we will see ssds go below $1per gb.

 

[VirtualLarry]

Mushkin already has lower prices than most of those companies, on a cost/GB basis.
wonder if they are a big enough company to ride out a price war

 

[Destiny]

I hope we will see ssds go below $1per gb.

They are already lower than $1 per GB... check out Anandtech's Hot Deals thread...

 

[Destiny]

Mushkin already has lower prices than most of those companies, on a cost/GB basis.
wonder if they are a big enough company to ride out a price war

Lowered DDR RAM & Flash memory prices have forced some companies to look at other product offerings for revenue... obviously the big boys are forcing a price war to drain the smaller competitors' cash reserves = not good in this economy...

 

[PeeluckyDuckee]

Mushkin offers great value right now of the many makers out there. 240gb up here in Canada goes for as low as $199. I was able to pick up one for $223 after tax, a far cry from $460 for 240gb just 6 months ago.

 

[Skott]

I hope we will see ssds go below $1per gb.

Would love to see them hit $0.50 per GB. I want to see the 512Gb SSDs in that mix too.

 

[groberts101]

Would love to see them hit $0.50 per GB. I want to see the 512Gb SSDs in that mix too.

No way that it will get to that point this year regardless of any pricing wars. Some mfgrs might cut off a couple of toes to get rid of some competition.. but they will not cut off their own legs to do it.

Maybe in the next year or two as we progress towards TLC nand though.

 

[exdeath]

Good. I look forward to when an average Dell or HP comes standard with an SSD.

 

[Anonemous]

Yea mushkin's 240 GB Chronos deluxe line was $199 this week.

 

[exar333]

I hope we will see ssds go below $1per gb.

Too bad we already fought to get storage at <1GB/1$ about 11 years ago on HDDs. LOL.

 

[TemjinGold]

Would love to see them hit $0.50 per GB. I want to see the 512Gb SSDs in that mix too.

I would love to see them at $0.05 per GB.

 

[Zap]

Yea mushkin's 240 GB Chronos deluxe line was $199 this week.

NCIXUS had a limited quantity that they sold for $179 a couple days ago. Not sure if it was Mushkin, but it was a Sandforce 2281 based 240GB drive of some kind.

 

[jhansman]

Of all the competitors, Samsung probably has the most to gain. They can lower prices on that product (and sell a ton) while making up the difference on the nine million other things they make and sell. Meanwhile, the others have to price accordingly or get out of the game. Bottom line? Cheaper, faster storage for us. We're at about a dollar a gig now, and if the big boys ramp up production, we could all be booting from 256GB drives in a few months. Just got a netbook for the wife, and the first thing I did to it was replace the stock drive with an SSD.

 

[Avalon]

No way that it will get to that point this year regardless of any pricing wars. Some mfgrs might cut off a couple of toes to get rid of some competition.. but they will not cut off their own legs to do it.

Maybe in the next year or two as we progress towards TLC nand though.

Is TLC nand actually going to take hold in the near future? I recall reading an Anand article saying it didn't make a lot of sense.

 

[VirtualLarry]

SanDisk has been using 3LC in their USB flash drives for years now.

I question the reliability and performance, for SSD usage though.

Sure, controllers could get better, but how much better can they get, when you consider the fundemental unreliability of 3LC?

 

[LOL_Wut_Axel]

SanDisk has been using 3LC in their USB flash drives for years now.

I question the reliability and performance, for SSD usage though.

Sure, controllers could get better, but how much better can they get, when you consider the fundemental unreliability of 3LC?

Umm...?

What are you on about? USB Flash Drives and Solid State Drives aren't the same thing, though some of the fundamentals are identical.

 

[hyrule4927]

Just looking at the price for a Crucial M4 on Newegg (~$125) I can't believe I payed $200 for mine back in September . . .

 

[Coup27]

Is TLC nand actually going to take hold in the near future? I recall reading an Anand article saying it didn't make a lot of sense.

I'm not sure I remember that. I think TLC will make a alot of sense for light duty machines, and theres probably more of them than there are medium / heavy duty machines.

 

[Blain]

:'( I'll miss the charm of spinning platters.

 

[Brunnis]

The Samsung 830 256GB just went down by around 8% here in Sweden and is now cheaper than the Crucial m4. It's also 16% cheaper than the Intel SSD 520 240GB. I couldn't resist, so now my X25-M G2 80GB will be relegated to HTPC duty. Awesome to finally being able to stop having to think so much about what to put on the SSD and what to put on the old HDD.

 

[groberts101]

Is TLC nand actually going to take hold in the near future? I recall reading an Anand article saying it didn't make a lot of sense.

not sure when he may have said that.. but as error correction goes up and wear leveling algorithms improve.. it becomes more likely to become reality. And don't be surprised if there are mfgrs out there who are already validating firmware code to work with that TLC. Couldn't say who that might be.. but you never know.

Have to keep in mind that reductions in PE/c is not anywhere near the concern that it used to be either. Especially when we start buying 512GB drives in the mainstream and assess how many hundreds of Terabytes they can write before lifespan becomes a concern. In essence, a 512GB SSD with 1,500 PE/c could be nearly as long lived as a 256GB model with 3,000 PE/c with all other things being equal between them.

Hell.. for that matter, look at how many hundreds of Terabytes a measly 60GB drive with 5,000 PE/c ratings can last. It's really quite redonkulous.

 

[Engineer]

256 GB Crucial M4 for $219.99 (no rebate - free) shipping @ Buy.com. 5% more off using discover cash back.

Dropping like a rock!

 

[CptObvious]

A number of channel retailers, which usually sell commodity memory products including flash drives and memory cards, recently began to offer SSDs, the sources observed. Some of the leading SSD producers are concerned about inferior products that might disrupt development of the market, and therefore have resorted to price-cutting measures to force the retailers to leave the market, the sources indicated.

Kingston Technology, Intel, OCZ and Crucial are identified as the ones lowering SSD prices.

How ironic that OCZ is part of that group

 

[RU482]

Mushkin already has lower prices than most of those companies, on a cost/GB basis.
wonder if they are a big enough company to ride out a price war

They just got bought by Avant. Apparently Avant manufactures a lot of the 3rd tier brand SSDs w/ Sandforce, so yes, they are big enough