Intel SSDs will have a read speed of 240MB/sec and a write speed of 170MB/s



Intel's 2.5" and 1.8" SSDs (Source: Intel)





Today the SSD market is not that big. Many consumers aren't willing to spend the significant price premium over a standard hard drive to get the benefits of an SSD. Some businesses, however, realize the potential of the SSD in an enterprise computing environment.
Expreview reports that it has an Intel roadmap that shows that three new SSDs are going to be unveiled by Intel. The SSDs will be in the X-series and are said to have a read speed of 240MB per second and write speed of 170MB per second. The SSDs will come in 2.5-inch (X25) and 1.8-inch (X18) form factors and will come in two models -- E and M. The E model is reported to be the top-of-the-line product with the highest performance, while the M model is configured for power savings.
Expreview reports that the X18-M will only consume 0.25 W of power in active mode. Capacities for the X25-E model are reported to be 32GB, 64GB, and 160GB with availability in the last quarter of 2008. An 80GB X25-M and an 80GB X18-M are reported to be launching in Q3 2008. A 160GB version of the X18-M is expected to hit the market around Q1 2009.
Micron and Intel have been working together to develop what the companies say will be the world's fastest NAND flash memory. DailyTech reported in early August that Micron had unleashed its own SSDs that offered read speeds even faster than what the Intel roadmap is claiming. Micron's SSDs claim to reach a read speed of 250MB per second.
DailyTech reported in April that Intel's SSD prototypes were going through in-house testing; odds are these are the same SSDs that are now showing up on the roadmap.


Intel SSD Roadmap (Source: Expreview)