SanDisk Corp., a leading supplier of various flash-based products, has unveiled a new family of solid-state drives (SSDs) that do not offer unprecedented performance, but boast with relatively affordable price and are likely to be broadly available. The company hopes that G3-series SSDs will finally drive flash-based storage into mainstream systems.

SanDisk’s C25-G3 and C18-G3 solid state drives – in 2.5” and 1.8” form-factors – will be available in 60GB, 120GB and 240GB capacities and will offer 200MB/s linear read speed as well as 140MB/s linear write speed. The new SSDs are based on multi-level cell (MLC) flash.

While performance levels of SanDisk’s G3-series are dramatically higher compared to hard disk drives (HDDs), they are hardly impressive compared to latest solid state drives by other manufacturers. What is noteworthy is that SanDisk has set manufacturer’s suggested retail prices of its 60GB, 120GB and 240GB units at $149, $249 and $499, respectively.

“SanDisk’s G3 SSD has met the demand of a 120GB SSD at less than $250 with an exceptional user experience. Three key features developed by SanDisk enable this new design: a new SSD algorithm called ExtremeFFS allows random write performance to potentially improve by as much as 100 times over conventional algorithms; reliable 43nm multi-level cell (MLC) all bit-line (ABL) NAND flash; and SanDisk’s new SSD controller, which ties together the NAND and the algorithm,” said Rich Heye, senior vice president and general manager of solid state drives (SSD) business unit at SanDisk.

With relatively affordable pricing, SanDisk expects SSDs to become more popular in mainstream notebooks.

“With large capacities and aggressive pricing, SSDs are poised to enter mainstream corporate notebooks in 2009,” said Mr. Heye.

The SanDisk G3 SSDs will be available in mid-2009 with Serial ATA and Parallel ATA interfaces. In addition, the SanDisk G3 SSDs will be available on sandisk.com for do-it-yourself (DIY) enthusiasts.

Tags: SanDisk, SSD