From the first time we all saw the X25 from Intel, we knew that the world would never be the same again. Who needs huge chunks of spinning metal when we can have pure memory! We fell in love – but our appetites were tempered by our pockets. Now that SSDs are as cheap as, er, chips – how many will we be buying? KitGuru kicks through the data.
If a 60GB SSD was over £400, then the likelihood of you switching would be minimal.
Today, we can see a ton of deals for Solid State Drives around the 120GB mark, all costing less than £80.
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While 120/128GB is not enough to run the rest of your life, it does represent the minimum drive size necessary for most people to run their daily lives. KitGuru did a series of tests on 64GB drives back in 2010 and found that, even if you are extremely frugal, it will run out of space inside 8 weeks.
The drop in 120/128/240/256GB drives has made SSD much more attractive to everyone.
Also, the fact that several drives now ship with Acronis etc, means that it is easier than ever for laptop users to clone their existing 5,400 rpm slug-o-snail drives and give their mobile computing experience a ‘twist of Apple'.
Having spoken with several manufacturers, distributors and resellers, we now have a much better idea of how many SSD products will be bought in the UK in 2013 – and a solid prediction for 2014:-
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KitGuru says: This is one of the few areas where we're seeing huge growth in the market. KitGuru has been saying for over 3 years that the best upgrade for most systems is the move from spinning hard drives to Solid State. But when will we hit the tipping point on boot devices? When will the majority of systems boot from memory?
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I think that in 2 to 3 years we’ll see the majority of new machines shipping with SSDs or hybrid dives. Hard drive prices will drop to a new low in a vain attempt at retaining market share. 2 TB SSDs will be cheap and plentiful. Major brand names will continue to absorb smaller companies. Controller technology will mature, further leveling the playing field. SATA Express will double throughput, further relegating hard drives to dinosaur status.