Well, as flash memory becomes the memory format of the future (think iPod, USB drives, memory sticks) it would only be a matter of time before flash hard drives will replace the standard hard drive. That time is now.

Samsung has created the world’s first computer that replaces standard hard disk drives with NAND Flash solid state disks (SSD). The SSD created is only has 32 GB of capacity. Because the new laptops have been fitted with the SSD they have several advantages over the standard hard drive.

Firstly, the SSD drives are able to effectively protect that data stored on them 2 times as much as hard disk drives when they experience external shock. Secondly, we can get recover more data store on SSD drives than hard disk drives when they are dropped or a spill occurs that damages the computer.

SSD drives from Samsung also are much faster. Data can be read from an SSD drive at the speed of 53 megabytes (MB) per second which is 3 times faster than standard hard drives. The SSD drives can have data written on them 1.5 times faster than normal drives.

Because the read and write speeds of the drives increase it means that more can be happening at the same time and more editing can occur on a computer.

Samsung tested the SSD drives on computers and found that a computer using Windows XP as it’s operating system started 25%-50% faster than if they used regular hard drives. They also found that SSD drives produce no noise because there are no moving parts. Regular hard drives produce about 30 decibels (dB) of noise. Of course, the SSD is also smaller (everything is these days) weighing only 20-30 grams compared to about 50 grams.

The new Q30-SSD laptop will include the 32 GB SSD hard drive. It comes with a 1.2 Ghz Intel Processor and 512 Megabytes of RAM.

Flash drives are beginning to become the norm. I think that it will only be a matter of time until the IDE and SATA drives on a computer a flash based (like a USB). The advantages of the solid state disk look promising. At the moment 32 GB of space looks very small. However, as the technology progresses it will contain larger amounts of storage capacity.

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