If you're an Apple fan, then you know how much the tech giant from Cupertino is on the forefront of innovation. They come with new adapters, breakthrough features as panorama photos and much more. Yesterday they revealed another breakthrough solution for the iMac and Mac Mini. They now have a hardware and software combination that is called 'Fusion Drive'. According to Apple, "Fusion Drive is a breakthrough concept that combines the high storage capacity of a traditional hard drive with the high performance of flash storage.
With Fusion Drive in your iMac, disk-intensive tasks — from booting up to launching apps to importing photos — are faster and more efficient. That’s because frequently used items are kept at the ready on speedy flash storage, while infrequently accessed items go to the hard drive. The file transfers take place in the background, so you won’t even notice. As the system learns how you work, Fusion Drive makes your Mac experience even better. And you don’t have to do a thing.
Apple fans can now stop reading and get in line at a store near you, we'll go on with an explanation on what this really seems to be.
For many this might sound pretty familiar. This is also what SSD caching software like Nvelo's Dataplex or VeloSSD does. They develop software that combined with a (small) SSD will also cache frequently used files on your fast SSD while store the remaining files on a slower HDD. It is very likely that Apple's Fusion Drive breakthrough is nothing more than a SSD caching solution. And of course it comes at an Apple price, the 128 GB cache is $250, where an OCZ Vertex or Crucial M4 with a capacity of 128GB go at $99.99. That's more than double the price.
Still, some websites report that Apple's solution is a bit different from current SSD caching software, but we expect that the differences will only be details and that it's nothing spectacular.
