Western Digital launches SSDs

Western Digital is now shipping its first line of solid state drives (SSDs) based off technology it acquired after buying out storage maker SiliconSystems Inc. in March. 

The SiliconDrive III SSD is designed for the enterprise, and includes 2.5-in. SATA and PATA drives alongside a 1.8-in. Micro SATA drive that supports native SATA 3 Gb/s.  Storage capacities up to 120GB are available.  The drives offer 100MB/s read speeds and 80MB/s write speeds, the WD press release reports.

The 2.5-in. SSD has storage capacities of 30GB, 60 GB, 90GB or 120GB, while the 1.8-in. drive is available in 30GB or 60GB capacities.  WD hasn’t released details of when the storage capacities will receive a bump in capacity, but it’s expected to happen at some point.

“SiliconDrive III is the first example of how WD plans to productize solid state technology developed by SiliconSystems. The launch of SiliconDrive III will also enable WD to leverage its global sales and distribution channels to accelerate the adoption of SSD technology beyond SiliconSystems’ traditional embedded systems OEM customer base into data streaming applications such as multimedia content delivery systems and data center media appliances,” WD SSD storage business unit vp Michael Hajeck said.  “SiliconDrive III is an ideal solution for OEMs that require increased performance, capacity, reliability and data throughput in their applications.”

SSDs remain more expensive with smaller storage capacities than hard disk drives, but the price per GB price point is lowering while the storage capacities also increase.  SSDs also are more secure and run cooler than traditional HDDs, which helps companies save money on power and repair costs.

Analysts expect SSD adoption to explode in the next couple of years, as SSD pricing becomes more competitive to HDDs.