Sandisk shows an SSD the size of a postage stamp

MEMORY PACKER Sandisk has released a postage stamp sized solid state drive (SSD) that weighs less than a paper clip.

The firm is claiming that its integrated SSD (ISSD) is the fastest embedded storage device for its size, coming in a range of capacities between 4GB and 64GB. The drives themselves can use the Serial ATA (SATA) bus and are intended to be soldered directly onto motherboards.

According to Sandisk's top marketeer, ISSDs should enable "OEMs to produce tablets and notebooks with an unprecedented combination of thin, lightweight form factors and fast performance". Though performance claims coming from a marketeer are usually suspect, the ISSD is pretty nippy.

The drives are good for 160MB/sec sequential read and 100MB/sec sequential write rates, which compare favourably with the current crop of 'full size' SSDs on the market. Sandisk says that OEMs are currently evaluating its ISSD, though it did not mention any confirmed customers.

As tablets are becoming more popular, ISSDs could offer a better solution instead of using older 2.5-inch mechanical hard drives. Given the 'instant on' nature of such devices, a move towards solid state storage is expected, or at least hoped-for by Sandisk.

Sandisk has in the past decided concentrated on portable flash memory products such as Compactflash and Securedigital cards. However it seems that in certain applications, such as netbooks, smartphones and even routers, those products are likely to come under threat from its own ISSDs. µ