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Page 1 of 2  Intel was always innovator in IT industry even if we don’t consider microprocessor manufacturing. Intel is “guilty” for many IT standards that we all use every day. Some of them become widely accepted and some don’t (BTX for example). SSD disks (Solid State Drive) are already for some time present among us primarily in notebooks (netbooks). Intel has in its portfolio SSD disks that stand out from the crowd (although it’s not that big crowd) because of their performances.
Extreme and Mainstream series of Intel SSDs have made “quantum leaps”
in SSD technology. Intel X25-M (2.5”) SSD that we got in our test lab
belongs to Mainstream series.
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MLC and SLC |
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There are two types of SSD memory standard, MLC (Multi-Level Cell) and SLC (Single-Level Cell). Disks that are based on SLC standard have flash memory cell that has 1 bit of data (0 or 1) while MLC based disks have 2 bit cell (00, 01, 10 and 11). That means that MLS disks have double capacity for the same price compared to SLC disks. On the other hand SLC disks are faster and have lower power consumption. One more difference is that SLC SSDs have higher write/delete cycles values compared to MLC SSDs. Since SSD disks are based on flash memory, life expectancy of SSDs is 5 working years with 100GB of data being written daily and SLC SSDs are better in this discipline than MLS SSDs. |
Intel X25-M model has 80 GB capacity, and besides its standard 2.5” size, SATA and power connector there’s nothing that differs this appearance of this model from any other model present on the market today. Big differences are hidden inside. PCB of this SSD has twenty 4GB memory chips (29F32G08) manufactured in 50nm manufacturing process. Although we didn’t find info on who made these chips, all clues point to Micron.
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X25-M is certified for 25 MB/s read speed and 70 MB/s write speed. It’s done in MLS SSD standard. Best part of this SSD is its 10-channel memory controller. Each channel is “responsible” for two memory chips. This controller works like a RAID 0 system but with flash memory.
Testing
After few tests it become clear that this SSD can be compared with RAID HDD system so we built one with two WS AAKS 320 GB HDDs in RAID 0 and RAID 1 configuration. One look at results will reveal how fast Intel X25-M SSD is and we will now explain some things that cannot be explained with results.
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Boot time of OS is 4 times shorter. Vista can gain most of SSDs because of its notorious slow bootup. Loading times of documents can be described as: instantaneous. Game levels are loaded insanely fast even if you are accustomed to using RAID 0. We even played two HD movies and at same time unpacked 2TB archive (with different file sizes in it) and everything worked like a charm. Nevertheless write speed of this SSD is not as fast as today HDDs (100 MB/s). Since SSD works with flash memory 70 MB/s isn’t slow, although it looks like that. Of course Extreme series of Intel SSDs have write speeds up to 170 MB/s like on model X25-E, but this SSD is based on SLC standard (and significantly pricier). All SSDs produce no noise and vibrations because there are no moving parts and Intel X25-M is no exception. Power consumption is 0.06 W in idle and 150mW on high load. Warming up is minimal and this Intel SSD has operating temperature from 0 to 70 degrees Celsius.
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Intel X25-M SSD |
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Capacity |
80GB |
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Read / Write [MB/s]
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250 / 70
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Warranty |
36 months
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Price
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≈ 600€ |
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Product HomePage
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Intel X25-M SSD
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Conclusion
Is this right moment for purchasing this SSD? Well, that depends on how much your business need fast data access and how big your budget is. Right now OEM price for Intel X25-M SSD is around 600€. But don’t despair because you can expect significant price drop in next year. Nevertheless we must congratulate Intel on design of this SSD that moved, more than significantly, performance levels. Maybe next year we will start to recollect HDDs the same way we have recollections of AGP now.
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