With the price per GB on SSDs coming down, companies want users to move from the actual combination of an SSD as boot drive with HDD for storage to a single disk solution, with a large SSD.
We may, not yet, have reached a point where SSDs take the place of HDDs, but it is apparent companies are trying to convince users to do so. It may take some more time, but it has started: last November Samsung announced the 860 QVO SSD, with the 2TB model costing close to $300, and the company said, then, that with the new drive family, available in 1, 2 and 4TB, ”it becomes possible to easily transition to a single high capacity SSD at a reduced cost, while eliminating the need for a combination of an SSD boot drive and separate HDD storage drive, a solution used by most people.”
While many will dispute the idea that SSDs will substitute HDDs, the truth is that, while prices are higher for SSDs, they are coming down fast. The newest example comes from a name you may not be very familiar with, Colorful, a Chinese professional manufacturer of graphics cards, motherboards and high-performance storage solutions, that just announced its latest and highest capacity SSD offering to date: the SL500 2TB SSD. According to Colorful, the new SSD brings massive capacity at a competitive price point giving mainstream consumers a viable option to completely replacing mechanical hard disk storage with high-speed, solid-state drives.
Easier to manage data
The Colorful SL500 2TB SSD removes, adds the company, “the need of mixing SSDs with HDDs to balance speed and performance, all the while making it much more accessible to mainstream consumers with its affordable price. Power users, gamers and multimedia professionals can now utilize the speed advantage of SSDs without relying on slower HDDs to compensate for growing file sizes. Now you can store all your games, work on large 4K videos all on a single SSD. The Colorful SL500 2TB SSD brings faster load times for apps and games that will benefit both professionals and gamers alike.”
Colorful says the new drive will make it easier for professionals to manage and maintain their data without mixing up multiple drives with numerous partitions. Applications load fast so you don’t need to spend time waiting for your photo or video to load in your editor. The benefits of the SL500 2TB SSD also expands to notebook and HTPC owners looking for a high-speed, high-capacity yet have low power consumption for longer battery life and less heat.
Final price will be less than $200?
With the new Colorful SL500 2TB SSD the solid-state drive series from the company offers a wide selection of capacities, starting at 240GB. The SL500 SSDs uses Intel 32-layer 3D NAND TLC flash memory along with the Silicon Motion SMI 2258XT controller to deliver speeds of up to 500MB/s read and up to 450MB/s write.
While Colorful has not disclosed the complete specifications or even the final price of its new SL500 2TB SSD, many believe the final price will be between $180-200, which effectively is a competitive price point. While these drives may not be the solution for all users, they seem adequate for some uses and may well be a viable choice if you’re on a budget.