Intel's clout in the field of Solid State Devices is growing fast and there are telling signs that should worry Seagate and the other HDD manufacturers; Intel has just signed HGST, the world's third largest hard drive manufacturer.
The partnership will see the Japanese storage firm use Intel's technology in its Serial Attached SCSI and Fiber Channel hard disk drives as early as 2010 and destined primarily at servers and high end workstations.
The new storage devices will be pure, non mechanical, solid storage drives and could spell the end (or gradual phaseout) of traditional SCSI/SAS hard disk drives whose capacities are currently restricted to 300GB (and cost around £300).
SATA hard disk drives currently reach 1.5TB and Samsung has just released a 256GB SSD, albeit at a premium price. SSDs though have a clear advantage when it comes to power consumption, size and pure performance.
Both Intel and Hitachi GST are aiming at different markets and are careful not to tread on each other's toes. Intel currently sells the 32GB X25-E Extreme solid state disk drive and it is likely that Hitachi will take over the brand.
Intel had announced earlier this year that they would be selling low cost, low performance, entry level Solid State Drives for desktops and laptops, using SATA interface.
Last week, IM Flash Technologies, a Joint Venture between Intel and Micron announced that it was moving to mass production on a 34nm manufacturing process.
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