256GB SSDs to sink below US$70 mark suggests industry insider

[HEXUS]

Apacer General Manager expects pricing milestone to be reached by H2 2015.

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[crossy]

No projected prices for the larger sized drives such as 500GB and 1TB SSDs were given.

Shame, I would definitely be in the market for one, (perhaps even two), high-performing 1TB drives at a reasonable price. Going rate of about £300 for an 840EVO is a little too steep for me at the moment (saving for major family holiday).

[xslavic]

The i would buy two 1tb SSD's.

[LSG501]

In my opinion this should have happened ages ago to be honest and lets be realistic we might as well switch that $ to a £ . I know the tech is different but if you can get 2tb of hard drive for around $70 then getting 1/10 of that on ssd shouldn't be hard. It's clearly possible as black friday and other sales have started bringing them down to the £70 range already.

[Saracen]

Shame, I would definitely be in the market for one, (perhaps even two), high-performing 1TB drives at a reasonable price. Going rate of about £300 for an 840EVO is a little too steep for me at the moment (saving for major family holiday).

Just a matter of time, IMO.

SSDs are really only at the very start of a maturity cycle for a new technology, but my bet is the cost/GB being equal, or even lower for SSDs (resulting in HDs dying out) is merely a matter of time. The big question is .... how much time? 6 months? Doubt it. 2 years? Could be. 5 years? Very likely. 50 years? Daddy, what's a "hard disk"?

[cheesemp]

Given that $1 usual equals £1 then I'd say they are already reaching those prices. I got an OCZ arc 100 240Gb from PC World for £65 at Christmas. Could have got a MX100 for £10 more. Looking forward to 1Tb drives becoming very affordable in a year or two.

[Jowsey]

Given that $1 usual equals £1 then I'd say they are already reaching those prices. I got an OCZ arc 100 240Gb from PC World for £65 at Christmas. Could have got a MX100 for £10 more. Looking forward to 1Tb drives becoming very affordable in a year or two.

I actually picked up one of those MX100's! Not a shabby purchase for £70 bones, and I flogged my old 60GB SSD for £25, nifty little piece of work indeed.

[Brian224]

...The big question is .... how much time?

Can't help but agree. SSDs can benefit from the developments in silicon manufacture that are being made in other areas as well. HDD prices have remained fairly static for years, increasing value by squeezing more data onto a platter, but nobody seems to be offering anything new (so far) that will reduce the cost of making high precision rotating machinery.

[iranu]

SSDs are really only a benefit when the OS and programs especially games are loaded on them. 1TB of storage? Are you really going to see any benefit from storing music, video, photos etc on them rather than just using a 2TB spinning drive that costs a tenth as much?

I suspect there may be a few niche areas where SSDs can be a benefit for storage but for the average user they won't see a benefit.

N.B. Samsung 830 240GB still going strong after 7TB written to it. Cost me £140 a couple of years ago.

[boothy02]

As much is this is a good thing i'd love to see more focus on speed then capacity at this point. i know there are faster SSD's around but not many seem to be coming out. what are chip vendors prioritizing?

[crossy]

SSDs are really only a benefit when the OS and programs especially games are loaded on them. 1TB of storage? Are you really going to see any benefit from storing music, video, photos etc on them rather than just using a 2TB spinning drive that costs a tenth as much?I suspect there may be a few niche areas where SSDs can be a benefit for storage but for the average user they won't see a benefit.

Any use that needs fast reads, (especially multiple) or low power will benefit from SSD - so it's amazing how large that "niche" actually is. I know folks who've moved their media-serving NAS to SSD and have been delighted - because you end up being limited only by network speed if you're trying to serve multiple requests. Laptops I was going to say is another use-case, but invariably there you've got OS and user data on the same disk - however if a large SSD saves us from hybrid abortions like WD Black^2 then bring it on.

Friend of mine, who's a photographer, dumps his photos on SSD - mainly because the super-fast reads play dividends with Photoshop.

N.B. Samsung 830 240GB still going strong after 7TB written to it. Cost me £140 a couple of years ago.

Yep, got two laptop's here who got migrated to 830's after they came out - both going really well. Actually one of those is what I'm typing this reply on. Although I couldn't afford the 240's so it's 120's instead.

[TRUTHnTRINITY]

I personally don't mind the prices of SSDs right now BUT I would love them to be cheaper! Wife needs more storage for photos.

[azrael-]

I'm sooo debating with myself whether or not I should fork out a small fortune for a 1 TB Samsung 850 EVO to replace my aging 1 TB WD Black HDD (from around 2008 if memory serves correctly). At the moment I'm not sure who's going to win.