Samsung has announced a 32GB solid state disk designed to completely replace traditional hard disks inside mobile computers. The disk features read and write speeds around twice as fast as current 1.8" hard drives and consumes 95% less power.
The 1.8" form factor drive lacks the storage capacity of current hard disks, but the advantages in power consumption and overall speed should make it a very attractive option for lightweight notebooks and tablet PCs. Read speeds are reported to be roughly 57MB/sec with write speeds coming in at 32MB - substantially faster than the roughly 24MB/sec read speeds of current 1.8" hard drives. In addition, the Samsung NAND SSD also provides noiseless operation.
With flash memory prices expected to fall dramatically in the near future, the new drive should debut at a substantially lower price point than current enterprise and military flash drives. When asked for an availability time frame, Samsung would only give "soon" in response.