Breaking: SSD and Flash Caching Updates
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How soon in production? And do better SSD writes also impact SSD endurance positively?
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That's awesome, both a huge speed increase and an increase in SSD longevity too. That's a really big deal.
Sounds like it could be implemented in firmware... so possible for existing drives to be updated potentially?
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@scottalanmiller said:
That's awesome, both a huge speed increase and an increase in SSD longevity too. That's a really big deal.
Sounds like it could be implemented in firmware... so possible for existing drives to be updated potentially?
Will depend. There is no money in developing updated firmware for older drives. But if the firmware on the newer drives that will come out with this is compatible, then there is a chance.
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@JaredBusch said:
@scottalanmiller said:
That's awesome, both a huge speed increase and an increase in SSD longevity too. That's a really big deal.
Sounds like it could be implemented in firmware... so possible for existing drives to be updated potentially?
Will depend. There is no money in developing updated firmware for older drives. But if the firmware on the newer drives that will come out with this is compatible, then there is a chance.
No money for old drives, but many of us run SSDs that are still on the market. If the drive is still being sold, updating the firmware could bring new life to an existing product line for cheap.
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But fixing a current product line when they have a new one that's about to launch would probably damage sales of the new one.
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@Dashrender said:
But fixing a current product line when they have a new one that's about to launch would probably damage sales of the new one.
Depends if their goal is to milk the old one or let it die. Software revamps of old hardware can mean huge profits that they would not want to give up. Much better margins on that.
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@scottalanmiller said:
@Dashrender said:
But fixing a current product line when they have a new one that's about to launch would probably damage sales of the new one.
Depends if their goal is to milk the old one or let it die. Software revamps of old hardware can mean huge profits that they would not want to give up. Much better margins on that.
I agree, but if the current product line will interfere with the new one that's literally coming out next month... I don't see them doing it.
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@scottalanmiller : True. But realistically, what do you think how big a need is the latter in terms of say how many people use Software revamps of old hardware? I know firmware update is different from the case I have in point - say 'using SSD caching software to boost applications running on existing HW - requiring no upgrade / replacement to server HW, other than plugging in a small sized SSD to speed up apps and yet leverage investment in HDD'.
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Shalooshalini made me think of something else, how many consumers are actually going to take advantage of a firmware update? Right now, probably a greater percentage than normal, but that's mainly because the only people who are using SSDs are techie types because the cost has kept it out of the average consumers hands. In 5 years though, assuming that SSDs have become the primary drive, making them the drive seen in general, the average consumer wouldn't be installing a firmware update to see those gains.
Now, in the Datacenter - that's a whole other ball of wax. And any drive still for sale today better get a firmware upgrade less they find themselves being swapped out for another vendor who does upgrade their older drives (even though the customer will be most likely purchasing newer ones) because the customer will say, hey if my old company X wouldn't upgrade my current stuff and Y will.... I better move to Y in case another breakthrough happens so I can get that upgrade as well.
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