14 DAY TRIAL // USB 3.0 and SATA 6.0Gbps are the two interfaces that have seen the most attention over the past few months, as they boast significant improvements to data-transfer rates compared with their predecessors. Of course, regardless of how fast they are, these interfaces will only have meaning when paired with storage technologies capable of taking advantage of their large bandwidths.
Naturally, when thinking of fast storage units, solid state drives are, most likely, the first to come to mind, even though HDDs also can, definitely, benefit from the new standard. Eager to leverage the high capabilities of SATA 6.0Gbps, Lexar Media has finally started shipping its Crucial RealSSD C300.
The drives are only slightly late in coming out and have data-transfer rates that, according to the company, can exceed even the 350MB/s threshold when running at their maximum. More specifically, the Crucial-branded RealSSD C300 SSDs have a top read speed of no less than 355MB/s. Of course, as it is the case with all solid state drives, the writing speed is significantly lower, but even that can go over 200MB/s, for a maximum of 215MB/s.
This high speed transfers are possible thanks to not only the next-generation SATA interface, but also to the inherent capabilities of solid state drives in general. As far as the actual build of the storage units is concerned, they are created from MLC NAND Flash memory chips and come in two versions, one with a storage capacity of 128GB and a more capacious model that manages to pack 256GB.
The two drives come with a one-year, limited warranty and, as most promising new products based on new technologies, have the disadvantage of carrying a rather steep price. Already available, the 128GB and the 256GB Lexar Crucial RealSSD C300 drives are priced at $500 and $800, respectively.