14 DAY TRIAL // Solid-state drives have really been upending the personal computing market, now that they are even less farther off than HDDs in terms of price. It is enough for analysts to predict great things for them.
IHS iSuppli is the analyst firm that has most recently published its thoughts on the SSD industry, particularly the adoption rate on the PS market.
While HDDs continue to sell well, and SSHDs/HHDs (hybrid drives) are bound to pick up speed for the near term, pure SSDs are said to be on a good track as well.
In fact, by the time 2017 rolls around, their shipment levels are expected to rise by a factor of seven.
Obviously, ultrabooks and other ultrathin laptops (mostly AMD-based since Intel has sequestered the “Ultrabook” term) will be primarily responsible for all this.
“For SSDs, the major factors driving growth in 2013 will be ultrabooks and other ultrathin notebook PCs, especially as Intel's upcoming Haswell processors bring about a robust combination of performance and efficiency for the superthin computers,” said Fang Zhang, analyst for storage systems at IHS, in a statement.
“In the coming years, ultrabooks and ultrathins - combined with appealing touch-screen displays and convertible form factors - are likely to become more compelling as the machines attempt to lure consumers away from smartphones and tablets, boosting demand for SSDs used in these systems.”
For those who want numbers, SSD shipments will reach 227 million in 2017, over 600% more than the 31 million in 2012. Meanwhile, PC HDD sales will drop from the 475 million of 2012 to 410 million in 2017 (down 14%).
That will leave SSDs with 36% of the PC storage market, quite a jump from the 6% in 2012. HDDs will go from 94% in 2012 to 64%. Hopefully, NAND Flash prices will drop fast.