SSDs Won't Become Very Popular, WD Says, Ultrabooks or Not

Western Digital is not nearly as convinced as NAND Flash storage makers that the ultrabook market will greatly boost SSD sales.

Western Digital reportedly stated, during the most recent conference call with financial analysts, that solid state drives sales wouldn't rise nearly as fast as some believed.

One would think that the company's abysmal HDD sales during the past quarter would make it less skeptical about the chances of SSDs, but that is not the case.

Then again, the 42% drop in HDD shipments wasn't owed to lowering popularity of platter spinners but to shortage of inventories after the Thai floods.

Speaking of popularity, the point WD made, or tried to make, was that HDDs would get to be popular even in Ultrabooks.

SSDs have been the preferred storage solution due to their ability to attain thinner form factors more easily than magnetic drives.

Nevertheless, it is perfectly possible for super-thin HDDs to be built (it has already been done, actually).

Coupled with larger storage capacities, Western Digital thinks that Ultrabooks won't in fact, be the catalyst for a surge in SSD sales.

“I expect ultrabooks to have traditional hard drives, hybrid hard drives and SSDs. [...] We think that the SSD penetration profile will be in very low single digits in a mature ultrabook environment,” said John Coyne, chief executive officer of WD, during the most-recent conference call with financial analysts.

“We see an emerging position for hybrids a little early to develop a view on exactly what percentage of penetration, but we see hybrids as a very compelling alternative on the performance side to solid-state on bang for the buck. We anticipate that in large capacity environments, traditional hard drives will continue to be the compelling solution.”

We can only wait and see what thin inventions WD comes up with, and when.