Low-density NAND flash chips to have more competitive pricing

Mar 20, 2010 11:51 GMT  ·  By

Various industry entities have different perspectives over the rise of the tablet market. Some see the new devices as a very promising outlet, whereas others do not believe that slates will take off so soon, if at all. Still, what most players agree upon is that, should the market really surge, it might propel certain other segments, such as the NAND Flash market.

Low-density NAND Flash memory chips are mostly used to provide small electronics, such as smartphones, handsets and other CE devices, with the required storage capacity. However, there is also the SSD market, where development of larger-capacity chips is encouraged. SSDs have been getting popular because of their high performance specifications, particularly in the area of read and write speeds. Now that tablets are ready to go, some NAND manufacturers believe that low-density flash memory products will see a similar popularity surge as the higher-capacity SSDs did on the desktop and laptop fronts.

Slates will most likely use low-capacity SSDs, similar to those employed by dual-drive PCs or netbooks. This tendency will be encouraged by the making of more 'affordable' SSDs, such as OCZ's Onyx (under $100) and Intel's X25-V ($125).

“This new value entry from Intel means more customers will have the chance to experience the benefits of SSDs, not just in notebooks or high-end PCs, but in mainstream desktops as a boot drive. This is the right price point to help convert more users to SSD computing,"a product manager at e-tailer Newegg.com said, according to Intel.

If these companies, and others, keep focusing on making NAND Flash memory cheaper, there is a rather high possibility, according to Digitimes, that a price competition may start on the market for low-density parts. Of course, this all depends on just how well received the upcoming x86 or ARM-powered Slates are.