Intel Plans 'Overclocking' Capability On SSDs 106
Lucas123 writes "Anticipating it will make a 'big splash,' Intel is planning to release an product late this year or very early next that will allow users to 'overclock' solid-state drives. The overclocking capability is expected to allow users to tweak the percentage of an SSD's capacity that's used for data compression. At its Intel Developers Forum next month in San Francisco, Intel has scheduled an information session on overclocking SSDs. The IDF session is aimed at system manufacturers and developers as well as do-it-yourself enthusiasts, such as gamers. 'We've debated how people would use it. I think the cool factor is somewhat high on this, but we don't see it changing the macro-level environment. But, as far as being a trendsetter, it has potential,' said Intel spokesman Alan Frost. Michael Yang, a principal analyst with IHS Research, said the product Intel plans to release could be the next evolution of SandForce controller, 'user definable and [with the] ability to allocate specified size on the SSD. Interesting, but we will have to see how much performance and capacity [it has] over existing solutions,' Yang said in an email reply to Computerworld."
Re:Why... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Awsome (Score:4, Interesting)
Doesn't mean that "gamers" won't buy this stuff... People are stupid when it comes to buying components. Only have 1 video card? Not overclocking your CPU? Only one hard drive? Yeah let's just get this 750W supply just in case.
A 750W power supply isn't that ridiculous. I had a system with 2 hard drives, a mid-level medium-power video card, and a dual-core processor (45W TDP). It had a 450W power supply from a reputable brand, which should have been more than plenty. However, when I switched out the processor to a 6-core one with a 95W TDP, stability went out the window. No overclocking, all BIOS settings on "safe", but it would freeze about every 30 minutes or so. I was going crazy trying to figure it out. I reformatted Windows, but no good. It was crashing using some Linux CD diagnostics tools so it had nothing to do with the software. I even RMA'd the CPU and got a new one.
Eventually I bought a new 550W power supply and all the problems went away. Maybe the "reputable brand" of my 450W power supply wasn't actually reputable, or maybe some element inside had degraded over time, but power supply problems are the most frustrating kinds of problems to solve if you are assuming that X watts should be enough. I'm not made of money, but I'm going to buy the best power supply I can afford in the future.