February 3, 2010
Intel and Micron Announce Double Capacity 25-Nanometer NAND
For the NAND flash market Intel and Micron have made an exciting achievement. Flash companies will soon be able to create twice as much capacity in their memory or to put their memory in half the previously required space. This breakthrough will greatly help innovation in devices that use this technology.
Making a press statement together Intel and Micron said "Manufactured by IM Flash Technologies (IMFT) Intel and Micron's NAND flash joint venture the 25nm process produces 8 gigabytes (GB) of storage in a single NAND device creating a high-capacity storage solution for today's tiny consumer gadgets." Many are expecting this to be a great boon to the flash industry with its fluctuating memory prices and trends that are often hard to predict.
They also said about the new technology "It measures just 167mm2 -- small enough to fit through the hole in the middle of a compact disc (CD) yet packs more than 10 times the data capacity of that CD (a standard CD holds 700 megabytes of data)." Basically this means that the 25nm method reduces the number of required chips to one-half of what its previous flash chip predecessors used to require.
The breakthrough will be certain to benefit many businesses and consumers alike. Having smaller sized flash dies will let superphones such as the popular iPhone to have twice the out-of-box memory capacity while the size and shape of the product will need no other modifications. Business clients use devices such as the iPhone to check e-mail stay in contact with their colleagues and work with several other available apps so easily increasing storage space will be extremely helpful.
A recent resurgence of Tablet devices are sure to benefit from this announcement as well. HP and Apple's iPad are just some of the new designs that are sure to benefit from the doubled capacity now possible with this newest technological innovation as they are sold on the premise of being superthin and will still be able to have their memory doubled without any such aesthetics being affected.
Another great potential here is that the flash manufacturers can now make smaller devices that hold more memory. It would also be possible to release a superphone that is smaller in size yet has just as much memory as the current normal sized model.
The cost benefit is apparent also with the new process cutting the cost per gigabyte for manufacturers. This should inevitably lead to a drop in the price for devices using NAND memory. It is also just as likely that flash makers will take in the cheaper cost of making their chips at higher profit margins in the short term at least during this global recession that has left many companies looking for opportunities to increase their income to healthier levels.
Overall this means that businesses can soon expect to see storage capacities in their favorite computing devices double and new lines of compact devices will have equal storage capacity to the current standard sized models. Over time we can expect retail prices to go lower also but there is sure to be an initial hold on lower pricing so that companies can grow their profit margin before the technology becomes commonplace.
Intel and Micron have begun to sample 8GB chips with the new 25nm process. However integration with currently manufactured devices and any storage benefits of this new technology should not be available until it gets closer to the end of this year.
Making a press statement together Intel and Micron said "Manufactured by IM Flash Technologies (IMFT) Intel and Micron's NAND flash joint venture the 25nm process produces 8 gigabytes (GB) of storage in a single NAND device creating a high-capacity storage solution for today's tiny consumer gadgets." Many are expecting this to be a great boon to the flash industry with its fluctuating memory prices and trends that are often hard to predict.
They also said about the new technology "It measures just 167mm2 -- small enough to fit through the hole in the middle of a compact disc (CD) yet packs more than 10 times the data capacity of that CD (a standard CD holds 700 megabytes of data)." Basically this means that the 25nm method reduces the number of required chips to one-half of what its previous flash chip predecessors used to require.
The breakthrough will be certain to benefit many businesses and consumers alike. Having smaller sized flash dies will let superphones such as the popular iPhone to have twice the out-of-box memory capacity while the size and shape of the product will need no other modifications. Business clients use devices such as the iPhone to check e-mail stay in contact with their colleagues and work with several other available apps so easily increasing storage space will be extremely helpful.
A recent resurgence of Tablet devices are sure to benefit from this announcement as well. HP and Apple's iPad are just some of the new designs that are sure to benefit from the doubled capacity now possible with this newest technological innovation as they are sold on the premise of being superthin and will still be able to have their memory doubled without any such aesthetics being affected.
Another great potential here is that the flash manufacturers can now make smaller devices that hold more memory. It would also be possible to release a superphone that is smaller in size yet has just as much memory as the current normal sized model.
The cost benefit is apparent also with the new process cutting the cost per gigabyte for manufacturers. This should inevitably lead to a drop in the price for devices using NAND memory. It is also just as likely that flash makers will take in the cheaper cost of making their chips at higher profit margins in the short term at least during this global recession that has left many companies looking for opportunities to increase their income to healthier levels.
Overall this means that businesses can soon expect to see storage capacities in their favorite computing devices double and new lines of compact devices will have equal storage capacity to the current standard sized models. Over time we can expect retail prices to go lower also but there is sure to be an initial hold on lower pricing so that companies can grow their profit margin before the technology becomes commonplace.
Intel and Micron have begun to sample 8GB chips with the new 25nm process. However integration with currently manufactured devices and any storage benefits of this new technology should not be available until it gets closer to the end of this year.
