mSATA Connector Promises Smaller Netbooks; Toshiba Launch First mSATA SSDs

If there's one thing we're crying out for, it's another netbook connector standard.  Happily the SATA-IO working group have delivered just that in the shape of mini-SATA (or mSATA), a new low-profile connector supporting 1.5Gb/s and 3.0Gb/s transfer rates but with a slightly smaller plug.  To celebrate, Toshiba have outed two new mSATA SSDs, offer 30GB and 62GB capacity

Each of the Toshiba mSATA SSDs boasts up to 180MBps sequential read speeds and up to 70MBps sequential write speeds; they also have clever power management tech which reduces consumption to less than half of read power levels when in idle, standby or sleep modes.  Toshiba have also released the same modules but in more traditional half-slim SATA II format, which are a little larger (but can at least be used with a desktop SATA II interface, unlike mSATA).

To be honest, while there are size benefits to the new interface – though not huge ones, if you look at the two modules pictured above – we're not sure whether we'd actually prefer to keep desktop/mobile compatibility instead.  Still, time and tides wait for no man, least of all us, so mSATA is likely here to stay.

[via Gizmodo]