Samsung has optimized its new solid-state drive, the 64GB SATA-2 FlashSSD, for better streaming performance, both with reads and writes, and the results show in our benchmark tests. The drive seems to have been tuned for high read performance of large data blocks. We also got the highest raw transfer rate we've yet seen out of a single SSD—but something peculiar happens when you build a RAID 0 array out of two drives: read performance drops by half. Nonetheless, this is one of the most balanced performers we've seen in the still far-from-mature SSD market. The price is dropping, too—though even if you add the SSD as an option with a new laptop (currently the least expensive way to buy these drives), you'll pay north of $500 for 64GB. It's an improvement, but not enough to make this a mainstream device quite yet—certainly not at this capacity.

For more on the Samsung 64GB SATA-2 FlashSSD, check out our sister site Extremetech.com