LaCie Thunderbolt SSD drive coming this summer

Posted:
in General Discussion edited January 2014
Peripheral and storage maker LaCie's Thunderbolt and Solid-State Drive "Little Big Disk" is coming this summer, with one hands-on preview demonstrating read speeds of 827 MB per second.



The drives, which run a pair of SSD drives configured in RAID 0, were first demonstrated at Intel's launch event for the Thunderbolt I/O technology. Intel partnered up with Apple to pair the chipmaker's codenamed Light Peak technology with the Apple-developed Mini DisplayPort.



SlashGear received a pre-launch demo of the Little Big Disk. The demo setup involved a Core i7 MacBook Pro with daisy-chained LaCie drives and a 24-inch Full HD LCD display.



A raw speed test involving reading and writing 4GB files posted write speeds of up to 352.5 MB per second and read speeds of 827.2 MB per second. Company representatives said the same setup topped 870 MB per second peaks during their own testing.



A second test took three simultaneous video files stored on the drives and played them at 1080p Full HD resolution. According to the report, playback was "stutter-free whether windowed or full-screen," and scrubbing through the clip with the two others running in the background presented no lag or pauses.







The Little Big Disk is due out "sometime over the summer," with production starting soon, according to the report. LaCie has said it plans to offer Thunderbolt-ready HDD versions of the drive, which should be a cheaper option than SSD, but has not indicated a timeline for the HDD model.







Alongside the unveiling of Thunderbolt in February, Apple released new MacBook Pros, the first systems to take advantage of the new technology. In May, Apple updated its iMac all-in-one desktop line to include the Thunderbolt port.



Though Apple does not have an exclusive deal with Intel, the Mac maker's close relationship with Intel may result in as much as a one year head start on PC manufacturers. However, a recent report suggested that the high cost of adding Thunderbolt to peripherals may limit adoption of the standard.



Thunderbolt will likely see more rapid adoption in the high-end video market. At the National Association of Broadcasters convention in April, several vendors demonstrated breakout video boxes that use Thunderbolt.







Job listings reveal Apple is building out its Thunderbolt team to bring the port to new devices.
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Comments

  • Reply 1 of 43
    realisticrealistic Posts: 1,154member
    LaCie Thunderbolt ready version of Little Big Disk should be a cheaper option. then the article later says that Thunderbolt is expensive to adopt.

    Those statements conflict.
  • Reply 2 of 43
    tallest skiltallest skil Posts: 43,388member
    This article title brought to you by The Department Of Redundancy Department.



    Jeez, do we ever need a breakthrough in SSDs to bring the price down...
  • Reply 3 of 43
    SpamSandwichSpamSandwich Posts: 33,407member
    Let me know when the entire Internet is replaced with Thunderbolt cables.
  • Reply 4 of 43
    bergermeisterbergermeister Posts: 6,784member
    New iMac sitting on my desk at work. Tw Thunderbolt ports in the back. Now just waiting for the Pegausus RAID to come out, or something nice from LaCie.



    Some of my larger transfers will be able to be completed without a coffee-making trip down the hall. Ugh. Less exercise. Could be fattening...
  • Reply 5 of 43
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by Realistic View Post


    LaCie Thunderbolt ready version of Little Big Disk should be a cheaper option. then the article later says that Thunderbolt is expensive to adopt.

    Those statements conflict.



    I think they were saying that the HDD version would be cheaper than the SSD, not that the Thunderbolt option itself is cheaper.
  • Reply 6 of 43
    realisticrealistic Posts: 1,154member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by sethwalt View Post


    I think they were saying that the HDD version would be cheaper than the SSD, not that the Thunderbolt option itself is cheaper.



    Thanks I missed the HDD instead of SSD, and I thought I could read.
  • Reply 7 of 43
    dluxdlux Posts: 666member
    Quote:

    However, a recent report suggested that the high cost of adding Thunderbolt to peripherals may limit adoption of the standard.



    First of all, the link in this sentence goes to AI's own article, which then links to the wrong article at iLounge. The correct article is this:



    http://www.ilounge.com/index.php/new...g-ios-options/



    And then, the iLounge article says this:



    Quote:

    We similarly have learned that the price of the components required to add a Thunderbolt port to an external hard drive is roughly equal to the cost of a low-end hard drive itself.



    There's nothing to back that up, no explanation, nada. Presumable a basic Thunderbolt drive enclosure will use an internal SATA bridge to PCI, along with a second pass-through port if desired. I'm just not seeing where all this extra expense is coming from, relative to alternative interconnects (except for raw eSATA, which cannot provide any sort of daisy-chaining, so they're not comparable.) Please dig some more before repeating this claim.
  • Reply 8 of 43
    joseph ljoseph l Posts: 197member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by AppleInsider View Post


    Peripheral and storage maker LaCie's Thunderbolt and Solid-State Drive "Little Big Disk" is coming this summer, with one hands-on preview demonstrating read speeds of 827 MB per second.





    Job listings reveal Apple is building out its Thunderbolt team to bring the port to new devices.







    LaCie is "a friend of ours".



    This should shut up the chicken littles who want to fool around with obsolete ports rather than skate to where the puck is going to be.
  • Reply 9 of 43
    asciiascii Posts: 5,936member
    Pretty much the same demo as at the Intel launch. That's not to take away from how impressive it is though!
  • Reply 10 of 43
    mcdavemcdave Posts: 1,927member
    "Thunderbolt will likely see more rapid adoption in the high-end video market."

    No kidding! Given it takes an SSD or multiple, striped HDDs which push the cost per GB way up it's never really going to be a consumer technology.



    McD
  • Reply 11 of 43
    jlanddjlandd Posts: 873member
    Wish it was (almost) anyone other than LaCie at the head of the pack. The only reason the count of dead LaCie products around here stabilized is because I stopped buying them.
  • Reply 12 of 43
    asciiascii Posts: 5,936member
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jlandd View Post


    Wish it was (almost) anyone other than LaCie at the head of the pack. The only reason the count of dead LaCie products around here stabilized is because I stopped buying them.



    I also stopped buying LaCie, but I think their past problems were related to overheating so maybe they will have more luck with SSDs?
  • Reply 13 of 43
    OK, I've always trusted Apple and Stevo...But it is hard to imagine having all my stuff on the iCloud.



    I'm going to try and just have the iCloud, iPad2, iP4 and an ATV.



    But it is awfully hard not to have an iMac as my "digital hub" with a 2TB TimeCapsule for backup.



    I feel like my late Dad hanging on to his WebTV!



    I have an aging first gen intel iMac that won't be upgradeable to Lion. Even though I am a strong advocate for Apple's "insistence" not to have a legacy drag like Windows, it still is hard to know everyone else will be enjoying Lion whilst I'm still on that dog Snow Leopard.



    When my old iMac dies I will invest in an 11" MBA and an Apple Monitor, me thinks!



    All in all, good problems to have!



    Best
  • Reply 14 of 43
    All I want is to be able to scrub my TIFF 1080p video files, somewhere over the rainbow where the thunderbolts fly... sigh



    Next year perhaps
  • Reply 15 of 43
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by jlandd View Post


    Wish it was (almost) anyone other than LaCie at the head of the pack. The only reason the count of dead LaCie products around here stabilized is because I stopped buying them.



    What a concept - mechanical hard drives not lasting a lifetime; actually failing...and only LaCie's....go figure.
  • Reply 16 of 43
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by LaBeaver View Post


    What a concept - mechanical hard drives not lasting a lifetime; actually failing...and only LaCie's....go figure.



    The problem with lacie is they only package other brand hard drives so when they fail you are stuck because if you want to do data recovery they can't honor warranty, cause they have to send drive back for their internal warranty with their supplier.



    Nice packaging and all but when doom strikes...



    Well that has been my experience anyway.
  • Reply 17 of 43
    asciiascii Posts: 5,936member
    I hope Apple releases a Cinema Display that when plugged in to a Thunderbolt port enables all sorts of ports on the back of the monitor, including USB3.
  • Reply 18 of 43
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by cy_starkman View Post


    The problem with lacie is they only package other brand hard drives so when they fail you are stuck because if you want to do data recovery they can't honor warranty, cause they have to send drive back for their internal warranty with their supplier.



    Nice packaging and all but when doom strikes...



    Well that has been my experience anyway.



    I don't know of any hard drive manufacturer that incorporates data as part of their guarantee. Best practices dictate maintaining a redundant backup anyway, since there is no question but what doom (disc failure) will occur.
  • Reply 19 of 43
    bergermeisterbergermeister Posts: 6,784member
    Hard disks can and will fail. Been there, and learned from it.



    Thunderbolt will really make the task of taking a backup off-site quick and easy. Can't wait.
  • Reply 20 of 43
    Quote:
    Originally Posted by McDave View Post


    "Thunderbolt will likely see more rapid adoption in the high-end video market."

    No kidding! Given it takes an SSD or multiple, striped HDDs which push the cost per GB way up it's never really going to be a consumer technology.



    McD



    yeah, consumers will never need more that 640K RAM.
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