Well now, what a surprize ... Western Digital has officially released its first solid state disks for embedded markets and data streaming applications, these SiliconDrive III models are based on technology the company acquired from its March 2009 acquisition of SiliconSystems. The speeds are not really convincing neither do these drives seem to have any from of caching.

A nifty feature though is that the range supports SiSMART, which keeps tabs on the drive's status in real-time, notifying the user when it needs to be replaced.

• SiliconDrive III 2.5-inch SATA Drive: SATA 3Gbps, 100MB/s read speed, 80MB/s write speed, 30GB to 120GB
• SiliconDrive III 1.8-inch Micro SATA Drive: SATA 3Gbps, 100MB/s read speed, 80MB/s write speed, 30GB to 60GB
• SiliconDrive III 2.5-inch PATA Drive: PATA ATA-7, 85MB/s read speed, 60MB/s write speed, 30GB to 120GB

The company