Intel Turbo Memory - We're gonna speed up Vista

Interesting. Intel plans to speed up applications with their Intel Turbo Memory.

Intel Turbo Memory (codenamed Robson, also known as a Robson cache) is a technology introduced by semi-conductor company Intel to utilize NAND flash memory modules, reducing the time it takes for a computer to power up, access programs, and write data to the hard drive.

The technology was publicly introduced on October 17, 2005 already at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) in Taiwan when it gave a demonstration using a laptop that booted up almost immediately. The technology attempts to decrease hard drive usage by moving frequently accessed data over to the flash memory. Flash memory reacts faster than hard drives and requires less power, allowing notebooks to be faster and more power efficient. The Robson cache connects via a mini-PCIe card with on-board NAND flash memory modules, supporting new features available in Microsoft Windows Vista, namely ReadyBoost (a hard-drive caching solution via USB flash drives) and ReadyDrive (a hard-drive caching solution via hybrid drives), allowing both read caching and write caching of data.

At the Flash Memory Summit in Santa Clara, Calif., Intel will be demonstrating its latest version of Turbo Memory based on flash memory to accelerate application performance in Windows.

Intel is offering a "dashboard" for Windows that allows the user to choose and control which applications or files are loaded into the Intel Turbo Memory cache (based on flash memory chips) for performance acceleration. Intel calls this "User pinning."

Intel is trying to address a longstanding shortcoming of Windows: its inability to take full advantage of flash storage devices. "There are issues related to taking full advantage of the speed of a (flash drive)," said Troy Winslow, marketing manager for the NAND Products Group at Intel, in an interview at the Flash Memory Summit.

In related news, Intel announced a new Z-P230 PATA (Parallel ATA) SSD drive that comes in 4 gigabyte (GB) and 8GB capacities, with a 16GB version following in September. Pricing is $25 for the 4GB version for 1,000 unit quantities and $45 for 1,000 unit quantities for the 8GB version.