Strontium Launches SandForce-Based SATA 6 Gbps SSD

Normally, we wouldn't outright advise against buying a product, but in this case we feel that we must, and it has nothing to do with Strontium itself.

Verily, the company didn't really go wrong anywhere when it made the 480 GB Python SSD. The drive is a nice and fast SATA III 2.5-inch, 7mm MLC NAND SSD, with 550 MB/s read speed and a write speed of 520 MB/s. The random write performance of 60,000 IOPS is no slouch either, and neither is the 1.5 million hour MTBF.

The reason we do suggest a delay is the flaw discovered in SandForce SSD controller chips. 256-bit AES encryption doesn't work (it is limited to 128-bit) and LSI hasn't finished that firmware fix yet. Then again, sales haven't started yet, so it's possible that the fix will have already been finished by the time Python shows up in stores. The price is expected to be of $450-500 (360-400 Euro).

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