Buffalo rolls out 100GB USB flash drive

Permalink: Buffalo rolls out 100GB USB flash drive

Buffalo Technology, the wireless networking and storage specialist, has launched a 100GB USB solid state disk (SSD) in Japan. Prior to Buffalo’s SHD-UHRS SSD, the largest capacity flash drive was 64GB.

In order to achieve the high capacity, Buffalo has used two types of flash memory in the drive, SLC and MLC, creating a hybrid configuration.

SLC (Single-Level Cell) and MLC (Multi-Level Cell) are both NAND-based non-volatile memory technologies.

MLC NAND Flash helps boost the drive’s capacity, as it allows each memory cell to store two bits of information, compared to the one bit-per-cell allowed by SLC NAND Flash.

Although SLC NAND offers a lower density, it helps enhance the drive’s performance by enabling faster write speeds.

Turbo USB, which features in most of Buffalo’s external hard drives and thumbdrives, helps speed up the drive’s transfers by 24%.

The Buffalo SHD-UHRS SSD is about the same size as a business card and weighs just 2oz. Sounds easy to lose, but at $952 anyone buying the drive will want to keep a close eye on it.

A 64GB version is available for $665 and a 32GB version for $312.