Flash Memory or Solid State Disks are disruptive

I asked a rhetorical question back in 2006 "Is Flash Memory disruptive"
The answer would have to be a resounding yes. Already the price per GB is rapidly falling.
People motivated by performance are getting very interested, if not already implementing systems which use Solid State Disks (SSD) as the part of or the primary storage for data.

Specially the solution is to get RAM IO read speeds for read intensive databases. Most databases are 90-98% read versus write. The technology of improving both the write speed and the life of the SSD is improving.
If your dig into computer architecture there is a hierarchy of IO performance. It start with CPU cache and ends with tape drives. See Jim Gray's CyberBricks presentation for more detail.

So Flash Memory as Solid State Disks are disruptive. They are disrupting hard drives and may well force them down the food chain in the IO pecking order. Making them closer to tape as a storage option.

This has not been helped by the inability of hard drives to get faster. Potentially hard drive manufacturers have seen that Solid State Disks are going to disrupt them, and so are no longer spending loads of money on Research and Development (R&D). If this was the case, it will truly be a change from past behaviour as the incumbent technology leaders tend to pursue the most demanding customers until they discover the market has moved on and those demanding customers switch and leave them behind.

It will be interesting to see how this pans out in the future.

Have Fun

Paul