There's an interesting thing happening to Notebook PCs. Very quietly, hard disk drives are starting to disappear from some premium models.
By itself, that would raise a lot of finance and accounting eyebrows. After all, the trend over time is for Notebook PCs to gain ever larger hard drives, not to lose them entirely.
What's happening though is that the standard rotating platter hard disk is being replaced by something called an SSD, or solid state drive.
An SSD is made up of a high speed version of flash memory, just like the stuff that you find in a USB flash drive. There are a number of significant differences between an SSD and a thumb drive, however. One is simply the amount of memory that each contains. Right now, the maximum amount of memory that you can get in a USB flash drive is 32GB, with 4GB to 16GB drives being the most common. SSDs are available in a variety of capacities, 16GB and 32GB drives are still the most common sizes, but many manufacturers of SSDs have announced capacities of 128GB or more.
The memory in a USB drive is a bit slower than that in an SSD, which is a second difference. That's because the USB interface has a much slower transfer rate than the interface for a typical hard disk drive.
Another difference is that the interfaces in each device are different. A thumb drive is designed to plug into a PC's USB port. SSDs are designed to be plug-compatible replacements for a standard rotating memory device, and as such have either IDE or SATA interfaces, just like their electro-mechanical cousins.
Finally, there's cost. As with any new technology when it is first introduced, the price for an SSD is significantly higher than an equivalently sized rotating hard disk drive. For example, a 16GB SSD at one of the better-known Internet stores costs about $450, while a 32GB SSD drive is over $1,000 right now. At the same store, a conventional 320GB Notebook PC hard drive costs under $200.
Of course, these are retail prices. When you purchase a Notebook PC with an SSD upgrade from one of the vendors starting to offer these, you'll pay substantially less, but there's still a hefty premium for going solid state.
Other than the enjoyment of being an early adopter, why bother? Here are three good reasons.
1.
They're tough. SSDs are substantially more shock resistant than a standard Notebook PC hard disk drive. While Notebook PC hard drives have gotten a lot more shock resistant in recent years, you can still crash the drive if it gets bumped hard enough during a read or write operation. But only a shock powerful enough to destroy a Notebook PC can damage the SSD.
2.
They're fast. SSDs are substantially faster than rotating hard drives. That means faster boot times and much faster response times on operations that require disk access.
3.
They're green. SSDs use considerably less power than standard rotating drives. Not only are they "greener" in terms of power usage, but by using less power they enable the Notebook PC to have a longer run time, and eliminate power conserving hard drive power downs and spin ups.
Tough, fast and environmentally friendly -- sounds like a perfect match for the on-the-go finance or accounting professional.
Rick Telberg is the most widely-followed commentator in the finance and accounting profession. He has helped launch and develop several industry-leading businesses, including the magazines Accounting Today, Accounting Technology and Practical Accountant magazines, and the websites WebCPA, SmartPros, and CPA2Biz. He serves as Editor At Large for the AICPA Insider family of e-newsletters and blogs at CPA Trendlines
Any views or comments expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and not necessarily those of any other organization. No person quoted or cited has any known connection to or interest in Hewlett Packard, and their appearance here should not be construed as an endorsement.
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