SSD price dropping at 'dramatic' pace

Thai flood effect continues as Idealo.co.uk predicts prices could equalise with HDD within 300 days

Solid state drive (SSD) prices are set to drop dramatically and become an even stronger competitor to HDD in the next 12 months as a result of the Thai floods, research has claimed.

According to Idealo.co.uk – which concentrated on 2.5in SSDs vs 2.5in HDD drives – the average SSD price per GB has declined five times more quickly than before the devastating floods that hit Thailand in October.

Prior to the floods, SSD prices were already falling at a rate of seven pence per day, the market watcher claimed. But between 14 October and 31 October there was a 10 per cent drop in price, falling an average of 75 pence per day. November saw a further five per cent drop, with a 21-pence-per-day rate of decline.

This is compared with HDD, which rose 70 per cent between 14 October and 1 December. “Rate changes are quite dramatic,” the analyst said in a statement. “It is unrealistic, however, to predict hard drive prices continuing their current rate of change. Even if the supply shortage of hard drives continues into next summer as some have predicted, HDD prices will slowly fall back down to the pre-flood price.”

But, the analyst added, if SSD prices continue to fall at the rate they are, it will take only about 300 days for the prices to equalise. “This would be an amazing accomplishment for the SSD market,” it said.

Analyst Context backed up the findings earlier this month with figures that showed how SSD sales were soaring through distribution.

And a number of traditional HDD manufacturers were feeling the pain, including Western Digital and most recently, processor giant Intel.