Solid-state hard drives coming into their own

Flash storage has been in use for years in portable devices and thumb drives, but not until recently has it been implemented effectively for the full-scale PC. The basic technology, according to Ars Technica, has existed for decades, but technical issues - such as the whole device burning out after a few days of use - have understandably delayed widespread adoption of the technology. The enormous gulf in price between flash storage and traditional models has also helped delay the solid-state drive. However, the day of the SSD may be near. More and more PC models offer SSDs in their laptop and desktop PCs, and the price is dropping rapidly. The SSD has numerous advantages over traditional hard drives, as well: It has no moving parts to get damaged in a fall, it uses far less energy than a standard drive, and it can access data much faster. In the long term, Ars Technica predicts that SSDs will soon supplant traditional models in personal computers, but also that standard hard drives could remain the solution of choice for low-cost mass storage where access speed is less important.