This is something not totally unexpected, but news of it actually starting to happen is something else.

Toshiba announces a solid state 512 gig drive.

Mass production begins in the second quarter of 2009. The hard drive will probably be around for a few more years until the solid state drives continue to drop in price and increase in size. Looks like when I upgrade my computer, I will be doing one set of hard drives for the last time (I usually replace them every 5 years with bigger and faster HDs).

Mark Viquesney