The PC market for the last few years has enjoyed the addition of what are called "hybrid drives" as part of its standard hardware loadout. A mix of solid state and hard drive, hybrid drives provide a "best of both worlds" philosophy in which frequently-accessed files like OS files and boot files are stored in flash memory, accessed with much more speed than a hard drive can muster, but other files not so regularly accessed – video files, document files and the like – are kept in hard drive space.
Apple, meanwhile, recently decided to join in with their new Fusion Drive.
The Fusion Drive, said to be part of a partnership arrangement with Seagate (News - Alert) that comes with certain inherent tools for Mountain Lion, is much the same as a hybrid drive. Based on current reports, it seems almost indistinguishable from a standard hybrid drive, with a mix of solid state storage mixed in with standard hard drive platters to make a combination drive that offers both high-speed on the stuff that's most frequently accessed, and plenty of storage space in a package that would be much more expensive if it were all solid state storage... Read More
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