Crucial Pushes 2.5-inch SSD to 256 GB

Lexar Media has announced its new series of Crucial M225 2.5-inch solid-state drives, sporting capacities up to 256 GB and read speeds of 250 MB per second.

Lexar Media has been a long-time player in the solid-state drive market, but lately its product lines had been looking a little long-in-the-tooth compared to new high-capacity, speedy offerings from other vendors. Today the company moved to address that deficiency, offering up its new Crucial M225 line of solid state drives, featuring capacities of 64, 128, and 256 GB and offering write speeds of up to 200 MB/s, and read speeds up to 250 MB/s.

“By upgrading their system with a solid-state drive, mobile computer users will enjoy a faster, more rugged system with storage built for mobility,” said Lexar Media’s senior worldwide product marketing manager Robert Wheadon, in a statement. “The fact that SSDs don’t have any moving parts makes Crucial solid-state drives quieter, cooler, and more durable than traditional hard drives.”

The Crucial M225 drives sport a 3Gb/s SATA 2.0 interface and MLC NAND flash components, all put into a 2.5-inch drive enclosure that can be used as a drop-in replacement for traditional 2.5-inch hard drives. Crucial also offers a Crucial SK01 External Drive Storage Kit for using the drives in an external case: the kit includes a 2.5-inch external USB enclosure, along with a 3.5-inch hot swappable drive bay and a 5.25-inch drive bracket.

The Crucial M225s are available now in 64, 128, and 256 GB capacities for suggested prices of $169.99, $329.99, and $599.99; the drives come with a five year warranty.