Relatively-new startup Pliant Technology claims their 3.5-inch enterprise SSD can read at speeds up to 500 megabytes per seconds and read 320 megabytes per second. Basically, you could copy the contents of a two terabyte drive in around an hour.

According to Computer World, the three-year-old company claims that the drive can be used non-stop for five years without slowdown. Apparently the mojo behind the Lightning EFD LS (and the slightly slower, 2.5-inch EFD LB) is that it uses a proprietary ASIC design that relies on a SCSI data transfer interface, as opposed to the more common Fibre Channel interface. As a result they’re currently able to achieve speeds of 6 gigabits per second (vs. the 4 Gb/s that Fibre Channel provides).

While it is available now for companies to purchase, it seems that the product has yet to be tested independently, so the accuracy of those speed claims are uncertain. [Pliant via Computer World via Slashdot]