Kingston targets SMEs with easy SSD upgrades

Kingston is stepping up its assault on the SSD market

Memory maker Kingston Technology has launched a combination package aimed at helping individuals, and small and medium sized enterprises to upgrade from existing traditional hard drives to its SSDNow V value series of solid state drives (SSDs).

"We are trying to garner mass-market adoption of SSDs by bundling all of the software, hardware and step-by-step instructions in a couple of low-cost options aimed squarely at everyday users," said Steve Hall, EMEA branded product manager at Kingston.

"The V Series upgrade kits are a perfect complement to our existing line of SSDNow products that target enterprise customers and power users."

The new kits are available in 64GB and 128GB versions and, along with the drive itself, provide cloning software and instructions on how to transfer the data and swap out the drives, thereby removing the need to reinstall the operating system or lose any settings.

Once cloned, desktop users can have the operating system and applications reside on the SSD drive, while the old hard drive is used to store data such as music, videos, files and photos.

The notebook upgrade kit comes with an external enclosure, which lets users retain their original hard drive and allow for additional external storage.

Kingston stepped into the SSD market at the beginning of the year, announcing that it would be using a rebranded version of Intel's SSD drives rather than developing its own.

The 64GB kit will sell for £96, while the 128GB pack has a price tag of £170. All SSDNow V Series kits are backed by a three-year warranty.

Kingston launched a similar pack for enterprises last month based on its SSDNow M series drives.