Samsung is working on a new type of NAND storage, offering higher data density and lower costs. The company believes the new triple-level cell ships are ideally suited for tablets and ultrabooks.

Samsung claims it is the first chipmaker to embrace triple-level cell (TLC) technology, but other companies are expected to follow suit. Unlike single-level cell (SLC) or multilevel cell (MLC), the new tech can store three bits per cell, greatly increasing density. The obvious offshoot is lower production cost, as TLC basically allows for more bits per wafer.

However, TLC also has some drawbacks. Due to its design, it is more prone to errors, less reliable and it is also slower than MLC. However, it still ends up significantly faster than hard drives and reliability issues can be worked out with a bit more digital signal processing.

Basically, Samsung believes MLC is overkill for tablets and ultrabooks and TLC should deliver adequate performance with significant cost savings. Besides, there is always a chance vendors could go for some sort of hybrid storage, much like SSD-HDD combos on some notebooks, so they could use small, speedy MLC for system drives and cheap TLC for additional storage.

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