Intel manufactures "Solid State Disk" (SSD) drives. These devices perform substantially better than conventional magnetic media hard drives, but carry a significant price premium because they are a new technology. The cost premium for an SSD can be up to 10 times greater than that conventional hard drive. Computer enthusiasts and many IT professionals are willing to pay more for the significant performance enhancement. (The explanation that follows has been simplified for a mass audience) It so happens that these "first generation" SSD drives have a fundamental design flaw: the way the built-in software in the device reads and writes data to memory causes the performance of the device to degrade to below that of published specifications over time. Intel has released a "second generation" of these drives that use less power and are faster and cost less. These second generation devies have built-in software that reduces the severity and performance impact of this degradation substantially. A very important thing to know is that the software for the second generation devices was released to the public separately, after the drives were already in the hands of customers. Customers can download and install this new software and see the performance improvements to their device... but users of the first-generation devices have not been provided with software that is compatible with their devices, and, as of this writing, Intel has issued no statement either in the affirmative (that there will eventually be an update for the first generation devices) and have given no reason why, technical or otherwise, there can not be such an update issued. We, the owners of the first generation consumer SSD devices, can only conclude that the only reason why Intel is not issuing this update is simple corporate indifference to their very best customers. Apparently, even though owners of the first generation device paid more for their device than that of the second generation, and the first-generation customers in fact make the second- and subsequent-generation devices possible, Intel has specificially decided not to provide the update for the first-generation devices. There is no stated technical reason why Intel can not issue this upgrade: they have decided not to do so for their own reasons, be they strategic or otherwise. Intel has already received their revenues for these devices, and the devices continue to operate as disk drives, but as they continue to be used, the performance degrades more and more. This petition is being published in hope that Intel will reconsider their ill-advised decision to neglect early adoptors: they must remember that the customers who have purchased these first-generation devices are amongst their very best customers. If the update for the first-generation consumer SSDs is not issued, Intel risks alienating influential computer enthusiasts. Intel must not forget that they have competition, and many of the products offered by the competition meet or exceed the value proposition of Intel products. Owners of first-generation Intel SSDs will be certainly remember this betrayal by Intel, and will likely consider competitive alternatives to Intel CPU and SSD products

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