When the tide moves, you go with it.

According to Macworld News, electronics manufacturer Toshiba will begin making flash-based solid-state drives for notebooks in earlier 2008.

The new drives, which will initially be available in 32, 64 and 128 gigabyte capacities, will use NAND flash memory as opposed to a traditional rotating magnetic storage disc and offer faster boot times as well as lower power consumption levels. Flash-based drives are also said to be more durable than hard disks and generate extremely minimal noise.

High prices for flash memory components has typically limited adoption of the drives, but Toshiba and other electronics firms such as Samsung are expected to increase production, a move that should lower prices and encourage wider use and adoption.

Toshiba has stated that it will start production of module SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment) drives in the first three months of 2008 with full production of 1.8 and 2.5 inch SATA drives beginning in May.

The drives themselves will offer a maximum read speed of 100 megabytes per second as well as a maximum write speed of 40 megabytes per second using a SATA II interface with a transfer rate of three gigabits per second. According to Toshiba, users can expect to see a drive life expectancy of around one million hours.

Toshiba will first demonstrate the drives at the Consumer Electronics Show, which is scheduled to begin January 7th in Las Vegas.

Final prices for the drives have yet to be announced.

Stay tuned for more information as it becomes available and if you have any thoughts about this, let us know over in the comments or forums.