Intel's 310, 320, and 710 were based on the X25-M G2 with firmware updates and newer denser flash. Other than that, all their 300, 500, and 700 series drives used third-party controllers until the 730 released two months ago. Of particular note is the fact that the 730 is the first non-enterprise drive to ship with a SATA 6Gbps-capable Intel controller. Intel's SSD controllers are what earned them their reputation for high performance reliable drives, and that's been missing from their consumer drives for a long time. Now, they're mostly just another Sandforce and Marvell OEM, with preferential pricing on IMFT flash and a longer QA cycle. The 730 isn't a clear winner like Intel's previous in-house drives, because the first release of that controller (the SSD DC3700) was so long ago that other vendors have put together and shipped consumer drives that can compete with the 730.
Sure, I'm familiar with the SF versus Intel's own in-house controller differences. I don't think I'd describe that as abandoning the market, though - the power usage on Intel's in-house controller has always been much better, but even on the Intel SSDs with SF controllers, I've had a much lower failure rate than on $CONSUMERSSD, and the power usage isn't horrifying - the non-SF ones are just much better.
I'm surprised by how crap the power usage is on the 730 though - it seems to reflect how the processor architecture in it originally came from the DC line, rather than the other way around.
Who would you say is competing with Intel in that space? Samsung doesn't make nearly the endurance guarantees, Crucial kept having hilarious firmware bugs, and I can't think of many other ubiquitous vendors with durability guarantees...
