[aweisberg]

http://wiki.apache.org/cassandra/Durability

"Cassandra's example configuration shows CommitLogSync set to periodic, meaning that we sync the commitlog every CommitLogSyncPeriodInMS ms, so you can potentially lose up to that much data in a crash ... You can also select "batch" mode, where Cassandra will guarantee that it syncs before acknowledging writes, i.e., fully durable mode"

Cassandra has very fine grained control over just about everything to do with consistency and durability. I believe you can pick your desired level of consistency at access time.