Denali Memory Report:
The Denali Memory Report is produced by Cadence Design Systems, Inc. It delivers memory market news, discussions of market trends, products and product strategies of the memory vendors, plus information about alliances and industry consortia.
Subscribe to Denali Memory Report!
-
Recent Posts
- Some great analysis on SSD wear leveling and power consumption
- The Economist covers PCM – must be something real
- Add OCZ to the growing list of SSD vendors differentiating their drives with a proprietary controller
- IDT announces DDR4 register chip for DDR4 registered DIMMs and 3D die stacks
- Western Digital sampling 5mm, 2.5-inch, 500Gbyte hybrid HDD with NAND Flash
Archives
What's hot on the Denali Memory Report?
Categories
- 3D
- ARM
- Compact Flash
- Cortex-A15
- DDR
- DDR3
- DDR4
- DFI
- DRAM
- eMMC
- Ethernet
- Exynos
- Flash
- HDD
- HMC
- Hybrid Memory Cube
- Hynix
- JEDEC
- LeCroy
- LPDDR
- LPDDR2
- LPDDR3
- LPDDR3E
- LPDDR4
- LRDIMM
- Marvell
- MCP
- Memcon
- Memristor
- Micron
- MLC
- MRAM
- mSATA
- NAND
- NOR
- NVM Express
- NVMe
- ONFI
- PCIe
- PCM
- QDR
- ReRAM
- Samsung
- SAS
- SATA
- SD
- SDRAM
- SLC
- SRAM
- SSD
- Storage
- Toggle
- UFS
- Uncategorized
- USB
- Wide I/O
- XQD
Meta
Category Archives: Flash
Western Digital sampling 5mm, 2.5-inch, 500Gbyte hybrid HDD with NAND Flash
Western Digital just started shipping 7mm, 2.5-inch HDDs earlier this year and has now announced that it is sampling a 5mm, 2.5-inch, 500Gbyte hybrid HDD with integrated NAND Flash caching. The drive will be showcased during Western Digital’s Investor Day … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, HDD, SSD
Tagged Acer, Asus, Flash memory, Solid-state drive, Ultrabook, Western Digital
Leave a comment
Future Memory: The MemCon Panel. What comes after NAND Flash and DRAM?
Just announced, there’s a pre-lunch panel at MemCon covering future memories. There are several new memory technologies that would usurp the thrones from DRAM and NAND Flash memory. Will any succeed? Come and hear the panel to find out. Jim … Continue reading
Posted in DRAM, Flash, MRAM, NAND
Tagged DRAM, Flash memory, NAND Flash, Santa Clara Convention Center
Leave a comment
The top 21 things you probably didn’t know about Flash memory, from the Flash Memory Summit
Last week’s Flash Memory Summit ended with a session titled “The top 10 things you need to know about Flash memory today. Richard Goering summarized the panel in his blog titled “Flash Memory Panelists Challenge Conventional Thinking About NAND and … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, SSD, Storage
Tagged Flash, Flash memory, Floyd, NAND Flash, Scaling limit, Solid-state drive, SSD, Western Digital
Leave a comment
Want to know why SK hynix is placing its bets on three different alternatives to DRAM and Flash?
Last week at the Flash Memory Summit, Dr. Sung Wook Park spoke about memory. No surprise there, but there were several surprises in Park’s presentation. The first surprise popped up in the slide immediately following the keynote presentation’s title slide: … Continue reading
Add Hitachi Data Systems to the growing list of companies developing their own SSD controllers
According to this Computerworld article, Hitachi Data Systems (HDS) announced last week that it is developing its own SSD controller for MLC NAND Flash to be used in its SSD arrays. The objective is a 4x improvement in read/write throughput, … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, MLC, NAND, SSD, Storage
Tagged Computerworld, Flash memory, Flash memory controller, HDS, Hitachi, Hitachi Data Systems, Solid-state drive
3 Comments
Tweaktown review of 1.6Tbyte SMART Storage Optimus SSD reveals a few secrets. Wanna see them?
Tweaktown.com attended last week’s Flash Memory Summit and has published some great photos of the internals of the 2.5-inch SMART Storage 1.6Tbyte Optimus SSD. The drive has dual SAS ports with accompanying specs of 1Gbps sequential read and 500MGbps sequential … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, MLC, NAND, SAS, SSD, Storage
Tagged Flash, Flash memory, Flash memory controller, Multi-level cell, NAND Flash, Skyera, SMART Storage, Solid-state drive, SSD
Leave a comment
Memcon is filling up. Register now to be sure you get a ticket. It’s free. September 18. Silicon Valley
The Flash Memory Summit took place this week and registration for next month’s Memcon in Silicon Valley suddenly took a big uptick. I’d like to suggest that if you want to be certain to attend Memcon next month, you might … Continue reading
As seen at Flash Memory Summit: Whose car is this?
Leaving Flash Memory Summit on Tuesday, I stopped in my tracks when I saw this Toyota Corolla’s license plate. Can you decode it?
Posted in Flash
Tagged Flash memory, Flash memory controller, Flash Memory Summit, Toyota Corolla
1 Comment
Want to know Rado Danilak’s and Skyera’s plan for total enterprise-class SSD world domination?
This week, I reported on a new high-end, high-performance 44Tbyte SSD for data centers and server farms from Skyera. (See “44Tbyte Skyera Skyhawk SSD employs Everspin MRAM as write cache” and “How Skyera developed the 44Tbyte, enterprise-class Skyhawk SSD from … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, HDD, MLC, NAND, SSD, Storage
Tagged Flash memory, Flash memory controller, Multi-level cell, NAND Flash, SandForce, Skyera, Solid-state drive, SSD
1 Comment
How Wired’s Mat Mohan got his personal data back from his SSD after his MacBook Air was hacked. Hint: $1690 in recovery fees.
Mat Mohan knows how to transform adversity into opportunity. He’s a senior writer for Wired’s Gadget Lab and his Apple account was ingeniously hacked through a scam perpetrated on Amazon to get the necessary information to hack into Apple’s system. … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, SSD, Storage
Tagged Apple, Data recovery, DriveSavers, Hard disk drive, Solid-state drive, SSD, Wired
Leave a comment
Marvell’s DragonFly NVRAM and NVCACHE provide high SSD IOPS for large storage apps
Marvell has just announced two new versions of its DragonFly PCIe board series: the DragonFly NVRAM and the DragonFly NVCACHE. Both boards contain a mixture of PCIe controller, SDRAM, SLC NAND Flash, supercapacitors, and software to create plug-in boards for … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, Marvell, SAS, SSD, Storage
Tagged Flash memory, IOPS, PCI Express, Servers, Solid-state drive, SSD, Storage
Leave a comment
44Tbyte Skyera Skyhawk SSD employs Everspin MRAM as write cache
NAND Flash memory would be perfect for nonvolatile storage because except that Flash write speeds are slow enough to create a window of time when write transactions could be lost during a power failure. This problem is especially acute for … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, MRAM, NAND, SSD, Storage
Tagged Flash, Flash memory, Flash Memory Summit, MRAM, NAND Flash, Skyera, Skyhawk
3 Comments
Friday Video: A personal invitation to Memcon from Sanjay Srivastava
Want to know why you need to be at Memcon this year? Here’s Denali Software founder Sanjay Srivastava to tell you why: Now go and sign up! It’s a free ticket and includes breakfast, lunch, and some goodies—not to mention … Continue reading
Flash memory endurance, multi-level cells, and process technology
I’ve been following an interesting discussion about Flash memory endurance, multi-level cells, and process technology in the LinkedIn Solid State Storage Group. Yesterday, The Memory Guy Jim Handy stepped in with this comment: “Flash endurance is the result of disruptions … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND
Tagged Error detection and correction, Flash, Flash memory, LinkedIn, MLC, Multi-level cell
Leave a comment
Flash Memory Summit: Great Program on Non-Volatile memory.
The Flash Memory Summit rolls into Silicon Valley – August 21-23. Here’s a summary of topics covered in the program: Flash Memory-Based Architectures Next-Generation Flash and SSD Controllers Solid-State Drive (SSD) Technology Enterprise SSDs Testing/Performance/Endurance NVMe LDPC Coding Enterprise Storage … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, mSATA, NAND, NOR, NVM Express, NVMe, SSD, Storage, Toggle
Tagged Flash, Flash memory, Solid-state drive, SSD
Leave a comment
Who do you want to see at Memcon?
As the emcee for the Memcon event on September 18, I’ve been given the opportunity to personally invite a few, select exhibitors to the show and to cut them a very sweet deal. To do that, I’d like to know … Continue reading
Want more details about the new Micron 1Gbit Phase-Change Memory / 512Mbit SDRAM device? Here are several
Yesterday, Micron announced volume production of a new memory device containing one 1Gbit PCM (phase-change memory) die and one 512Mbit LPDDR2 SDRAM die. This morning, I had a conversation about this new device with Philippe Berge—Senior Director of the NOR, … Continue reading
Posted in DDR, Flash, LPDDR2, Micron, NOR, PCM, Storage
Tagged Flash memory, Micron, MicronTechnology, Mobile DDR, NOR Flash, PCM, Phase-change memory, Synchronous dynamic random-access memory
Leave a comment
StorageSearch.com names top 25 SSD companies. Guess who?
StorageSearch.com has been following SSDs for a long, long time so they’ve got as much right to name their top picks as anyone. Here’s the 2Q 2012 version with a few you might not have heard about, yet: Fusion-io Violin … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD
2 Comments
Korg introduces SSD-based music workstation, the Korg Kronos X, with 62Gbyte drive and option for a second SSD
File this under places you might not expect to find SSDs: Korg USA has announced the Kronos X Music Workstation, a music keyboard and workstation with a 62Gbyte SSD for storing sound samples in sound libraries. That’s a lot of … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD
Tagged Flash memory, Flash memory controller, Korg, Music, Solid-state drive, Workstation
Leave a comment
Three Golliaths and a host of Davids meeting up on the storage battlefield. Who wins?
If you want to read a short, interesting overview of the combined HDD/SSD storage battlefield, look no further than a new article on The Register’s Web site. The article, titled “Will the titans of storage decide to flash their bits?” … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, HDD, Micron, Samsung, SSD
Tagged Flash, Hard disk drive, Hynix, OCZ Technology, Samsung, Solid-state drive, Toshiba, Western Digital
Leave a comment
Jim Handy, The Memory Guy, answers your questions about Flash memory
Two weeks ago, Jim Handy (who bills himself and appears on the Internet as “The Memory Guy”) posted a blog discussion about the end of Flash memory scaling. He also posted a notice of the blog as a discussion on … Continue reading
Posted in 3D, Flash, Memcon, ONFI
Tagged Charge Trap Flash, Flash, Flash memory, Jim Handy, LinkedIn, Memory Guy, Open NAND Flash Interface Working Group, Solid-state drive
Leave a comment
MOSAID and NOVACHIPS announce plans for an HLNAND-based SSD controller chip. Release set for 2013.
A couple of weeks ago, MOSAID and NOVACHIPS announced plans to jointly develop an SSD controller based on the MOSAID high-speed HLNAND interface specification. If you’re not familiar with the MOSAID HLNAND high-speed serial interface, join the club. Most NAND … Continue reading
Posted in 3D, Flash, Hybrid Memory Cube, NAND
Tagged Flash memory, Flash memory controller, HyperLink, MOSAID, NAND Flash, NOVACHIPS, PCI Express, Solid-state drive, SSD
1 Comment
Applied Materials develops Centura Avatar etcher for enabling 3D NAND Flash manufacture
About a year ago, I wrote an EDA360 Insider blog entry about 3D NAND Flash semiconductor memory. (See “3D Thursday: A look at some genuine 3D NAND cells, courtesy of Micron”) In this post, I discussed a talk by Glen … Continue reading
Jim Handy, The Memory Guy, writes that Flash memory is dead…but perhaps not just yet
My good friend Jim Handy—who writes several blogs including The Memory Guy and The SSD Guy—recently published a blog titled “The End of Flash Scaling.” He writes: “Everyone knows that flash memory is about to hit its scaling limit – … Continue reading
Posted in 3D, Flash, Memristor, MRAM, ReRAM, SSD
Tagged Flash, Flash memory, Flash memory controller, Hynix, NAND Flash, SSD
1 Comment
Whoa, Momma! Flash memory maker SK Hynix enters the SSD market. Take a look at these performance charts!
Jim Handy, the “SSD Guy” and the “Memory Guy,” just published a short blog post alerting us to the fact that Flash memory maker SK Hynix has entered the SSD market just four days after announcing the purchase of Link_A_Media, … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, mSATA, ONFI, SATA, SSD, Storage
Tagged Flash, Flash memory, Hynix, IBM, Phase-change memory, SK Hynix
Leave a comment
Registration opens for the Flash Memory Summit 2012. Read on for program highlights
The Flash Memory Summit takes place on August 21-23 here in Silicon Valley at the Santa Clara Convention Center and it’s now opened its registration. However, before you register, you might want to know what’s being covered. A reasonable request … Continue reading
SSD prices: More affordable? Steady, substantial decline? In free fall? Just what is going on here?
Senior Writer Vincent Chang over at CNET writes that “SSDs are more affordable than ever” and has the charted data to prove it. Clayton Vallabhan at ITPnet.com goes even further, writing “SSD prices in freefall.” For an even more extensive … Continue reading
Will cache SSDs rule the world in notebook storage? IHS iSuppli’s Magic 8 Ball says “Signs point to Yes”
An excellent article by Hot Hardware’s Joel Hruska (see “Analysts Predict Skyrocketing SSD, Cache Drive Sales, But What Happened To Hybrid Hard Drives?”) contains several tasty bits of data and a quote from Ryan Chien, analyst for memory and storage … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, HDD, SSD, Storage
Tagged cache SSD, Flash memory, HDD, Hybrid drive, IHS iSuppli, Seagate, SSD
Leave a comment
Violin Memory’s Narayan Venkat writes about why Flash-based storage is doing well in data centers: time and money
Narayan Venkat, VP of product management at Violin Memory, recently published a guest blog post titled “6 Reasons Solid State Memory Is The Biggest Story In Computing” over at Forbes.com. The rhetoric in the article should be familiar stuff to … Continue reading
Flash Memory Summit 2012, Santa Clara, CA. Registration now open
Every year, the Flash Memory Summit rolls into Silicon Valley to discuss the latest in Flash memory, SSDs, and possibly up-and-coming alternative non-volatile memory technologies. This year, the event takes place on August 21-23 at the Santa Clara Convention Center … Continue reading
Corsair does the Neutron dance with new line of fast SSDs based on Toggle NAND Flash
PC hardware maker Corsair has introduced a new line of 2.5-inch, 7mm SSDs called the Neutron GTX series. I find it very interesting that the first fact put forth in the Corsair press release for this new series is about … Continue reading
So just how big is the semiconductor memory market? $50 billion? $60 billion?
Yesterday, Jeremy Wagstaff, Chief Technology Correspondent for Reuters in Asia, published an article on wannabe non-volatile memory technologies such as MRAM and Memristors or ReRAM (See “Pushing the PRAM: when chips just can’t get any smaller”). The lure is a … Continue reading
Will SSDs be the first big market for 3D NAND Flash memories?
I’ve been meaning to write about a comment regarding NAND Flash memory and SSDs written by Thomas McCormick in LinkedIn’s Solid State Storage Group and this seems like the perfect time. McCormick is an Integrated Hardware/Software Product Development Leader at … Continue reading
Posted in 3D, DDR, DRAM, Flash, Memristor, MRAM, NAND, SSD, Storage
Tagged DRAM, Flash, Flash memory, memristor, MRAM, NAND Flash, Solid-state drive, SSD
Leave a comment
MRAM spotted in Buffalo Memory SSD—for cache
Several sources including TomsHardware.com have reported the appearance at the 15th Embedded Systems Expo in Japan of an SSD built by Buffalo Memory Company with MRAM for cache memory. The drive uses 8Mbytes of MRAM (magnetic RAM) as a cache … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, MRAM, SSD
Tagged Flash, Flash memory, Magnetoresistive random access memory, MRAM
1 Comment
Tiny RunCore single-chip SSDs cram 8 to 64Gbytes onto small SATA cards that fit anywhere
RunCore has announced a line of small single-chip SSDs in a format that the company calls “Mini DOM” (miniature disk on module). The high-speed SATA SSDs are available with capacities from 8 to 64Gbytes in three form factors: a 7-pin … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SATA, SSD, Storage
Tagged Flash memory, Mini DOM, NAND Flash, RunCore, SATA, Solid-state drive
Leave a comment
Do you know the advantages and disadvantages of the six different use cases for SSDs?
Marc Staimer, founder and senior analyst at Dragon Slayer Consulting, has just published an excellent primer on locating SSD storage within a server and storage network. With the advent of PCIe-based SSD storage based on NAND Flash memory, the number … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, HDD, SSD
Tagged Cache, Flash memory, Flash memory controller, Hard disk drive, NAS, Network Attached Storage, PCI Express, SAN, Solid-state drive, SSD, Storage area network
1 Comment
Spansion CEO maps divergent semiconductor memory strategy at Globalpress—a destiny that leads to smart memory
Spansion CEO John Kispert mapped out an individualized product strategy for the semiconductor memory vendor at today’s Globalpress Electronics Summit being held this week in Santa Cruz, California. Kispert first pointed out that Spansion currently has approximately 8000 customers who … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NOR
Tagged Apple, Flash memory, iPhone, John Kispert, Kispert, NAND Flash, Semiconductor memory, Spansion
Leave a comment
Lexar translates USB 3.0 specs into significant benefits that consumers care about with the new S73 JumpDrive
Sometimes, we insiders get pretty esoteric in the way we describe technological improvements. Take SuperSpeed USB 3.0 for example. Most consumers know it’s faster than USB 2.0—after all, 3.0 is bigger than 2.0 so it must be better—but perhaps they … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, ONFI, USB
Leave a comment
BIWIN America introduces 12x20mm e-MMC SSDs with on-chip controller, power-on boot, explicit sleep mode
BIWIN America has just announced a “single-chip” SSD device employing the e-MMC interface. The device is available in capacities from 2 to 64Gbytes, all packed into a 169-ball BGA package measuring 12x20x1mm. An integral SSD controller provides built-in BCH error … Continue reading
Posted in eMMC, Flash, NAND, SSD
Tagged e-MMC, Flash memory, Multi-level cell, NAND Flash, Solid-state drive, SSD, Wear leveling
Leave a comment
Low-cost Intel 330 series SSDs sport SandForce SF-2281 SSD Controller
According to this extremely informative article on the Anandtech.com site, Intel’s just-released 330 series SSDs push Intel into the low-cost SSD zone using the SandForce SF-2281 SSD controller. Apparently, Intel’s 520 SSD series also employs this controller, but the use … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD, Storage
Tagged AnandTech, Flash memory, Flash memory controller, Intel, Multi-level cell, NAND Flash, SandForce, Solid-state drive
1 Comment
Will your multicore SoC hit the memory wall? Will the memory wall hit your SoC? Does it matter?
Multicore SoC and processor designs were our solution to the death of Dennard Scaling when IC process geometries dropped below 90nm, when processor speeds hit 3GHz, and when processor power consumption went off the charts. Since 2004, we’ve transformed Moore’s … Continue reading
Posted in 3D, DDR, DDR3, DDR4, DRAM, Flash, PCIe, Wide I/O
Tagged DDR SDRAM, Graphics processing unit, System-on-a-chip, X86
9 Comments
A detailed look at the IP components of an SSD controller chip by Dr. Eric Esteve
IPNEST blogger and analyst Dr. Eric Esteve has just published a detailed look at many of the IP components needed to design a high-performance SSD controller chip including a NAND Flash controller and high-speed PHY interface for NAND Flash devices. … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, NVMe, ONFI
Tagged Eric Esteve, Flash memory, Flash memory controller, NAND Flash, ONFI, PHY, Solid-state drive, SSD
Leave a comment
Intel jumps on the PCIe SSD bandwagon with the fast, new 910 Series
Intel has just announced an SSD family based on the PCIe expansion-card form factor and interface. The SSD family is called the 910 Series and it’s based on Intel High Endurance Technology and MLC (multi-level cell) 25nm NAND flash memory … Continue reading
Micron’s mSATA RealSSD C400 and RealSSD C400v drives get huge performance from their SATA 6Gbps interfaces and 25nm MLC NAND
Micron’s new RealSSD C400v and RealSSD C400 mSATA SSDs can operate as SSDs in ultralight, ultrathin notebooks and can also be used as a Flash caches in SSD/HDD hybrid systems. The drive fits the 3×5 cm, 3.75mm-thick mSATA form factor … Continue reading
4th International Memory Workshop in Milan tackles all things non-volatile with respect to semiconductor memory. May 20-23
You will need to travel to Milan, Italy to attend the 4-day intensive event devoted to non-volatile memory, which seems to be the exclusive topic for the 4th International Memory Workshop Symposia on VLSI Technology and Circuits covers latest STT-MRAM … Continue reading
Symposia on VLSI Technology and Circuits covers latest STT-MRAM developments
Session 7 of the 2012 Symposia on VLSI Technology and Circuits is all about Spin-Torque-Transfer Magnetic RAM (STT-MRAM), one of the several technologies hoping to challenge NAND Flash memory for the top spot in the non-volatile memory hierarchy. Five presentations … Continue reading
Want to tour the Kingston SSD factory with TweakTown?
Kingston Technology manufactures SSDs in Taiwan’s Hsin Chu Science Park and TweakTown’s Cameron Wilmot recently went for a visit. With his camera. Although Wilmot wasn’t allowed to shoot video, he did shoot a lot of photos that are included in … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD
Tagged Flash memory, Kingston, Kingston Technology, Solid-state drive, SSD, Taiwan, TweakTown
Leave a comment
Interview with Whiptail’s CTO James Candelaria demonstrates how SSD controllers can greatly improve NAND Flash endurance by managing write amplification
As NAND Flash geometries continue to shrink, device endurance specs have suffered, which is a significant challenge when using these devices in SSDs. This interview with Whiptail’s CTO James Candelaria discusses how his company’s approach to buffering writes in SSD … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD
Tagged Flash, Flash memory controller, Multi-level cell, NAND Flash, RAID, Solid-state drive, SSD, Whiptail, Write Amplification
Leave a comment
Supertalent USB 3 SSD memory-stick drive virtually “saturates” USB 2 port using 8-channel LSI SandForce SSD controller
In a sea of undifferentiated USB memory sticks, Supertalent is coming on very strong by differentiating its USB 3.0 Express RC8 drive through its use of an LSI SandForce SSD controller with 8 channels of NAND Flash memory. As a … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD, USB
Leave a comment
Forbes.com publishes article on growth areas for SSDs and NAND Flash devices: mobile and cloud
Tom Coughlin, the President and founder of Coughlin Associates, has just published a good background piece on growth paths for SSDs and Flash memory. I commend it to your attention and I particularly want to call your attention to several … Continue reading
LSI Corp releases multiple PCIe SSD and Flash-cached RAID storage cards in Nytro portfolio
LSI Corp has just announced a number of products in its Nytro line of PCIe-based storage cards. The LSI Nytro WarpDrive is a second-generation SSD card available in capacities of 200Gbytes to 3.2Tbytes using a memory-stacking architecture to load the … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, HDD, PCIe, SAS, SSD
Tagged Flash memory, Hard disk drive, LSI, PCI Express, RAID, SandForce
Leave a comment
Free Webinar on essential memory and storage verification IP: DDR3/4, LRDIMM, 12Gbps SAS, NVMe, Ethernet. April 10.
Verification IP (VIP) is an essential component of the development process for all ICs and systems and now you have the chance to listen to a free April 10 Webinar on applying that essential component in memory and storage applications. … Continue reading
ISQED: Who and what will win the Universal Memory Derby?
Professor Cristophe Muller of Aix-Marseille University gave an excellent overview of non-volatile semiconductor memory as the third ISQED keynote this week. It’s a very good overview of today’s landscape and well worth discussing in a wider forum like this blog. … Continue reading
Agilent: Memory technology has hit a wall due to physics limitations and that has implications for your designs
Last week, Agilent ran a seminar in Milpitas, California. The first of three subseminars was about memory technology with an excellent overview of the state of memory technology today. It was presented by Gordon Getty, an Agilent Application Engineer based … Continue reading
DRAMeXchange opines on six major DRAM and NAND Flash trends for 2012-2015. What do you think?
The DRAMeXchange http://www.dramexchange.com/ keeps a very close watch on the spot and contract prices for all forms of semiconductor memory including DRAM and NAND Flash devices. The group also keeps an eye on trends that may affect pricing. A couple … Continue reading
Posted in 3D, DDR3, DDR4, DRAM, Flash, HDD, LPDDR2, LPDDR3, Memcon, ONFI, Toggle
Tagged DDR3 SDRAM, Flash, Flash memory, NAND Flash, PCI Express, Ultrabook
Leave a comment
More on developing your own SSD controller chip. Is rolling your own right for you?
A couple of days ago, I described the new STEC MACH16 SSD and noted that STEC had developed its own SSD controller and firmware. (See “STEC’s MACH16 Slim 2.5-in SATA SSD requires small footprint, fits in small embedded spaces”) I … Continue reading
Free Webinar on using NOR Flash memory—sponsored by Avnet and Spansion. March 13
Avnet and Spansion are sponsoring a free Webinar on using Spansion’s GL-S NOR Flash memory, which is available in capacities of 128Mbytes to 2Gbytes. Although NAND Flash memory gets most of the attention these days, NOR Flash memory is apparently … Continue reading
Objective Analysis White Paper covers the basics of SSD design. Do you know what’s important?
Jim Handy at Objective Analysis has just published a White Paper about SSDs titled “Enterprise Reality, Solid State Speed.” The White Paper provides an excellent introduction to issues surrounding SSD design. The key issue here is the basic wearout failure … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, SSD
Tagged ECC, Flash, Flash memory, Flash memory controller, LSI Corp, NAND Flash, SandForce, Solid-state drive
Leave a comment
SanDisk shows 128Gbit, 3-level cell NAND Flash memory chip at ISSCC. Is 20nm (or 19nm) here, so soon?
I’ve already written about retired SanDisk CEO Eli Harari’s ISSCC keynote prediction that ReRAM/memristor technology would supplant DRAM and NAND Flash memory by the time the 11nm process node arrives. (See “SanDisk’s founder and retired CEO Eli Harari says that … Continue reading
SanDisk’s founder and retired CEO Eli Harari says that the future of SSDs, computer memory, and everything else belongs to memristors at 11nm
The SSD Review reports that SanDisk’s founder and retired CEO Eli Harari delivered some explosive predictions at last week’s ISSCC in San Francisco. In sharp contrast to the recent and highly publicized paper predicting the slowdown of SSD speed and reliability … Continue reading
SMART Storage Systems’ Optimus Ultra SSD taps consumer-grade NAND Flash memory with magic wand named Guardian to make enterprise-class SSD
A lead from Computerworld put me onto the announcement by SMART Storage Systems of a new enterprise-class Optimus Ultra SSD based on consumer-grade MLC (multi-level cell) NAND Flash devices. Using consumer-grade silicon to make this drive cuts the OEM cost … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD
Tagged DIF, ECC, Flash, Flash memory, MLC NAND Flash, Multi-level cell, NAND Flash
Leave a comment
The sky is falling! The sky is falling! Paper predicts the bleak future of SSDs and NAND Flash memory
An interesting and disturbing paper titled “The Bleak Future of NAND Flash Memory” written by two researchers at the Department of Computer Science and Engineering at the University of California, San Diego, and one Microsoft employee uses current trends with … Continue reading
STT MRAM startup Spin Transfer Technologies secures $36M in Series A funding
Last week, STT MRAM startup Spin Transfer Technologies announced that it had secured $36M in Series A financing from Allied Minds and Invesco Asset Management. Spin Transfer Technologies is developing an “orthogonal” version of STT (spin transfer technology—the technology, not … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, MRAM, NAND
Tagged Flash, Flash memory, Magnetoresistive random access memory, MRAM, NAND, SDRAM, Spin torque transfer
1 Comment
Flash Memory Summit 2012: Call for presentations
Planning is now underway for the Flash Memory Summit 2012, which will be held in Santa Clara, CA in August. There’s no better show devoted exclusively to NAND Flash semiconductor memory and applications of NAND Flash—particularly SSDs. The organizers have … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD
Tagged Flash memory, Flash memory controller, Multi-level cell, NAND Flash, Semiconductor memory, Solid-state drive, SSD
2 Comments
Why is the NVMe SSD interface inherently more efficient than disk-based protocols such as SATA?
The speed at which the electronics industry moves sometimes masks other developments that are incredibly slow-paced and the conversion of storage I/O protocols from hard-disk-centric to solid-state disks (SSDs) is a shining example. Most SSDs currently employ I/O protocols originally … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, HDD, NAND, NVM Express, NVMe, SSD
Tagged ATA, Flash memory, NAND Flash, NVM Express, NVMe, PCI Express, SATA, Serial ATA
2 Comments
Watch out SSDs, here comes the NVM Express!
I was reading an article on the Information Week Web site about using SSDs for accelerating enterprise storage and came across this statement: “For the most part, the type of SSD that you use in the storage system does not … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, NVM Express, NVMe, SSD
Tagged Flash memory, Hard disk drive, NVM Express, PCI Express, SAS, SATA, Serial ATA, SSD
3 Comments
Hitachi Global Storage unleashes 2.5-inch, 100 to 400Gbyte enterprise SSDs with Intel 25nm SLC NAND Flash
This week, Hitachi GST (Global Storage Technology) announced a new line of 2.5-inch, 100 to 400Gbyte enterprise SSDs, called the Ultrastar SSD400S.B, based on Intel 25nm SLC (single level cell) NAND Flash devices. The endurance specs of the Flash devices … Continue reading
Posted in Flash, SSD
Tagged Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, Hitachi GST, Intel, IOPS, Multi-level cell, Solid-state drive
Leave a comment
Quickly Noted: EETimes on the challenges of testing semiconductor memory for mobile applications. Is testing really a 3D IC “stopper”?
Janine Love at EETimes interviewed Cecil Ho, President of CST (Simmtester.com)—a memory tester vendor, about issues surrounding the testing of semiconductor memory that’s optimized for and aimed at mobile applications. In these applications board real estate and physical volume are … Continue reading
Can MLC NAND Flash work in enterprise SSDs? Yes, with the right storage algorithms says Seagate
MLC (multi-level cell) NAND Flash memories provide 2x or 3x the storage for slightly more than the cost of SLC (single-level cell) NAND Flash memories. Consequently, there’s a big economic case to be made for MLC NAND Flash devices in … Continue reading
Posted in eMMC, Flash, NAND, SLC, SSD
Tagged Flash memory, Flash memory controller, MLC, MLC NAND Flash, Multi-level cell, Solid-state drive, SSD
1 Comment
Elpida prototypes 50nm, 64Mbit, 10nsec Resistive RAM (ReRAM). 30nm production slated for 2013
Elpida, the world’s third largest DRAM manufacturer, just announced successful development of a 64Mbit resistive RAM (ReRAM) prototype chip using a 50nm process technology. Two key specs for this prototype are a 10nsec write speed, similar to DRAM and orders … Continue reading
JEDEC Mobile Memory Summit: The pace quickens and memory standards must keep up
By Scott Jacobson CES hosted the JEDEC Mobile Memory Summit on January 12th to review the current state of the market for mobile semiconductor memory and to discuss future trends. It was a full day review of current mobile device … Continue reading
Posted in DRAM, eMMC, Flash, JEDEC, NAND, UFS
Tagged Feature Phone, Flash, JEDEC, LPDDR3 SDRAM, Mobile, MultiMediaCard, Smartphone, Universal Flash Storage
Leave a comment
You say “to-may-to” and I say “to-mah-to.” So how do you say “memristor”?
Bryon Moyer at Electronic Engineering Journal and I had a discussion a couple of weeks ago about memristors, real and ideal, and resistive RAM. Is there a difference? Does it matter? What is it we’re really looking for, a “true” … Continue reading
Is MRAM ramping up to the big time?
Today, MRAM (magnetic RAM) supplier Everspin announced that it expects to close out FY 2011 with a shipment volume that exceeds that of 2010 by more than a factor of three. MRAM combines the thin-film magnetics initially developed for the … Continue reading
SSDs as HDD caches to grow like topsy say Intel and IHS iSuppli
Intel has made a significant change in the way its chipsets handle SSDs and the result, according to analyst firm IHS iSuppli, will be a 100x increase in the annual number of drives sold in the PC space between now … Continue reading
Crucial updates SSD firmware that allows drives to cruise past 5184 hours
After 5184 hours of active use, users of Crucial SSDs were experiencing intermittent blue screens of death (BSODs). Now the company has released a field-installable firmware update that appears to solve the problem. Check it out here. As SSDs become … Continue reading
New Swiss Army Knife: knife blade, scissors, a nail file, and a 1Tbyte SSD. $3000???
According to this article on http://www.psfk.com, Swiss Army Knife vendor Victorinox introduced a new pocket knife at this week’s CES with a knife blade, scissors, a nail file, and a 1Tbyte SSD. The SSD is built into a pop-out, clear … Continue reading
How about a close look at Micron’s incredible shrinking Flash memory?
Chris Ramseyer at Tweaktown was kind enough to notice and snap this photo of Micron’s incredible shrinking Flash memory chips at this week’s Storage Visions event in Las Vegas. The image shows graphically what the numbers tell us intellectually. Starting … Continue reading
Need an objective way to evaluate SSD performance? SNIA has one
SNIA, the Storage Networking Industry Association, has just published a White Paper titled “Understanding SSD Performance Using the SNIA SSS Performance Test Specification” as a companion piece to the association’s SSD Performance Test Specification (PTS). As the White Paper’s introduction … Continue reading
Marvell brews ARM-based native PCIe SSD Controller IC: 88NV9145 handles direct PCIe to NAND Flash I/O for high-performance, low-overhead SSD designs
It looks like 2012 is the year for native PCIe (PCI Express) interfaces to NAND Flash devices. Hot on the heels of the PCIe-based XQD memory card specification from the Compact Flash Alliance (see “Nikon D4 camera and Sony H … Continue reading
Toshiba adds 4 and 8Gbit BENAND devices to its SmartNAND lineup
Toshiba has just announced a new family of SLC (single-level cell) managed NAND Flash devices dubbed BENAND. The 24nm devices incorporate ECC so that the host processor need not perform that function, which saves time and simplifies the NAND Flash … Continue reading
Is 2012 the year ONFI 3.0 takes off? Intel, Micron, and Cadence say yes.
The ONFI 3.0 specification—released in March, 2011—raises the bar on the interface to Flash semiconductor memory. In particular, it boosts transfer rates to 400 Mtransfers/sec using an NV-DDR2 DDR-400 signaling protocol; it adopts 1.8V SSTL_18 differential signaling on the strobes … Continue reading
Nikon D4 camera and Sony H Series Flash memory cards usher in the era of high-performance XQD cards with PCIe interfaces
Nikon and Sony have jumped the gun on CES by introducing a new DSLR camera (the Nikon D4) and a new series of Flash storage media (the Sony H Series). These announcements mark the beginning of the XQD Flash card … Continue reading
Posted in Compact Flash, Flash, NAND, SD, XQD
Tagged Compact Flash, Nikon, PCIe, SD, Sony, XQD
3 Comments
Denali Memory Report 