Tag Archives: Solid-state drive

Some great analysis on SSD wear leveling and power consumption

Posted on September 17, 2012 by sleibson2

Some great analysis by Cullen Logan at Amazon.com appeared on LinkedIn over the weekend in response to my post “Are Enterprise SSDs a “bad” idea? Four tips and counter-tips for your consideration”: “To put some raw data out there, consider … Continue reading →

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Western Digital sampling 5mm, 2.5-inch, 500Gbyte hybrid HDD with NAND Flash

Posted on September 11, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Using SSD controller technology as a differentiator: Kingston adds another data point with SSDNow Enterprise-class drives

Posted on September 5, 2012 by sleibson2

Memory and SSD vendor Kingston Technology has just announced enterprise-class SSDs called the SSDNow E100 in capacities of 100, 200, and 400 Gbytes. What I find interesting about this announcement are the emphasis on endurance and reliability (“10x improvements … … Continue reading →

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The top 21 things you probably didn’t know about Flash memory, from the Flash Memory Summit

Posted on August 30, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Need yet another argument for designing your own SSD controller?

Posted on August 30, 2012 by sleibson2

A Web site called legitreviews.com recently reviewed the ADATA XPG SX900 128Gbyte SSD and this review contains additional justification for seriously considering developing your own SSD controller for new storage products. The review starts off this way: “ADATA is long … Continue reading →

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Add Hitachi Data Systems to the growing list of companies developing their own SSD controllers

Posted on August 27, 2012 by sleibson2

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 , , , , , , | 3 Comments

Tweaktown review of 1.6Tbyte SMART Storage Optimus SSD reveals a few secrets. Wanna see them?

Posted on August 27, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Want to know Rado Danilak’s and Skyera’s plan for total enterprise-class SSD world domination?

Posted on August 23, 2012 by sleibson2

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 , , , , , , , | 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.

Posted on August 23, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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NVMe Emulator from Teledyne LeCroy emulates the SSD or the host controller

Posted on August 21, 2012 by sleibson2

A PCIe-based emulator board from Teledyne LeCroy—the Summmit Z3-16 Exerciser—can emulate either an NVMe SSD or an NVMe controller, so it’s a good choice no matter what type of NVMe hardware you’re developing. It supports transfer rates of 2.5 to … Continue reading →

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Marvell’s DragonFly NVRAM and NVCACHE provide high SSD IOPS for large storage apps

Posted on August 21, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Seen on the street: WD needs SSD Engineers

Posted on August 18, 2012 by sleibson2

Drinking coffee with my friend Ira Feldman on Friday at the Starbucks behind Cadence, this advertising truck pulled up and parked for a while. Must be some sort of sign about the growing popularity of SSDs. I wonder how many … Continue reading →

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Plextor blog walks you through the design process for the PX-M5S SSD: better, faster, cheaper

Posted on August 13, 2012 by sleibson2

Plextor has just published an extremely interesting blog post that walks you through some of the high-level design decisions behind the company’s new PX-M5S SSD. According to the design goals, the prioritized objectives are: 1) speed 2) reliability 3) price … Continue reading →

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Beware of Geeks bearing gifts (SSDs)?

Posted on August 9, 2012 by sleibson2

I love this article in Bloomberg Businessweek titled “Samsung Sends Out Geeks to Revamp Laptops With New Drives.” It reports that Samsung placed a roving pan-European army of “geeks” in the UK, France, and Germany to ambush pedestrians and offer … Continue reading →

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Are Enterprise SSDs a “bad” idea? Four tips and counter-tips for your consideration.

Posted on August 8, 2012 by sleibson2

I ran across a commentary on the Kaminerio Web site, “Is SSD Really a Bad Idea? BE CAREFUL WHOSE ADVICE YOU TAKE” by Eyal Markovich, which is a reaction to a blog posting by Phil Goodwin on the SearchSolidStateStorage.com Web … Continue reading →

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Virident Systems introduces PCIe SSD with capacities to 2.2Tbytes, high IOPS

Posted on August 8, 2012 by sleibson2

Virident Systems has announced the Virident FlashMAX II, the company’s next-generation PCIe SSD for enterprise environments. According to the company, the FlashMAX II features the highest capacity (550Gbytes to 2.2Tbytes) in a low-profile PCIe plug-in card format, with industry-leading performance … Continue reading →

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How many SSDs does it take to saturate PCIe Gen 3? Would you believe 16 drives?

Posted on August 6, 2012 by sleibson2

It’s now possible to conduct some interesting performance tests on real PCIe Gen 3 products and the video below shows you a PCIe Gen 3 RAID card talking to 16 SSDs, which is the number of drives needed to saturate … Continue reading →

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Flash Memory Summit: Great Program on Non-Volatile memory.

Posted on August 3, 2012 by sleibson2

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 , , , | Leave a comment

Cool case instantly transforms 2.5-inch HDD or SSD into WiFi-connected network storage

Posted on July 23, 2012 by sleibson2

Patriot Memory is now selling the Gauntlet Node, a cool name for a cool disk-drive case that transforms a 2.5-inch HDD or SSD into a WiFi-connected network storage device. The enclosure has an internal SATA port and can accommodate drive … Continue reading →

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Korg introduces SSD-based music workstation, the Korg Kronos X, with 62Gbyte drive and option for a second SSD

Posted on July 17, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Three Golliaths and a host of Davids meeting up on the storage battlefield. Who wins?

Posted on July 16, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Jim Handy, The Memory Guy, answers your questions about Flash memory

Posted on July 10, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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MOSAID and NOVACHIPS announce plans for an HLNAND-based SSD controller chip. Release set for 2013.

Posted on July 9, 2012 by sleibson2

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 , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

Will SSDs be the first big market for 3D NAND Flash memories?

Posted on June 7, 2012 by sleibson2

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 , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

This SSD will self destruct…immediately. On Command (See the video)

Posted on May 30, 2012 by sleibson2

In case you need an SSD that can be wiped quickly, RunCore has introduced the InVincible SSD with two modes of erasure: non-destructive and destructive. Two buttons—one red, one green—activate the erasure. The two buttons apparently connect to the SSD’s … Continue reading →

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SSD Review: Intel 910 PCIe SSD a “game changer”

Posted on May 9, 2012 by sleibson2

It’s always great fun to see a company hit one out of the ballpark with a new product and that’s exactly what Intel has done with its new 910 PCIe SSD, if you believe this recent article by Paul Alcorn … Continue reading →

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Tiny RunCore single-chip SSDs cram 8 to 64Gbytes onto small SATA cards that fit anywhere

Posted on May 3, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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WD’s HGST to demo 12Gbps SAS SSD at SCSI Trade Association Technology Showcase next week in California

Posted on May 2, 2012 by sleibson2

HGST, the Western Digital subsidiary formerly known as Hitachi Global Storage Technologies, has announced a new 12Gbps SAS SSD and will be demonstrating it at the SCSI Trade Association Technology Showcase next week on May 9 at the Hyatt Hotel … Continue reading →

Posted in SAS, SSD, Storage | Tagged , , , , , , , , , | 1 Comment

25 Years of Removable Storage in One Photograph

Posted on May 1, 2012 by sleibson2

Thomas Morffew published this amazing photo showing 25 years of removable storage artifacts. At the top are 5.25- and 3.5-inch floppy disks. Towards the bottom, in the center are some CDs and then comes the solid-state storage—memory sticks, SD cards, … Continue reading →

Posted in Storage | Tagged , , , , , | 3 Comments

Do you know the advantages and disadvantages of the six different use cases for SSDs?

Posted on April 30, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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BIWIN America introduces 12x20mm e-MMC SSDs with on-chip controller, power-on boot, explicit sleep mode

Posted on April 18, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Low-cost Intel 330 series SSDs sport SandForce SF-2281 SSD Controller

Posted on April 17, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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A detailed look at the IP components of an SSD controller chip by Dr. Eric Esteve

Posted on April 13, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Want to tour the Kingston SSD factory with TweakTown?

Posted on April 9, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Interview with Whiptail’s CTO James Candelaria demonstrates how SSD controllers can greatly improve NAND Flash endurance by managing write amplification

Posted on April 9, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Micron releases video on using PCIe for fast, enterprise-class SSDs like its P320h SSD

Posted on March 28, 2012 by sleibson2

As yet another example of how new, fast interfaces are changing the way SSDs fit into the enterprise storage arena, here’s a new video showing Gary Gentry, General Manager of Micron’s Enterprise SSD Division, explaining how and why Micron has … Continue reading →

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STEC’s MACH16 Slim 2.5-in SATA SSD requires small footprint, fits in small embedded spaces

Posted on March 6, 2012 by sleibson2

STEC has introduced a small-form-factor Slim SATA SSD with a Slim SATA interface for embedded and other computing applications that require lots of storage that can fit in a small space and consume little power. The STEC MACH16 SSD is … Continue reading →

Posted in Flash, NAND, SSD | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , | 4 Comments

Objective Analysis White Paper covers the basics of SSD design. Do you know what’s important?

Posted on March 1, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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SanDisk’s founder and retired CEO Eli Harari says that the future of SSDs, computer memory, and everything else belongs to memristors at 11nm

Posted on February 26, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

Posted in 3D, Flash, HDD, Memristor, ReRAM, SDRAM, SSD | Tagged , , , , , , | 2 Comments

Flash Memory Summit 2012: Call for presentations

Posted on February 16, 2012 by sleibson2

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 , , , , , , | 2 Comments

SanDisk launches X100 SSD in 2.5-inch, mSATA, and custom form factors. Capacities to 512Gbytes.

Posted on February 15, 2012 by sleibson2

SanDisk has just jumped into full-fledged OEM mode with the X100 SSD series that is available in 2.5-inch (7 or 9.5mm thick), mSATA, and custom form factors and capacities of 32 to 512Gbytes. All drives are based on MLC (multi-level … Continue reading →

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Hitachi Global Storage unleashes 2.5-inch, 100 to 400Gbyte enterprise SSDs with Intel 25nm SLC NAND Flash

Posted on February 10, 2012 by sleibson2

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 →

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Free half-day SSD seminars across North America and the UK

Posted on February 7, 2012 by sleibson2

Demartek, a research and analysis firm, will be holding seven free half-day seminars on SSD basics across North America (and one in the UK) during 2012. These seminars look to be pretty basic, so they’re an introduction for people who … Continue reading →

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Can MLC NAND Flash work in enterprise SSDs? Yes, with the right storage algorithms says Seagate

Posted on February 6, 2012 by sleibson2

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 , , , , , , | 1 Comment