STEC Outs Mach16 Slim SATA SSD for Embedded Systems

Embedded systems include everything from rugged to PCs to medical equipment to in-car systems to game consoles, and space is typically at a premium. STEC is looking to offer a speedy storage solution that occupies as small a footprint as possible with its Mach16 slim SSD. The drive purports to burn 70% less power in 60% less space than other alternatives.

The Mach16 uses a standard SATA connector and STEC firmware and controllers, as well as the company’s CellCare, Secure Array of Flash Elements (SAFE), and PowerSafe technologies, and it offers 245MB/s 128K read and 150MB/s 128K write performance.

The Mach16 is available now in capacities of 25GB and 50GB.

STEC Launches New MACH16 Slim SATA SSD Bringing Enterprise-Class Technologies to Embedded Systems

True Enterprise-Class SSD Performance with 60% Smaller Footprint and up to 70% Less Power Consumption than Hard Drives

SANTA ANA, Calif., March 5, 2012 – STEC, Inc. (NASDAQ: STEC), The SSD Company™, a leading global provider of solid-state drive (SSD) technologies and products, today announced that its enterprise-class MACH16™ SSD technology now extends to the embedded market in one of the industry’s smallest solid-state form factors. The new MACH16 Slim SATA SSD provides embedded system designers with the same advanced flash management technology as STEC’s enterprise SSDs. The device leverages industry-standard 22-pin SATA cabling (supporting JEDEC MO-297 and SFF-8156 specifications) and provides the highest data integrity, endurance and reliability available in this market segment. With these features, the MACH16 Slim SATA SSD is well-suited for high-performance and rugged embedded systems.

Where size and power consumption are concerned, the MACH16 Slim SATA is an ideal drop-in replacement for a 2.5-inch rotating hard disk drive (HDD), or even a traditional 2.5-inch SSD. This SATA-based solution, which enables system designers to shrink the total storage footprint by 60 percent, consumes up to 70 percent less power than an HDD or conventional SSD. This combination of compact design and low power consumption supports the industry trend toward commercial, off-the-shelf, small-format system boards (e.g., Mini-ITX, Pico-ITX and CompactPCI) targeted for next-generation original equipment manufacturer (OEM) embedded designs.

“We estimate that the market for intelligent embedded systems is over 1.8 billion units and over $1 trillion in revenue today, and will double to nearly 4 billion units and over $2 trillion in revenue by 2015,” said Jeff Janukowicz, research director for solid-state storage at IDC. “The MACH16 Slim SATA SSD will anchor STEC’s embedded solid-state portfolio, and is a well-positioned solution for embedded system designers who require true enterprise SSD technology in a small industry-standard format.”

The MACH16 Slim SATA embedded SSD leverages STEC’s patented SSD controller and firmware technologies that help optimize performance, endurance, data integrity and reliability. The device features the same advanced flash management capabilities as STEC’s leading enterprise SSDs, including:

-STEC's CellCare™ Technology, which uses a combination of flash management techniques, digital signal processing, ECC methods, and other technologies to increase NAND cell endurance and data retention, as well as performance.
-STEC's Secure Array of Flash Elements™ (SAFE) Technology, which improves reliability by providing mechanisms to recover from NAND flash page-, block-, die- and chip-failures, improving the Mean Time Between Failure (MTBF) and the Mean Time To Data Loss (MTTDL).
-STEC's PowerSafe™ Technology, which provides instant data backup and recovery in the event of an unplanned power failure.

Data-path protection and advanced error code correction, which protects critical data from corruption.
Advanced wear-leveling, which spreads the writing of each data block evenly across all data blocks to maintain consistent and even use of the NAND blocks so that one block location does not wear out faster than any other block location inside of the device.

“Our new MACH16 Slim SATA SSD brings the critical features of our proven enterprise-class SSDs to embedded platforms,” said STEC Chairman and CEO Manouch Moshayedi. “System designers no longer have to settle for consumer-grade products for their mission-critical and ruggedized applications. They can now trust their data to the MACH16 Slim SATA SSDs.”

STEC’s new MACH16 Slim SATA embedded SSDs are available now, with user capacities of 25 and 50 Gigabytes (GB). These devices support sustained performance up to 245MB/s for sequential 128K read operations, and up to 150MB/s for sequential 128K write operations. As a result, MACH16 Slim SATA SSDs are ideally suited for a range of embedded applications that includes network and telecommunication systems, military vehicles, rugged PCs, gaming systems, digital signage, transportation systems, ATM machines, kiosks, point-of-sale machines, cash registers, printers, GPS systems, vehicle infotainment systems, data loggers and medical equipment.

For more information regarding the MACH16 Slim SATA embedded SSD, please visit STEC’s web site at www.stec-inc.com.