Items tagged with SandForce
Seagate announced that it has acquired LSI’s Accelerated Solutions Division (ASD) and Flash Components Division (FCD) from parent Avago for $450 million in cash. What Seagate is getting is a nice big pile of enterprise PCIe-based flash and SSD controller technologies that will allow it to push harder into the enterprise storage space. “Seagate is committed to providing our customers with a complete range of storage solutions, and this acquisition will significantly enhance our flash storage offerings to supplement our existing portfolio,” said Steve Luczo, Seagate chairman and CEO in a press release, touting LSI’s broad PCIe flash portfolio and “best-in-class”...
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OCZ's RevoDrive series has been a popular enthusiast and workstation-class storage product family for years now. The last time we looked at an OCZ RevoDrive, the RevoDrive 3 X2 offered smoking-fast performance and bandwidth of up to 1.5GB/sec for reads and 1.25GB/sec for writes, thanks to its PCI Express-based design, which basically comprises four Sandforce-based SSDs on a single card... Since then, OCZ was acquired by Toshiba and has been going through its product stack, revamping their SSD portfolio with fresh re-designs based on Toshiba NAND Flash memory... Blinding Speed - OCZ's RevoDrive 350 PCIe SSD Reviewed OCZ has now replaced the RevoDrive 3 series with an almost completely...
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OCZ's RevoDrive series has been a popular enthusiast and workstation-class storage product family for years now. The last time we looked at an OCZ RevoDrive, the RevoDrive 3 X2 offered smoking-fast performance and bandwidth of up to 1.5GB/sec for reads and 1.25GB/sec for writes thanks to its PCI Express-based design, which basically comprises four Sandforce-based SSDs on a single card, alleviating the 6Gbps SATA bottleneck. Since then, OCZ was acquired by Toshiba and has been going through its product stack, revamping its SSD portfolio with fresh re-designs based on Toshiba NAND Flash memory for not only increased performance but better cost structure as well. OCZ has now replaced the RevoDrive...
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In November last year, we gave you a first look at LSI's forthcoming SandForce SF3700 PCI Express SSD Flash controller. It's an impressive silicon integration of both a native PCI Express x4 interface and SandForce's excellent SSD controller technologies, along with some refinements and advancements baked in. At the time, LSI mentioned a few OEM partners they were aligning with for manufacturing of their various reference designs and form-factors and Kingston, as well as ADATA and AVANT were on that short list. At CES 2014 last week, however, it was Kingston that stepped out with the first incarnation of a PCI Express SSD card based on the technology and targeted at the enthusiast...
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OCZ’s now three-year-old line of Deneva enterprise-class SSDs is getting a refresh with new models in the Deneva 2 series. The company announced three new versions in 120GB, 240GB, and 480GB capacities. The new 2.5-inch SSDs feature a SATA 6Gbps interface and 19nm NAND MLC flash and utilize the LSI SandForce SF-2281 processor. OCZ says that the Deneva 2 SSDs can hit up to 550MBps read and 520MBps write bandwidth and 45,000/34,000 read/write IOPS. OCZ also redesigned the drives’ power architecture to optimize back plane functionality and better current and power fluctuation management as well as overall more efficient power consumption. Other features include data fail recovery, intelligent...
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The SSD market is very competitive at the moment, to say the least, and though ADATA isn’t always necessarily front and center, the company has a handful of interesting product offerings, including the ADATA XPG SX900 we'll be showing you here. SSD manufacturers sometimes roll with proprietary controllers, such as OCZ and Samsung, while others adopt third-party products. ADATA falls into the latter category. The XPG SX900 packs an LSI SandForce 2281 controller, which is one of the more popular solutions at this time... ADATA XPG SX900 256GB SSD Review...
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The SSD market is very competitive at the moment, to say the least, and though ADATA isn’t always necessarily front and center, the company has a handful of interesting product offerings, including the ADATA XPG SX900 we'll be showing you here. SSD manufacturers sometimes roll with proprietary controllers, such as OCZ and Samsung, while others adopt third-party products. ADATA falls into the latter category. The XPG SX900 packs an LSI SandForce 2281 controller, which is one of the more popular solutions at this time. ADATA says that its firmware actually increases the available storage capacity slightly over other SandForce-based drives, giving the XPG SX900 about 7% more...
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The Intel SSD 335 is the company’s first solid state drive to ship with NAND flash memory produced using a 20nm process. Intel claims the drive “uses the smallest, most efficient multi-level cell NAND flash on the market”. The flash memory used on the Intel SSD 335 was jointly developed my Intel’s and Micron’s IM Flash Technologies (IMFT) and was announced last April, but is now ready for prime time in a drive targeting the sweet spot of the enthusiast and DIY market… Intel Solid State Drive 335 Series SSD Review...
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The solid state storage market has rapidly evolved over the last four years or so. Whereas early drives were relatively slow and offered inconsistent performance, current high-end drives routinely approach the limits of the SATA interface and off much better performance, both in terms of sequential and random IO operations. Over the same time period, solid state drives have also gotten significantly more affordable. It wasn’t that long ago that sought-after SSDs were commanding $3-4 a gigabyte. Now though, a quality, brand name, high performance SSD can be had for less than $1 a gigabyte. Much of the price reduction in the SSD market is due to fierce competition among companies vying for...
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Intel has announced a new series of SSDs aimed specifically at data centers, with a focus on features that matter most to that market. The DC S3700 series is designed to offer high performance at an extremely predictable rate, ensure end-to-end data protection, and keep total power consumption low. Predictable performance in a data center is much more important than in the consumer or professional space. In normal workloads, it doesn't matter much if a series of drive operations is faster or slower, provided that the overall level of performance remains steady and the drop-offs aren't a sign of a deeper problem. Data centers, in contrast, absolutely require smooth operation. Performance of an...
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Given that competition is helping to drive prices down, we're of the opinion that there can never be too many players in the solid state drive business, and a week ago we learned that MSI was getting ready to join the SSD party. It was LSI SandForce that originally spilled the beans by plastering MSI's name on a webpage that lists all SandForce-driven SSDs that currently exist or, in this care, are coming soon, but at the time, details were few and far between. Not anymore. A website with a supposed "inside connection at MSI" posted what appear to be official specs for MSI's upcoming high-performance Reflex Series SSDs. If the information is accurate, MSI is planning to launch its Reflex line...
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The past year has seen solid state drives (SSDs) grow bigger in capacity, run faster than ever, and come down in price, with many high-end drives now selling for around $1 per gigabyte, and sometimes less. Helping to spark this bang-for-buck renaissance is the fact that everyone and their uncle is kicking out SSDs these days, and many of them are turning to SandForce, which powers drives by nearly four dozen manufacturers. Soon you'll be able to add MSI to the list. LSI SandForce maintains a webpage that lists all the SandForce-driven SSDs on the market, broken down by company. If you scroll down about midway, there's an interesting entry that lists MSI as one of SandForce's soon-to-be partners....
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A company called Silicon Power announced today its new Velox V60 solid state drive for performance applications. With a sexy SandForce controller tucked away inside and a brushed aluminum finish, the Velox V60 crunches through data at high speeds and looks good while doing it. In fact, Silicon Power couldn't say enough about the looks of this thing. "Unlike a traditional SSD that is rigid and bulky, SP V60 offers a stylish brushed aluminum enclosure in metallic gray," Silicon Power explains. "It features a hairline finished cover with a silver embossed diamond cut logo and a body with curved edges. Its minimalist design speaks quality and character; adding style to functionality so consumers...
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Intel is launching a brand new line of solid state drives today, built around SandForce’s popular SF-2200 family of storage processors. The new SSD 520 Series solid state drives, as they are known, will supplant the Marvell-based 510 series at the top of Intel’s consumer-targeted SSD lineup and be offered in capacities ranging from 60GB to 480GB. Like other SandForce SF-2200-based drives, the new Intel SSD 520 series is outfitted with a SATA III interface with sequential reads and writes speeds in the 550MB/s to 520MB/s ranges, respectively. According to their specifications, 4K random reads peak at around 50K IOPS (QD32), with 4K random writes hovering around 80K IOPS for the 240GB...
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Intel is launching a brand new line of solid state drives today, built around SandForce’s popular SF-2200 family of storage processors. The new SSD 520 Series solid state drives, as they are known, will supplant the Marvell-based 510 series at the top of Intel’s consumer-targeted SSD lineup and be offered in capacities ranging from 60GB to 480GB. Like other SandForce SF-2200-based drives, the new Intel SSD 520 series is outfitted with a SATA III interface with sequential reads and writes speeds in the 550MB/s to 520MB/s ranges, respectively. According to their specifications, 4K random reads peak at around 50K IOPS (QD32), with 4K random writes hovering around 80K IOPS for the 240GB...
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SandForce's SF-1200 and SF-2200 controllers have popularized SSD's in recent years by offering excellent performance even in lower cost drives. The company is building on that success now with a new, enterprise-oriented chip designed for cloud computing environments. The SF-2481 is designed to offer SLC levels of reliability while using cheaper MLC NAND flash. "As the SSD market matures, architectures are being developed to satisfy the specific needs of various market segments," said Jim Handy, SSD analyst for Objective Analysis. "SandForce is wisely targeting one of the most important SSD markets by tuning a variant of its high-performance SSD Processor to the needs of the Internet data center....
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Yesterday’s announcement that LSI had entered into an agreement to acquire SandForce was interesting to say the least. The two companies have obvious synergy and should be able to leverage each other's resources to produce some powerful and innovative storage products. However, due to LSI’s strong position in the enterprise space and SandForce’s more consumer oriented position, along with the announcement’s minimal discussion of mainstream or desktop-targeted products, some questions lingered as to how LSI planned to market SandForce products moving forward. After all, dozens of manufacturers that specifically target enthusiasts and desktop users offer products built around...
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Update 10/27 - 2:30 PM: We just had a conference call and interview with LSI VP and GM, Gary Smerdon on this announcement and what it means to SandForce customers and LSI moving forward. More details are available in that coverage. News broke earlier today that LSI Corporation, maker of enterprise-class storage solutions, has entered an agreement to acquire solid state storage processor manufacturer SandForce. According to the terms of the agreement, LSI will pony up approximately $322 million in cash, net of cash assumed, and assume approximately $48 million of unvested stock options and restricted shares held by SandForce employees. SandForce’s storage processors have...
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OCZ just made available new firmware that's supposed to fix a handful of stability issues with certain SandForce-based solid state drives (SSDs). Affected SSDs include the Vertex 3 series, Vertex 3 Max IOPS series, Agility 3 series, and Solid 3 series. According to the release notes, the firmware addresses the following: Fixed a rare condition that may cause Windows Blue Screen error when the primary-configured drive woke up from either a SATA slumber mode or S3/S4 modes. Fixed a rare condition that may cause Windows Blue Screen error when the drive was configured as primary with OS installed. Fixed a corner-case issue that may cause the drive to stutter or Windows freezing screen when a media...
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SandForce announced that it will be demonstrating its SF-2000 series SSD processors with Toshiba’s 24nm MLC NAND flash at the Flash Memory Summit 2011 in Santa Clara, CA this week. The two companies are working closely to improve the quality and performance of NAND flash as well as drive down costs. The marriage is designed to deliver reliable, high-performing solutions for enterprise, client, and industrial computing markets in products such as, according to Shigeo Ohshima (Technology Executive, Memory Design and Application Engineering, Toshiba Corporation) “thin-and-light notebooks as well as mainstream enterprise applications.” Toshiba’s space-efficient 24nm design...
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Andy Samberg, Kiv Schaffer, and T-Pain aren't the only ones who got to ride on a boat. Kingston Technology's HyperX solid state drives set sail for U.S. shores and are now shipping starting at $270, the memory maker announced today. These SandForce-based drives are Kingston's first SATA 6Gbps SSDs. They're available in 120GB and 240GB capacities and offer sequential read and writes speeds of up to 555MB/s and 510MB/s , respectively. Kingston's shipping them as standalone drives with a HyperX branded 2.5-inch to 3.5-inch desktop mounting plate included, or as part of a HyperX Upgrade Kit that also tosses in Acronis True Image HD migration software, external drive bay, multi-head screwdriver, and...
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Just in case you found yourself lamenting the lack of SandForce-driven solid state drives (SSDs), what with there only being about a million different options and all, SuperTalent this week added another one to the pile. It's the TeraDrive CT3, a SATA 6Gb/s drive designed to fill the gap between SuperTalent's PT3 and CT2 products and take its place as the price/performance leader among the pack. "As with the PT3, the CT3 features the new SandForce SF-2200 SSD processor and the SATA III interface. You can think of the new TeraDrive CT3 as the PT3 with asynchronous Flash or as the CT2 with a SATA III interface; either way the CT3 is a perfect combination for price and performance," SuperTalent...
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