Mosaid Demos Single-Controller 2TB 6Gb SATA SSD

MOSAID Technologies Inc. introduced HLSSD (HyperLink Solid State Drive), a SSD that achieves terabyte-class storage capacity using a single controller device.

MOSAID engaged PaxDisk Co. Ltd of Korea to develop the terabyte-class HLSSD.

Terabyte-class HLSSDs are optimized for data centers and the enterprise. Based on HLNAND (HyperLink NAND) technology, HLSSDs deliver scalability, performance, reliability and cost advantages over SSDs that use conventionally designed NAND flash devices.

MOSAID’s prototype HLSSD utilizes a single FPGA-based SATA-3 controller to deliver 2TB capacity over four HLNAND channels. In comparison, a conventional 2TB SSD requires four SATA-3 controllers, plus a SATA-3 hub controller, operating over 32 channels.

"Our affordable and scalable terabyte-class HLSSDs will be an enabling technology in data center and enterprise applications," said Jin-Ki Kim, VP, R&D, MOSAID. "HLSSDs can be used to build large, fast storage pools that lower the TCO by reducing the number of storage tiers, and minimizing the need for advanced intelligence in the storage arrays."

Today’s data centers are designed with up to four tiers of storage devices: lower cost, lower performance tape drives and SATA HDDs, and higher cost, higher performance SAS HDDs and SSDs. This architecture necessitates advanced intelligence in the storage arrays to determine which data to allocate to the faster SAS HDDs and SSDs.

With MOSAID’s terabyte-class HLSSDs, only two storage tiers are needed: SATA HDDs and HLSSDs. As a result, the requirement for intelligence is reduced, as is the TCO, including power, footprint, cooling, maintenance and other elements.

In mid-2013, MOSAID plans to release a 2TB/4TB/8TB production HLSSD that will use a purpose-built HLNAND flash controller in 40nm process technology.

2TB HLSSD Features

• SATA-3 (6Gbps) host interface in 3.5" form factor
• 2TB capacity, scalable to 8TB
• single FPGA-based SATA3 controller
• SSD architecture with 2nd generation of HLDIMM
• Single HyperLink interface per HLDIMM for superior signal integrity
• Four HyperLink channels
• 16 32GB HLNAND Flash MCPs (multi-chip packages) per channel
• In Design – HLNAND SSD Controller

MOSAID and Novachips Inc. recently entered into a joint development agreement to design and build an HLNAND controller for SSDs optimized for data center and other memory-intensive applications. An HLSSD with one HLNAND controller will support 8TB capacity with a SATA-3 host interface. Scheduled for mid-2013, the HLNAND controller will be a scalable, flexible solution available to system designers.

First Single Channel, Full Performance 16-Die NAND Stack
MOSAID is also sampling a NAND flash MCP with a 16-die NAND stack operating on a single channel. The 512Gb HLNAND MCP combines a stack of 16 industry standard 32Gb NAND flash die with two HLNAND interface devices to achieve 333MB/s output on a single byte-wide HLNAND interface channel. Conventional NAND flash MCPs cannot stack more than four NAND dies without suffering from performance degradation, and would require two or more channels to deliver similar throughput.

MOSAID will be speaking and exhibiting at the Flash Memory Summit, taking place August 21-23, 2012 in Santa Clara, CA.

About HyperLink (HL) NAND Flash
HLNAND flash is a performance solution that combines MOSAID’s own HyperLink memory technology with industry standard NAND Flash cell technology to deliver advanced feature set, reaching sustained I/O input-output bandwidths more than ten times higher than conventional flash.