6Gb SAS Tachyon Controllers From PMC-Sierra for SSDs

PMC-Sierra, Inc. introduced its latest generation of SAS/SATA protocol controllers, which doubles the performance and port density of existing solutions.

The Tachyon SPCv family sets the industry performance benchmark for enterprise storage systems, delivering more than 750,000 I/Os per second (IOPS), integrating 16 ports and supporting advanced data protection.

The trend toward SSDs, which can provide a greater than 100x increase in IOPS compared to traditional HDDs, is increasing performance requirements for enterprise storage systems. The Tachyon SPCv controller’s multi-core architecture enables storage equipment manufacturers to take advantage of SSD performance.

"PMC has shipped over 74 million 6Gb/s SAS ports in our controller and expander product lines, substantially more than our nearest competitor, and six of the top seven storage systems OEMs have architected platforms around PMC’s 6Gb/s SAS Tachyon controller products," said Derek Dicker, vice president of marketing for PMC’s Enterprise Storage Division. "The combination of industry-leading performance and port density in our new SPCv controller family positions PMC to extend our market segment leadership in enterprise storage."

The Tachyon SPCv family includes the PM8008 SPCv 8x6G and PM8018 SPCv 16x6G, offering eight and sixteen 6Gb/s SAS ports, respectively. The controllers comply with the 6Gb/s SAS-2.1 specification, support the emerging PCIe 3.0 system interface, and include hardware acceleration for the industry-standard T-10 (INCITS) data protection scheme. These features enable SAS-based storage systems to meet the data integrity and performance requirements of enterprise IT environments.

"Storage system capacities and complexity are increasing as system vendors incorporate more SSDs and 2.5-inch Small Form-Factor HDDs in their latest external storage enclosures," said Shane Rau, research director, Computing and Storage Semiconductors, IDC. "This is driving the need for higher performance and greater connectivity at the controller level to reduce hardware complexity and cost."

The SPCv controllers, combined with PMC’s existing Tachyon Fibre Channel and SAS/SATA protocol controllers, maxSAS SAS expanders and SPS active/active multiplexers, strengthen PMC’s position as enterprise storage silicon vendor offering an end-to-end enterprise-class chipset solution.

The Tachyon SPCv controller family
integrates features including:

• PCIe 3.0 system interface
• SAS 2.1-compliant SAS interfaces
• 8 or 16 SAS/SATA ports in a single controller
• Leading performance, scalability and density
• More than 750,000 IOPS performance (PM8018)
• Compatibility with the Tachyon SAS programming model
• 1.5Gb/s, 3Gb/s, 6Gb/s SAS/SATA compatibility
• Data protection support via T-10 DIF
• SAS Tachyon Software Development Kit (sTSDK)

Availability
The PM8008 Tachyon SPCv 8x6G and PM8018 Tachyon SPCv 16x6G devices are available to select OEM partners.