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Microsemi Corporation, a leading semiconductor producer, is announcing the production release of their Flashtec NVMe2032 and NVMe2016 controllers, allowing the world’s leading data centers and enterprises to install the highest-performing solid-state drives (SSDs) that utilize next-generation NAND technologies. Offering the highest capacity, reliability and performance for storing critical data, these devices are the industry’s first SSD controllers to integrate DDR4 DRAM, maximizing throughput and alleviating bottlenecks.
Microsemi’s second-generation Flashtec NVMe2032 and NVMe 2016 controllers support the standard NVMe host interface, and are geared to high-performance 4KB random read/write operations, while performing all flash management operations on-chip and utilizing minimal host processing and memory resources. Microsemi’s latest controllers are able to achieve up to 1,000,000 random read IOPS.
According to Derek Dicker, Microsemi’s vice president and business unit manager for performance storage, “Microsemi is pleased to announce the production release of our second-generation Flashtec NVMe controllers, tuned for enterprise storage, server and data center workloads. These controllers deliver world class performance, advanced low-density parity check (LDPC) error correction suitable for managing next-generation 3D NAND, and a programmable architecture upon which SSD builders can develop custom firmware, providing developers the ultimate means of product differentiation.”
The NVMe interface is becoming more and more widely adopted by hyperscale and enterprise data centers due to the high speed and low latency connection between SSDs and the host processors, which delivers significant performance advantages over SATA and SAS interfaces. Market research firm IDC recently released a report titled “Worldwide Solid State Drive Forecast, 2015-2019” that noted that the number of high-performance PCIe-based SSD units has an estimated compound annual growth rate of 44% from 2014-2019. Microsemi’s NVMe2032 and NVMe2016 controllers are positioned to take advantage of this growing demand for robust NVMe-based solutions with devices that are designed for power efficiency, yet still providing superior performance, reliability and data integrity.
Eric Endebrock, vice president of Storage Marketing for Micron observes that “We congratulate Microsemi on the production release of its second-generation NVMe 2032/2016 enterprise NVMe controller with a high-performance, flexible low-density parity-check engine. These types of enabling technologies align to Micron’s 3D NAND needs which are focused on mission-critical and high performance workloads.”
Key features of Microsemi’s NVMe2032 and NVMe2016 controllers include:
- Up to 20TB flash capacity using 256Gb flash
- Single-level cell (SLC), multi-level cell (MLC), enterprise MLC and triple-level cell (TLC) flash with toggle and Open NAND Flash Interface (ONFI) compatible
- PCIe Gen3 x8 or dual independent PCIe Gen3 x4 (active/active or active/standby) host interface
- 32 independent flash channels, each supporting up to 8 chip enables
- DDR4-2400
- Option read-only memory (ROM) allows NVMe Flash controller to be used as a boot device
- Encryption (XTS-AES-256)
- Power fault and abrupt shutdown without data loss of corruption
- Flash channel RAID
- End-to-end host to flash data protection
Microsemi’s Flashtec NVMe2032 and NVMe2016 controllers are available in volume production quantities today. Microsemi will be demonstrating these two new second-generation NVMe controllers at Flash Memory Summit 2016 in Santa Clara, CA from 8/8 through 8/11. You can visit Microsemi at booth 213.