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VIA Technologies, well known for their various peripheral controller solutions and low power x86 processors, has announced their intention to bring an SSD controller to market.
According to VIA, the processors will be based on technology licensed from Tensilica and will offer 4x the performance of competing solutions.
Specifically, Tensilica stated that their solution compares favorably with simply raising clock speeds or more complex multi-core solutions.
By adopting Tensilica’s Xtensa DPs (dataplane processors), VIA’s designers will gain an unprecedented amount of flexibility when it comes to mixing control and signal processing and customizing the IP core. This will allow VIA to deliver high performance while at the same time, delivering efficient, low power operation.
When it comes to architecture, VIA seems to have hit the mark, as the design will be able to employ single-cycle bit field manipulation and arithmetic instructions in addition to multiple simultaneous single-cycle table lookups, which enhances IOPS performance and provides up to 10 times the efficiency of other products. I have to say, this seems quite familiar, as LSI Sandforce has made it clear that they favor potency over brute force as well, stating that an effective algorithm is more critical than raw horsepower.
It really does seem that VIA is in good company when it comes to their design philosophy, and it will definitely be interesting to see how their implemention stacks up against the competition. Indeed, the introduction of another major player in the SSD processor market is long overdue, as LSI Sandforce and Marvell offerings seem to be be the only reasonable choices for third parties wanting to deliver a high performance product. With any luck, VIA’s new solution will give SSD manufacturers another solid option, providing excellent performance while at the same being delivered at a lower cost than the competition.
Hopefully, VIA will be able to give the “big guys” a run for their money and foster even more competition in an industry that’s been gaining momentum since the beginning of the year. Such a situation would certainly harken back to the days when VIA was making a significant dent in 1st party chipset sales by providing low-cost, fully featured alternatives. If they can deliver on performance, this is one case where I’d be more than happy to see history repeat itself. Isn’t rooting for the underdog fun?
See Press Release On Next Page……..
This is all wonderful and great but by the time they make it to market you’ll have to buy a 1TB size SSD to see these outstanding gains in performance. Like the new Octane…great numbers no matter the data type with with consumer realistic queue depths of 1-4 but if you want to see it’s best performance you have to spend $900 or more for the 512GB drive. Someone, somewhere needs to figure out what it takes to maintain high performance in a reasonable size drive. Atm the SF2281 120gb drives are right on the edge with satisfactory performance without having the step to the 240GB hotrod. I’m hoping the soon to hit 24nm toggle doesn’t take too much of a random write hit (ie the 34nm to 25nm transition we all loved so well…NOT). Imo the Vertex 2 50GB 34nm drives were the last of the ‘poor mans raid’ era.
Seeing as the controller hasn’t yet been released, I wouldn’t jump the gun when it comes to performance vs capacity. VIA has been known to have one or two tricks up their sleeve and I wouldn’t be surprised if their SSD processor ends up exceeding everyone’s expectations. I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough.
based upon a MIPS processor, while heavily tweaked, will make for an interesting entrant. I am excited to see this, for some reason this announcement reminds me of when the Idilinx BareFoot controller was announced months before launch…. waited waited and waited…and on launch it was a giant leap forward.
Heres hoping my hunch is correct!