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Every now and then something comes around that is particularly eye catching and the world of SSDs is no different.
The Viking Modular SATADIMM is just one of those things and we thought we might venture outside the box just a bit and put a 25GB SLC version of the SATADIMM to the test. It can be described as a wolf in sheeps clothing because, although it does look like a typical RAM module, it is really anything but.
INTRODUCTION
The Viking Modular 25GB slc SATADIMM SSD is an enterprise solid state drive that simply fits into a DDR3 DIMM socket and is powered by the socket itself. It is connected by the SATA 2.0 connector from the motherboard and it’s benefit in the enterprise environment cannot be understated given respect to the vast number of configurations that it can be situated in.
Installation of the SATADIMM simply a click into the DIMM socket and quick connect of the SATA connector. It is available in slc capacities of 25GB to 200GB and mlc/emlc capacities of 50GB to 400GB. Its powered by the SandForce SF-1565TA3-SBH processor with 8x4GB modules of 34nm SLC RAM (29F32G08AFABA) of which 2x4GB NAND chips are used for by the SandForce firmware for over provisioning. The silver ‘Jiffy Pop’ looking rectangle you also see is the super capacitor (SuperCap) which is ensures all data is cleared from the cache in the event of sudden power loss.
SPECIFICATIONS
| SLC | 25GB to 200GB |
| MLC / eMLC | 50GB to 400GB |
| Sustained Read / Write | 260 MB/s |
| Sustained Random Read & Write IOPS | Up to 30,000 IOPS |
| Interface | SATA 3Gb/1.5Gb, S.M.A.R.T., NCQ |
| Reliability | |
| ECC | Up to twelve 9-bit symbols per 512 byte sector |
| Bit Error Rate (BER) | < 1 in 10 to the power of 17 bits read |
| Power Fail Data Protection | Super Capacitor |
| Tiered Error Protection | Data recovery from sector, page, and block failures. End to end CRC protection. |
| Endurance | 5 Years * |
| Temperature Monitoring | On-board sensor, SMART attribute |
| Environmental | |
| Shock | 50g, 11ms, 3 shocks applied in each direction on 3 mutually perpendicular axes X, Y, Z |
| Vibration | 16.4g rms 10-2,000 Hz, 3 axes |
| Operating Temperature – Commercial | 0°C to 70°C |
| Non-operating Temperature | -40°C to 85°C |
| Altitude | 80,000 feet |
| Humidity | 5% to 95%, non-condensing, relative |
| Test Standard | MIL-STD-810F |
| Safety / Agency Compliance | FCC, CE, TUV |
| Power | |
| Voltage | 1.25-3.3V + 5% |
Pg 1 – Introduction
Pg2 – Test Bench and Protocol
Pg 3 – Benchmarks
Pg4 – HDTune Pro Benchmarks
Looked like expendable RAM at first, but the RAM slot is in this situation just a power connector?
Seems kind of wasted as most high-end beefy servers use a lot of RAM, especially in the virtualization industry that we see nowadays.
Besides that, what advantage has this SSD on DIMM size?
It basicaly wastes a RAM slot instead of a SATA connector, and since we have molex and sata splitters a SSD can always be connected with a normal power cable.
Or am I wrong and is the RAM slot used for anything more then power draw?
This is indeed somewhat ridiculous, why swap in a potential 32GB of +3GB/sec r/w (300k iops) in for a lousy 25-400GB 30000iops. It makes no sense, the only thing I could understand it if you we’re to design sas ram drives in ram format but even then the using-memory-banks-as-placeholder argument holds up.
I can only agree. This product is simply ridiculous. A SATA DOM module takes less space. And using a RAM slot just to draw power… well… what’s next? Using a CPU socket to power SSD?