Samsung has developed and started sampling 100, 200 and 400 gigabyte (GB) multi-level-cell (MLC) solid state drives (SSDs) for use as the primary storage in enterprise storage systems.
"While Samsung is already well situated in the SSD market for
enterprise servers with high-performance SSDs using single-level-cell
(SLC) NAND flash memory, we are now expanding our line-up to include
high-density SSDs using MLC NAND flash memory," said Byungse So,
senior vice president, memory product planning & application
engineering team, Samsung Electronics.
Samsung?s new MLC-based SSDs are employing 30-nanometer-class MLC
NAND flash chips with a Toggle DDR interface and a controller that
uses a 3Gb/s (gigabits per second) SATA interface. Ssmaunf claims
that the new
MLC-based SSDs closely approach or even exceed some of the SLC
NAND-based SSDs now in the marketplace.
The new drives can process random read commands at 43,000
input/outputs per second (IOPS) and random writes at 11,000 IOPS.
This compares to a 15K RPM HDD which has an IOPS rate of 350,
amounting to a 120X gain in random IOPS read performance and a 30X
gain in random IOPS write performance.
In terms of power consumption, the new enterprise SSDs have a 150
times higher IOPS/Watt rate compared to 15K RPM HDDs, making them
able to process 150 times more data while consuming the same amount
of energy.
In addition, the new Samsung SSDs feature an 'end-to-end data
protection' function with advanced data encryption algorithm to
assure reliability and security for the drive.
With the new SSDs, Samsung widens its range of SSD densities for
server and storage applications to include 2.5 inch 50, 60, 100 and
120GB SSDs using SLC NAND flash memory, and 2.5 inch 100, 200 and
400GB SSDs using MLC NAND flash memory. Samsung also now has 3.5 inch
SLC-based SSDs in 100 and 200GB densities.
Starting next month, Samsung will begin mass producing its new
MLC-based enterprise drives.
According to Gartner, shipments of SSDs for servers and enterprise
storage systems will increase to 6.3 million units in 2014 from 324K
units in 2009. In revenue, the SSD enterprise market is expected to
grow more than seven times from US$485 million to US$3.6 billion
during the same period.