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Super Talent RAIDDrive  (Source: Super Talent)
New SSD comes in three models for enterprise, workstation and gamers

Super Talent has announced its latest SSD development with a new patented product called RAIDDrive. RAIDDrive promises to increase the performance and slot capacity of PCI Express based storage solutions with up to 2TB of MLC or SLC NAND flash memory inside.

Super Talent says that the RAIDDrive is the markets largest server-based SSD solution and is an extension of its RAIDSSD product line. The RAIDDrive has a "turbocharged" DRAM cache and the RAIDDrive ES model for enterprise servers has a full battery backup for protection of data in a power loss situation. The RAIDDrive comes in three models, including the ES version and a WS version for workstations along with a GS version for gamers.

All of the drives connect to a PC with a PCIe 2.0 x8 interface and promise to deliver read speeds of up to 1.2GB/s with sequential wire speeds of up to 1.3GB/s. Super Talent says that it will reveal more performance details in June when the drives are officially available.

The maker also says that an optional feature of the series will allow the drives to be configured with internal RAID5 capability for extra data protection. The RAIDDrive ES is aimed at enterprise servers performing intensive applications like database transaction processing, business intelligence and virtualization. The WS model is aimed at workstation use for tasks including animation, video editing, oil/gas exploration, and CAD. The GS version is for gamers looking for a faster IO subsystem.

Super Talent COO, CH Lee said in a statement, "We are proud of the innovative intellectual property that our outstanding engineering team has developed. The RAIDDrive is just the latest in a series of patented products which enable us to provide differentiated products to our customers."

The product is similar to the PCIe SSD DailyTech covered in 2007 from ioDATA.

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Patented?
By Dribble on 4/1/2009 11:14:58 AM , Rating: 3
It's a bunch of SSD's plugged into a PCI raid controller, the raid controller has a bit of local cache. None of this is exactly ground breaking.

Wonder what they have managed to patent? (hence stop other companies producing a cheaper version)




RE: Patented?
By cfaalm on 4/1/2009 2:38:37 PM , Rating: 2
Still it is good they take advantage of existing tech to create or assemble if you will, something worthwhile. This baby is going to be expensive, though.

Next up are "traditional" 1TB HDDs that are actually 2 platter 2TB HDDs but with onboard RAID controller.

Still can't figure out what wire read speeds are though =P


RE: Patented?
By DeepBlue1975 on 4/1/2009 4:12:49 PM , Rating: 2
Caching scsi controllers have been on the markets for quite a long time.

But a caching controller that includes the drive in it, is a rare thing.

And a caching controller that includes multiple raided drives in it, is even rarer.

Ground braking? Not at all. Nothing really new here.

But the integration of several drives in a RAID configuration, combined with a self contained caching controller that exposes itself as a storage medium while leaving all of your available storage ports free and only using up a PCIe slot which, except for GPUs, are seldom used for anything else on desktops, is a nice, kinda innovative idea that hasn't been exploited before.


RE: Patented?
By Devilboy1313 on 4/1/2009 10:43:03 PM , Rating: 2
Sounds a bit like the hardcard drives from the 1980s and early 1990s.

Drive + controller + cache + slot = Been done before. RAID is a nice feature though.


RE: Patented?
By DeepBlue1975 on 4/2/2009 4:52:49 PM , Rating: 2
Yep, but as you said, not a raid of drives in a card :D

It could be said it's a new spin of an old idea.


RE: Patented?
By EricMartello on 4/4/2009 4:40:12 PM , Rating: 2
Since SSD is memory it would make more sense for them to use technologies that improve memory performance rather than trying to make memory emulate outdated physical disk technology. What I'd like to see is a dedicated SSD storage interface on motherboards that is like a dedicated pathway to the CPU, just like DIMM slots are for memory. If they are arranged in banks there is no reason they cannot do multi-channel access (i.e. dual channel) which is basically RAID-0 for your memory.


RE: Patented?
By DeepBlue1975 on 4/6/2009 7:33:13 PM , Rating: 2
Just hold your horses and with the years something like that should and maybe will happen.

Every long walk starts with the very first step, which is where we are at about storage.
Before flash drives can have a better interface, they have to drop in price to a point in which most of the people will start thinking about ditching these horrible mechanical hdds and start using SSDs.

Once conventional HDDs go the way of the dodo, SSDs can start making more radical changes and experiment with new, more appropriate, speedier, and fancier interfaces.


RE: Patented?
By Cincybeck on 4/5/2009 12:55:58 AM , Rating: 2
Maybe you're thinking to much inside the box. I think you're thinking PCI-E<Raid Controller<SATA(Or other connection)<SSD Controller<Flash memory. If they came up with an inbetween chip that emulates a storage controller such as. PCI-E<Supertalent's Chip<Flash memory. I would say thats more plausible for a patent, and could explain the high transfer rates they're claiming. Just my speculation. I tried searching for the patents but couldn't find anything relevant to these drives.


By Lord 666 on 4/1/2009 10:46:02 AM , Rating: 4
Enough said




By Ryanman on 4/1/2009 10:50:32 AM , Rating: 2
You'd think a PCI interface would be a no brainer, since SATA is gonna be such a limiting factor. Anyone who realizes a Multi-GPU setup isn't worth it is going to have 2 of these slots open.


By Ryanman on 4/1/2009 12:27:37 PM , Rating: 2
Sorry, that's what I meant by PCI. Probably could have guessed by me saying there are 3 ports in some of the higher end motherboards.


By inighthawki on 4/1/2009 1:26:10 PM , Rating: 2
Chances are if they aren't looking into multi-gpu performance they arent looking into multi-gpu motherboards, best case scenario, i would guess they would have 2x pci-e, with 1 of them being used. Also it leads me to believe they may not be "made of money" limiting the option of this by a whole lot as well.


By Ryanman on 4/2/2009 9:22:08 AM , Rating: 2
The fact is, a lot of the motherboards with 3 PCIx slots are the best choice for their socket, like the i7 Boards. And since there are a ton of cards coming out (sound, network, the list goes on) for that interface, I'm sure as hell going to have at least 2 when I build later this year.


By inperfectdarkness on 4/2/2009 9:25:12 AM , Rating: 2
....as long as it doesn't use jmicron....


Here is a competing product from OCZ. 10gb/s SSD
By TonyO on 4/1/2009 12:08:52 PM , Rating: 3
OCZ Announce Ultra High Performance Climax™ SSD

(Seoul, South Korea----April 1, 2009) OCZ, a leading maker of Solid State Drives, announced their latest product: Climax™ Solid State Drives, with a peak transfer rate of 12.8GB/s read and write speeds. Using the patented Wongdong™ controller introduced by Jong-il, Inc. a custom SSD controller design house based in Korea, lagging write speeds that plagued MLC and SLC SSDs are a thing of the past.

The new drive features sustained read and write speed of approximately 8 Gigabits per second, 50 times the read speed, and over 70 times the write speed of previous generation MLC based SSDs.

“OCZ is the industry’s leader in SSD technology, we are proud to have them as our customer for Wongdong™ controllers. Our controller outperforms every other consumer grade controller on the market with its patented Bakaru™ memory management system. Jagiyya OCZ!”. Dr. Yongban Kim, CEO of Jong-il, Inc.

OCZ’s exclusive new technology enabled a special memory cell architecture that has no changes in performance throughout its life. Whatever it tests at on day 1 will be what the drive will perform at up to the end of its life.

The drive offers virtually unlimited life, with a MTBF of over 1 million hours, and unlimited write cycles per cell.

Climax™ offers its own independent back up power supply, featuring a 200 watt hour lithium polymer battery that powers an internal auxiliary data backup and storage device** that automatically loads the data upon startup and shutdown, or in the event of power interruption, stores all the data on the SSD in a secured subsystem until power is restored.

Climax™ is now available in 256GB, 500GB, and 1TB sizes on the PCIe X16 3.0 bus.*

About OCZ Technology

OCZ Technology Group, a member of JEDEC, designs, develops and manufactures ground-breaking, high performance memory and computer components that set industry standards. OCZ products are the first choice for users needing high-reliability, ultra-high performance solutions. In 2007, PC Power & Cooling and Hypersonic PC were brought into the OCZ Technology Group, forming a well-rounded, highly innovative organization that places the company at the forefront of high-end computing. All of OCZ Technology Group's products are available through its worldwide network of distributors, online resellers and retail stores. For more information visit our website at www.ocztechnology.com

* OCZ Climax™ SSDs features semiconductor memories manufactured by Samsung, Inc.. (PN: M392B1K73BM1)
** Auxiliary data backup and storage device manufactured by Hitachi, Inc. (P: B001Q9EKU0)
*** Wongdong™ is a registered trademark of Jong-il, Inc., Korea.
**** Bakaru™ is a registered trademark of Jong-il, Inc., Korea.




By EricMartello on 4/4/2009 4:37:28 PM , Rating: 2
I thought OCZ just slaps their stickers on Samsung or other real manufacturer's products.

Anyway I really like the idea of moving away from traditional hard disks that have to be bay-mounted to "SSD on a PCIex card". The lack of an SATA-to-PCIex bridge as well as the increased throughput could potentially make for much faster storage subsystems, not to mention easier system assembly. I hope this takes off.


Typo...
By diego10arg on 4/1/2009 11:12:20 AM , Rating: 2
quote:
read speeds of up to 1.2GB/s with sequential wire speeds of up to 1.3GB/s.




By kattanna on 4/1/2009 10:54:13 AM , Rating: 2
it only uses DRAM for a fast cache, storage is done within the flash memory itself


By karielash on 4/1/2009 10:54:46 AM , Rating: 2

Quote 'The RAIDDrive has a "turbocharged" DRAM cache and the RAIDDrive ES model for enterprise servers has a full battery backup for protection of data in a power loss situation'

Taken from the article.


By mjcutri on 4/1/2009 11:00:50 AM , Rating: 5
From the ORIGINAL press release: (http://tinyurl.com/d88lzt)
quote:
RAIDDrives support up to 2 TB of MLC or SLC Nand Flash memories, have a turbocharged DRAM Cache, and the RAIDDrive ES is fully battery backed to protect data in the event of power loss.


So it is a flash drive with a ram cache and a battery backup for the server version that allows it to save the data in the cache to the flash in case of a power failure. Leave it to DT to take a rather simple press release and make it ambiguous enough that it doesn't make sense anymore...(I'd expect this from Mick, but Shane is usually better about stuff like this)


By noxipoo on 4/1/2009 11:19:26 AM , Rating: 2
people gotta make it seems like they are earning their paychecks these days. can't let the axe fall on them!


By jaericho on 4/1/2009 11:30:12 AM , Rating: 2
Enterprises might. This gives me the idea that they might be trying to get in on the same market as FusionIO.


I think you've been duped..
By LuxZg on 4/1/09, Rating: -1
RE: I think you've been duped..
By therealnickdanger on 4/1/2009 12:05:08 PM , Rating: 2
OCZ announced their Z-Drive about a month ago, so this is just SuperTalent's response. This is just the beginning of many such PCIe drives to hit the market. SATA-3Gbps and even the yet unreleased SATA-6Gbps is too slow for the amount of R/W that these drives need.

If pricing is competetive with OCZ's model, you can expect pricing around $2,000.


By therealnickdanger on 4/1/2009 12:06:00 PM , Rating: 2
Speaking of which, why no love for the OCZ product in the article?


By someguy123 on 4/1/2009 5:28:20 PM , Rating: 2
actually, i believe info on this drive's existence was leaked to other sites a few weeks ago (if not longer).

also I highly doubt a company would post an april fools press release, especially one that looks legitimate.


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