BitMicro has announced a flash memory-based solid state drive (SSD) with capacities ranging from 16GB to 1.6TB.
It is in 3.5-inch format and supports 4Gbps Fibre Channel connectivity, meaning that it could take on a core element of the hard disk drive market.
SSDs access data in microseconds, instead of the millliseconds needed by hard drives. The BitMicro E-Disk Altima 4GB FC delivers more than 55,000 IOPS and has a sustained data transfer rate over 230Mbps. A fast hard drive for example will run at around 300 IOPS.
BitMicro says its storage capacity can be up to 1.6TB. The company website says it can reach the maximum capacity of 640GB in 1-inch. Therefore, two and a half such 1-inch units would be needed to achieve a 1.6TB capacity; in other words three 3.5-inch form factor drives joined together.
The company has developed two ASICs (application-specific integrated circuits) to boost SSD performance. The Enhanced Datamover and Storage Accelerator (EDSA) flash I/O controller supports large blocks of flash enabling capacities to rise to the terabyte level.
EDSA works with the Logical Unifier of Extensive Transfer Arrays (LUNETA) ASIC, an interface controller designed to orchestrate massively parallel and multi-block I/O operations on large arrays of flash devices.
Sampling for the Altima 4GB FC SSD is expected to begin in Q1 2008 with volumes shipping in Q2 2008. No pricing information was released.