Marvell Showcase PCI-E SSD with 2GB/s throughput

 

Santa Clara based Marvell Technologies today laid claim to the fastest SSD till date with their new PCI-E SSD. The MLC NAND Flash based device boasts of a whopping 2GB/s sustained throughput and 200K IOPs.

 

Created using the 88SE9480 quad-channel PCI-Express to SATA controller, the SSD features four 88SS8014 SATA controllers connected to NAND Flash controllers. All of these controllers come with wear-levelling technology and ECC hardware for high-end performance.

 

Showcased in its pre-production stage at Computex, the SSD consists of two separate cards connected via SATA connectors. Cache for the SSD is expected to be in the form of four DDR2 SoDIMMs, which would be accommodated in the memory slots on the upper card. However, details on the specific sizes supported are unavailable at the moment.

 

As of now, the device is aimed at server and workstation class environments, and there is no news on whether Marvell would make it available for 2.5in hard drives. However, company reps at Computex did reveal that the SSD is compatible with such drives. If the SSD becomes available as an independent product, it could bring an entirely new generation of SSDs into the market.

 

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