LSI shows off Sandforce powered goodies

Computex 2012: 19 and 20nm flash and PCIe SSDs

LSI logoLSI may have bought Sandforce, but at Computex, all that changed was the odd sticker and logo. The rest was pure Sandforce of old, bringing some older LSI products up to speed too.

Remember the old LSI Warpdrive from early last year? That clunky PCIe 8x SLC SSD has been updated a bit with a Sandforce controller, and basically newer everything. It is now called the LSI Nytro WarpDrive, and bears not just one, but two LSI logos. The old 300GB SLC version has been updated to 200 or 400GB, and there are now 400GB, 800GB, and 1.6TB MLC versions as well.

LSI Nytro WarpDrive

Warp Speed part 2 Mr. Sulu!

If you have to ask why anyone would want a probably more expensive but smaller SLC drive, well, you aren’t the target market, move along. For everyone else, the write durability will be well worth the extra coin. The addition of MLC is probably less for capacity reasons than the more sophisticated wear leveling in the Sandforce controllers allowed it. In any case, if LSI stands behind it as enterprise ready, it is a safe bet that it will live up to the write lifetimes quoted.

LSI with Toshiba 19nm flash

Toshiba 19nm Toggle flash

Intel 20nm ONFI Flash

Intel 20nm ONFI2 flash

One thing Sandforce likes to do is point out their support of upcoming devices and geometries. In this case, they did so by showing off their controller in SSDs bearing Toshiba 19nm Toggle NAND flash and Intel 20nm ONFI2 flash. Not much more to see than bleeding edge semiconductors, even if they all look like square black plastic blocks.S|A

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Charlie Demerjian

Roving engine of chaos and snide remarks at SemiAccurate
Charlie Demerjian is the founder of Stone Arch Networking Services and SemiAccurate.com. SemiAccurate.com is a technology news site; addressing hardware design, software selection, customization, securing and maintenance, with over one million views per month. He is a technologist and analyst specializing in semiconductors, system and network architecture. As head writer of SemiAccurate.com, he regularly advises writers, analysts, and industry executives on technical matters and long lead industry trends. Charlie is also available through Guidepoint and Mosaic. FullyAccurate