Samsung's 3D V-NAND Flash Memory Enters Mass Production

Samsung Electronics has begun mass production of the industry’s first 256-gigabit, three-dimensional (3D) Vertical NAND (V-NAND) flash memory based on 48 layers of 3-bit multi-level-cell (MLC) arrays for use in solid state drives (SSDs).

Samsung’s new 256Gb 3D V-NAND flash doubles the density of conventional 128Gb NAND flash chips. In addition to enabling 32 gigabytes (256 gigabits) of memory storage on a single die, the new chip will also easily double the capacity of Samsung’s existing SSD line-ups, and provide an ideal solution for multi-terabyte SSDs. A 48-layer 3-bit MLC 256Gb V-NAND flash chip delivers more than a 30 percent reduction in power compared to a 32-layer, 3-bit MLC, 128Gb V-NAND chip, when storing the same amount of data.

“With the introduction of our 3rd generation V-NAND flash memory to the global market, we can now provide the best advanced memory solutions, with even higher efficiency based on improved performance, power utilization and manufacturing productivity, thereby accelerating growth of the high-performance and the high-density SSD markets,” said Young-Hyun Jun, President of the Memory Business at Samsung Electronics. “By making full use of Samsung V-NAND’s excellent features, we will expand our premium-level business in the enterprise and data center market segments, as well as in the consumer market, while continuing to strengthen our strategic SSD focus.”

http://www.samsung.com

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PMC Debuts Fastest SSD Contrillers and PCIe Switches

PMC-Sierra introduced the industry’s first PCI Express (PCIe) storage switches and the world’s fastest solid-state drive (SSD) controllers.

The company says its new, second-generation Flashtec NVMe Controllers will power new SSD capable of one million IOPS and greater than 20TB of flash capacity. They are the industry’s first SSD controllers to integrate DDR4 DRAM.

PMC's new Switchtec PSX storage switches enable PCIe flash drives to scale in high-performance storage systems, with enterprise-class resiliency and the industry’s lowest power. PMC says systems built with Switchtec PSX consume up to 60 percent less power than those using other PCIe switches, enabling a savings of nearly 1000 Watts per rack. Systems also require 75 percent fewer devices than other switches in a typical flash array, allowing system designers to increase flash density, lower bill of materials costs, and improve the mean time before failure for higher reliability. The Switchtec PSX family comprises switches from 24 lanes to 96 lanes.

“While working with the industry to enable the first NVMe SSDs, it became clear there was no reliable way to connect and scale many of them in a single enclosure, much like SAS does today,” said Derek Dicker, vice president of the Performance Solutions Group at PMC. “In partnership with the industry’s most forward-thinking hyperscale and all-flash array customers, PMC created a new PCIe storage switch category with our Switchtec products to deliver the high port count, low power, resilient storage features that the industry needs.”

http://www.pmcs.com/performancestorage.

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Toshiba Develops 16-die Stacked NAND Flash Memory

Toshiba announced the world’s first 16-die (max.) stacked NAND flash memory utilizing Through Silicon Via (TSV) technology.

The prior art of stacked NAND flash memories are connected together with wire bonding in a package. TSV technology instead utilizes the vertical electrodes and vias to pass through the silicon dies for the connection. This enables high speed data input and output, and reduces power consumption.

Toshiba’s TSV technology achieves an I/O data rate of over 1Gbps which is higher than any other NAND flash memories with a low voltage supply: 1.8V to the core circuits and 1.2V to the I/O circuits and approximately 50%*2 power reduction of write operations, read operations, and I/O data transfers.

http://www.toshiba.com

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Toshiba Launches High-Performance PCIe SSDs

Toshiba America Electronic Components introduced three families of PCIe solid state drive (SSD) products based on NVMe2 (Non-Volatile Memory Express) protocol technology. Sampling begins in Q4 2015.

The new drives are for high performance notebooks; thin notebooks, 2-in-1/convertible notebooks, all-in-one PCs and tablets; and server and storage applications.

Each NVMe SSD product is engineered with a distinct Toshiba-developed controller platform and Toshiba’s own state-of-the-art MLC NAND flash memory, so the technologies are well suited for optimum performance and reliability. Each SSD family is designed for its target segment with capacity, optimized form factor, and security capabilities.

“Toshiba leverages the performance and latency advantages of PCIe and flash memory to produce industry standard NVMe SSDs that will reach client, hyperscale/datacenter and enterprise markets. Market adoption of NVMe SSDs is going to accelerate, and Toshiba is well positioned to capitalize on this trend,” said Don Jeanette, Vice President at TRENDFOCUS.

http://www.toshibastorage.com/

Last week, Toshiba’s Semiconductor & Storage Products company announced its next generation of enterprise solid state drives (eSSDs).

The new PX04S line features four serial-attached small computer system interface (SCSI) SAS eSSD models well-suited for enterprise applications including: mail servers; database servers; virtualized enterprise file servers; and primary storage in read, write or mixed workload environments. Continuing Toshiba’s legacy of quality and reliability, the dual-ported 12Gbit/s SAS PX04S line offers random 4K performance with read IOPS up to 270K and write IOPS up to 145K. This is Toshiba’s first 12Gbit/s SAS SSD to deliver 3.84TB of operating capacity.

The product line up includes a high-endurance model targeted at applications requiring the highest levels of eSSD performance, reliability and endurance, the PX04SHB supports 25 complete drive writes per day with a one hundred percent random workload.

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Hibernia Express Transatlantic Cable Reaches Ireland

Hibernia Express, the first transatlantic cable to be deployed in 12 years, has come ashore in Cork, Ireland.  The new ultra low latency submarine cable, spanning 4,600km, will link Halifax, Nova Scotia to Slough, England and Cork, Ireland.  Service is slated to begin in September 2015.

“Our customers are now just weeks away from having access to the most advanced submarine cable system on the market,” states Omar Altaji, CCO of Hibernia Networks. “Financial firms, web-centric companies, media players and traditional telecom service providers alike will benefit from the speed, diversity and scalability that Hibernia Express brings to the transatlantic corridor.”

http://www.hibernianetworks.com

Hibernia Express utilizes a 6-fiber-pair submarine cable, with a portion of the fibers optimized for lowest latency and a portion optimized for 100X100 Gpbs design capacity. The total cross-sectional design capacity of the cable will be over 53 Tbps. Hibernia Express will initially launch with 100 Gbps transmission capacity using TE SubCom’s C100 SLTE platform.

Hibernia Express follows the most direct route between the UK and North America, promising to reduce latency by at least 5 milliseconds over existing cables.

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Google Announces Corporate Restructuring

Google is restructuring under a new parent organization called Alphabet Inc. in order to bring more accountability to its growing number of products, services and projects. Alphabet will be a conglomerate of companies, including a slimmed-down Google, Life Sciences (working on glucose-sensing contact lenses), Calico (working on longevity), etc. It will not be a consumer brand.

Alphabet Inc. will replace Google Inc. as the publicly-traded entity and all shares of Google will automatically convert into the same number of shares of Alphabet, with all of the same rights. Google will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Alphabet. Our two classes of shares will continue to trade on Nasdaq as GOOGL and GOOG.

Larry Page will be CEO of Alphabet. Sergey Brin will be President of Alphabet. Sundar Pichai will be CEO of Google.

https://investor.google.com/releases/2015/0810.html

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Black Hat Conference Attracts 11,000

Black Hat USA 2015, which was held last week in Las Vegas, attracted a record-11,000+ professionals across the InfoSec spectrum – spanning academia, world-class researchers, and leaders in the public and private sectors.

Top sponsors of Black Hat USA 2015 include: Diamond Sponsors: FireEye, Lieberman Software, Qualys, RSA, and Tenable Network Security; Platinum Plus Sponsors: AlienVault, Cisco, Digital Guardian, Fidelis Cybersecurity, HP, Lockheed Martin Corporation, LogRhythm, Palo Alto Networks, Inc., Raytheon | Websense, and Webroot; Platinum Sponsors: Bromium, Core Security Technologies, Fortinet, IBM, Optiv Security, Proofpoint, Inc., Tripwire, and ZeroFOX Inc.

The next Black Hat event will be in Amsterdam, November 10-13, 2015.

http://www.blackhat.com/

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