2011 SSD Market Analysis

Tweaktown wrote an article a few days ago, according to the display situation of various manufacturers at the CES exhibition earlier this month, analyzed the basic pattern of the SSD market in 2011, especially the competition situation of the major master control program manufacturers. The following is the full text of the content translation:

At the CES 2011 conference venue, we saw at least 7 new SSD controllers that will be launched in 2011. Of these, 4 are for the consumer sector and 3 are for the corporate market. Among them, there are three controllers that provide a physical sample display that reads and writes twice as fast as 2010's performance king: Micron's Crucial RealSSD C300.

The SSD market in 2011 is also not just a master competition. Various forms of flash memory will also play an increasingly important role. The new flash will increase the capacity of mainstream SSDs to 512GB, while at the same time generally lowering the cost of SSDs, but this cost reduction may not appear until the fourth quarter in the market.

Let us categorize the dominating vendors and look forward to the SSD market in 2011.

SandForce

In mid-2010, SandForce was not the fastest SSD on the market. The 240GB SandForce product is still slower than the Micron Crucial Real SSD C300 256GB. However, the SandForce solution can provide 40GB, 50GB, 60GB, 80GB, 90GB, 100GB, 120GB, 400GB, 480GB, etc. Various types of capacity are available for users to choose from, all of which can provide excellent performance, which makes it become a basis for many users. The best choice for your own budget when purchasing products.

SandForce has also been successful in winning partners in 2010 and will be even more successful in 2011. Kingston, which previously sold Intel SSDs, has decided to use the SandForce solution in its own high-end solid-state drive products. Other SandForce partners will also use it in 2011.

SandForce's most important partner is OCZ. Without the support of OCZ, SandForce solutions cannot have the current market position. At CES, OCZ was the only company to showcase SandForce's next-generation workable products. OCZ's enterprise-class Vertex 3 Pro can achieve 540MB/s transmission speed, and can also achieve up to 70,000 IOPS random write speed. Moreover, Vertex 3 Pro is not OCZ's flagship product, Vertex 3 EX will be able to reach 80,000 IOPS, which is almost twice the top product on the market today.

It seems that the biggest problem with SandForce is that they seem to be starting to pay more attention to the corporate market. We know that with the high investment in R&D and manufacturing of enterprise-class SSDs, their performance is certainly better than consumer-grade products. However, because SandForce will focus its efforts on the enterprise level, it will take longer for consumer products to reach the market. According to the current news, Vertex 3 Pro and Vertex 3 EX will not be released until March, and consumer-grade products will only be later.

In the enterprise market, SandForce's competitors are mainly Intel and Toshiba. Intel and Hitachi exhibited their own enterprise-level products at CES. Toshiba's samples were also quite attractive. In the consumer market, the performance of SandForce products will have a clear advantage in 2011, and the time to market is a concern. In March, Marvell's new products will be launched on the market, reaching speeds of around 470MB/s. Compared with SandForce solutions, there are not many backward products, and an estimated three-month delivery advantage will make Marvell products in the consumer market first. .

There is one other advantage worth mentioning about the SandForce program. Its new generation of controllers can match almost all flash memory particles on the market. Solid-state drive manufacturers can freely choose according to their own performance and cost requirements.

Marvell and Micron Crucial

In 2010, to mention Marvell's master plan, it would have to say Micron's Crucial's RealSSD C300. Now, Marvell is ready to build its own SSD camp, but the list of specific vendors is not yet clear. Micron has announced the use of the new RealSSD C400, Marvell’s new controller.

In last year's Computex, A-DATA announced its own new generation of solid state drive S501. After the dismantling of the media, it was discovered that the disc was actually built by Jianxing. At the end of 2010, the Marvell solution SSD produced by Plextor was also from Jianxing. From this point of view, this traditional optical drive foundry company is already in full swing operating its own solid-state hard drive product line, and its customers should be the main force of the Marvell camp, in addition to Plextor and Granville may also include a pirate ship And Patriot.

Not surprisingly, the first product of Marvell's new solution will be the Micron RealSSD C400 (consumer model Crucial C4). Although its performance is slightly lower than SandForce's main control product, it will be listed at least two to three months ahead of the latter. Just recently there are rumors that Marvell's new master can only match 25nm flash memory, and the price is quite expensive.

Almost every Marvell camp manufacturer has said that its next-generation SATA 6Gbps products will provide strong garbage cleanup capabilities. We know that the TRIM instruction has not been implemented under RAID array conditions. This will cause long-term usage performance problems of the SSDs in the disk array. If the Marvell solution can achieve effective garbage cleanup in the hard disk, it will help it seize high-end RAID users and enterprise-class market.

Intel and Hitachi came together in the enterprise-class SSD market. Intel and Hitachi came together. At the Hitachi booth at the CES, they demonstrated the new enterprise-class SSD UltraStar SSD400S, using a SAS 6Gb/s interface and a read speed of 535MB/s. As you can see from the photos, this product is from Intel to Intel flash memory.

In the consumer market, everyone is looking forward to Intel's X25-M G3 (codenamed Postville Refresh). With the 25nm process IMFT (Intel Micron Joint Venture) flash memory, X25-M G2 will provide 80GB, 160GB, 300GB, 600GB capacity. Although the third-generation products are still said to be SATA 3Gbps interfaces, the performance of the X25-M G3 is still not to be underestimated with Intel's ten-channel read/write technology. It may be difficult to compete with products such as SandForce in theoretical tests, but the actual use experience has always been the strength of Intel's solution.

In addition to the X25-M G3, we can also expect the Intel SATA 6Gbps interface master presented in Hitachi samples to appear in future Intel consumer products, but this may need to wait until the end of this year.

Intel's X25-E will also be updated as usual in 2011. In the new code-named Lyndonville, SLC flash will be replaced by eMLC, providing 100GB, 200GB, and 400GB capacity. However, unless Intel quickly joins the SATA 6Gbps camp, their products really fall behind an era of SandForce and Marvell.

Toshiba Toshiba? ! That's right. The most amazing SSD display on CES comes from Toshiba. The enterprise-class products they exhibit use 32nm SLC particles with capacities of 100GB, 200GB, and 400GB, and use the SAS interface to address the corporate market. However, Toshiba will also launch a very strong consumer-grade product line.

According to Toshiba, its products have their own unique technology in the garbage disposal function. In 2011, we can look forward to Toshiba's consumer-grade SSD products, with over 90,000 IOPS and a read speed of over 510MB/s.

The basic specifications of the all-rounder Pirate Ship P3 series will use the Marvell master. However, at present, the pirate ship will not give up its cooperation with SandForce, but at the same time promote two kinds of program products. The same is true of Patriot, they show the new SATA 6Gbps SSD Wildfire, but did not disclose whether to use SandForce or Marvell program.

It can be expected that many vendors will compete to launch Marvell and SandForce SATA 6Gbps products this year. In addition to those old faces, Zalman, Antec, and so on will probably test the water SSD field. Take a look at OCZ, they have completely abandoned their own line of memory and are fully committed to the SSD market.

In short, in 2011, users will finally have the opportunity to purchase excellent SSD products with 550MB/s single-disc read and write and 600GB capacity. And if you are approaching the SSD market for the first time, the 120GB product with the SandForce SF-1200 solution may fall below $150 for those who are looking for a cost-effective solution, and products that reach $1 and 1GB will further attract more people to experience the solid state. The hard disk brings about the improvement of PC performance.