PMC today announced its new Flashtec NVRAM drive, built from DRAM paired with a flash-based backup unit that provides persistence during power failures. The Flashtec NVRAM uses a PCIe 3.0 interface and can be mapped directly by its host as persistent memory, a configuration which PMC benchmarked at ten million IOPS with small random access transactions. The drive can also be configured as an NVMe block device for DMA transactions, which reached one million random read IOPS in manufacturer 4K benchmarks.
The Flashtec NVRAM drive family is built with PMC’s NVMe controllers. The company’s NVMe controllers offer dual port functionality, support multiple NAND vendors, and are customer-programmable to streamline the development of custom firmware on its standards-compliant NVMe base. Currently RHEL 6.5 and 7.0 Beta are the two officially-supported operating systems for the Flashtec NVRAM drive.
The Flashtec NVRAM uses a small form factor which requires one MD2 low-profile PCIe socket. Its capacitor module provides power for the backup unit during power failures and is specified for five years of operation.
Availability
The Flashtec NVRAM drives are expected in 4GB, 8GB and 16GB capacities as early as Q4 2014. The Flashtec NVMe controllers are available now in 16- and 32-channel options.
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