BitMicro Ultra320 SCSI flash drive crosses terabyte divide

BitMicro Networks this week introduced the 3.5-inch E-Disk Altima E3S320 solid state drive which offers storage capacity of up to 1.6TB, the first device based on the Ultra320 SCSI standard to hold more than a terabyte of data.

The E-Disk Altima E3S320 drive was unveiled at the West 2008 conference in San Diego.

Bit Micro said the new solid state disk technology will be shipped to its OEMs for testing in a few months. The product is expected to ship in capacities ranging from 16GB to 1.6TB by late summer, Fremont, Calif.-based BitMicro said.

Pricing was not disclosed.

The new single level cell NAND flash drive will provide sustained data transfer rates of up to 230MB/sec. with peak speeds reaching 320MB/sec. in burst mode, Bit Micro said. The device features an I/O rate of up to 30,000 IOPS, 1500Gs operating shock and data write protect and secure erase data security controls.

Storage experts believe that solid-state drive offerings will become more amenable to end-users in 2008 as costs for flash storage drops. BitMicro has aggressively pursued larger storage capacities for its solid-state drive product portfolio in recent months. The company unveiled an 832GB version of its E-Disk Altima 2.5-in. flash drive in January.

BitMicro said the Altima Ultra320 SCSI storage product is targeted at large organizations running high-performance applications, military and industrial deployments.