MLC Solid State Drives: Accelerating the Adoption of SSDs

**RSS Robot** · 04-08-2011, 02:40 AM

IN THIS WHITEPAPER

In this IDC white paper, sponsored by Toshiba, IDC explores the opportunity for solid state drives (SSDs); specifically, the advantages multilevel cell (MLC) NAND-based SSDs bring to the market, the market segments most likely to benefit from MLC SSDs, and the opportunity for MLC NAND-based SSDs.

SITUATION OVERVIEW

The computing market is a large, well-established market, but it is by no means static. The way people use their PCs today is different from the way they used them just a few years ago. As this market matured, PCs evolved to suit a wider array of usage models, as evidenced by a number of different dynamics:

The shift to portable PCs from desktop PCs
The enormous rise in digital content that touches both our personal lives and our professional lives on a daily basis
The newer forms of devices, such as ultramobile PCs (UMPCs) or ultra-low-cost PCs (ULCPCs).

Storage and storage requirements are not immune to these dynamics and are evolving as well. Hard disk drive (HDD) technology is over 50 years old and has been a key enabling factor in the rise and success of the computing market through its ability to provide high capacities, good performance, and reliable storage at low prices. However, storage requirements are changing, and it is difficult for one storage technology to satisfy every use scenario related to storage. As markets change, system OEMs insert other requirements into the decision matrix when choosing a storage solution. Price and storage capacity have long been the main requirements of any storage solution; however, form factor, reliability, performance, energy efficiency, and environmental metrics increasingly are becoming more important characteristics in the decision process.

Enter SSDs into the marketplace. An SSD is built using semiconductor memory, typically NAND flash memory, to store data rather than a spinning magnetic platter that is used in a traditional HDD. As a result, SSDs offer a number of advantages over other storage solutions:

Performance. With no mechanical armature to move, SSDs have virtually no latency time and can provide very fast access to the data stored. As shown in Figure 1, the difference in access times between typical SSD and HDD solutions is rather large and translates into faster performance in certain applications and functions.
Reliability. Specifications of SSDs on the market indicate that they provide a high mean time between failure (MTBF) and have a low probability of mechanisms that cause an entire SSD to fail. Intuitively, this thesis would seem to be true; however, this metric has yet to be validated in the market with years of historical experience and field data.