Flash Memory Guide
Contents
1. Portable Flash memory for computers digital Cameras mobile phones and other devices R Kingston TECHINOLOGY Flash Memory Guide lye z BEL Kingston HFN OLO Kingston the world s leading independent manufacturer of memory products offers a broad range of Flash cards USB Flash drives and Solid State Drives SSD collectively called Flash storage devices that employ Flash memory chips for storage The purpose of this guide is to explain the various technologies and Flash memory offerings that are available Note Due to Flash technology changes specifications listed in this document are subject to change without notice 1 0 Flash Memory Empowering A New Generation of Flash Storage Devices Toshiba invented Flash memory in the 1980s as a new memory technology that allowed stored data to be saved even when the memory device was disconnected from its power source Since then Flash memory technology has evolved into the preferred storage media for a variety of consumer and industrial devices In consumer devices Flash memory is widely used in Notebook computers Personal computers Tablets Digital cameras Global Positioning Systems GPS Mobile phones Solid state music players such as Electronic musical instruments MP3 players Television set top boxes Flash memory is also used in many industrial applications where reliability and data retention in power off situations are key requirement2. Flash was invented after NOR Flash and is named after the specific mapping technology used for data Not AND NAND Flash memory reads and writes in high speed sequential mode handling data in small block sizes pages NAND Flash can retrieve or write data as single pages but cannot retrieve individual bytes like NOR Flash AND Flash memory is commonly found in solid state hard drives audio and video Flash media devices television set top boxes digital cameras cell phones for data storage and other devices where data is generally written or read sequentially For example most digital cameras use NAND Flash based digital film as pictures are usually taken and stored sequentially NAND Flash is also more efficient when pictures are read back as it transfers whole pages of data very quickly As a sequential storage medium NAND Flash is ideal for data storage NAND Flash memory is less expensive than NOR Flash memory and can accommodate more storage capacity in the same die size Flash memory which stores a single bit per cell g a value of 0 or 1 per cell is known as Single Level Cell SLC Flash 5 0 Die Stacking and Multi Level Cell Multi Bit Cell Flash technologies In order to economically increase the amount of bit storage that a Flash memory chip can accommodate manufacturers utilize die stacking and multi level cell or multi bit cell technologies These technologies result in a Flash memory chip havi
3. cards come in Type form factor INTERFACE VOLTAGE PIN COUNT SIZE INMM CompactFlash 3 3 and 5 Volts 50 36 4 x 42 8 x 3 3 7 3 Secure Digital Cards SD SDHC SDXC microSD microSDHC microSDXC Secure Digital introduced in late 2001 is a second generation derivative of the MultiMediaCard MMC standard see section 7 4 The Secure Digital format includes several important technological advancements over MMC These include the addition of cryptographic security protection for copyrighted data music The SD Card Association of which Kingston is an executive member sets the specifications for Secure Digital cards Flash Memory Guide R NA EOP Kingston NOLOGY SD cards are slightly thicker than the original MMC cards This means that devices designed to support SD cards may also accept MMC cards if the host device is not strictly limited to SD media for SD copy protection management features However devices exclusively designed for MMC cards will not support the thicker SD cards Kingston offers standard SD cards as well as high performance Ultimate SD cards to capture high definition video Secure Digital High Capacity SDHC starting at 4GB and Secure Digital Extended Capacity SDXC starting at 64GB offers larger volume data storage and optimized recording performance with support for FAT FAT32 exFAT file formats In addition Kingston SDHC and SDXC cards use speed class ratings known as Class 2 4 6 and 10
4. faster than USB 2 0 and fully backward compatible with USB 2 0 at 480Mb s However USB 3 0 devices will not work in USB 1 1 ports Please note Some of the listed capacity is used for formatting and other functions and thus is not available for data storage K 2012 Kingston Technology Corporation 17600 Newhope Street Fountain Valley CA 92708 USA All rights SGS reserved All trademarks and registered trademarks are the property of their respective owners MKF 283US
5. not work in USB 1 1 ports To understand what affects a Flash storage device s performance one needs to consider several factors see next page NOLO Flash Memory Guide i CA ae Kin gst on Flash Memory Chip Technology In general Flash storage devices built with Multi Level Cell MLC NAND Flash will deliver higher performance than the standard Triple Level Cell TLC NAND Flash or Multi Bit Cell Single Level Cell SLC vs Multi Level MBC NAND Flash based cards or DataTraveler Cell MLC and Multi Bit Cell MBC Standard Flash cards or the DataTraveler USB drives deliver the best price performance value for most users of digital cameras tablets mobile phones and other electronic devices Elite Pro Ultimate Flash cards or SuperSpeed DataTraveler 3 0 USB Flash drives will deliver faster reads and writes ideal for advanced users photography professionals and enthusiasts Of course to achieve the performance benefit of faster Flash cards or USB Flash drives user must have the compatible high speed devices and properly configured computers Some digital cameras and other devices require Flash based high performance Flash cards for proper functionality Host Consumer Devices The built in controller interfacing with Flash cards or USB Flash drives in many consumer devices may have limited bandwidth Please consult your user manual or contact the device Digital cameras mobile phones PDAs manufacturer for sp
6. of a PC the system board will need to have built in SuperSpeed USB 3 0 connectors and the Operating System e g Windows will also need to have the proper USB 3 0 drivers installed in order to be able to support SuperSpeed USB transfers For details on USB Performance refer to Appendix A Flash memory product manufacturers provide x speed ratings for Flash cards However due to a lack of industry standards comparing different Flash products may prove difficult for consumers For details see kingston com Flash x Kingston works closely with global semiconductor and controller manufacturers to ensure that Kingston Flash devices deliver superior price performance to its customers For enthusiasts and advanced customers demanding the highest performance Kingston offers the Elite Pro Ultimate line of CompactFlash and SD cards the DataTraveler SuperSpeed USB 3 0 Flash drives and HyperX SSDs Flash Memory Guide i Pe Wi z BEL Kine Ston NOL 7 0 Kingston s Flash Product Lines There are several types of Flash storage devices that are available from Kingston USB Flash Drive DataTraveler Secure Digital Cards SD SDHC SDXC microSD microSDHC CompactFlash Cards eMMC SSD 7 1 USB Flash Drives Introduced in 2002 USB Flash drives offer an incredible combination of high storage capacity fast data transfer rates and great flexibility all in the palm of your hand Heralded as a floppy or CD driv
7. time to extend the useful life and reliability of the Flash storage device High Quality Connectors Kingston s Flash storage devices always use highly rated mating connectors to ensure long life and reliable usage of the Flash memory device Operating Temperature and Humidity SSD 0 70 C Humidity 85 RH USB Flash Drives 0 60 C Humidity 85 RH SD and Micro SD 25 C 85 C Humidity 5 to 95 RH CF Card 0 60 C Humidity 95 RH NOLO Flash Memory Guide x ANA z BEL Kingston Card Readers 0 70 C Humidity 93 RH For detailed product environmental specifications check Kingston s product pages and datasheets for more information 1 Toshiba press release Toshiba America Electronic Components Inc Releases Performance Research on MLC NAND Flash Memory for Consumer Applications May 10 2004 High Capacity Flash storage devices can provide large storage capacities in a very small form factor This flexibility makes them ideal for consumer uses such as digital flm or storage for MP3 music where portability and convenience are important Please note Some of the listed capacity is used for formatting and other functions and thus is not available for data storage Please see Section 2 for details High Performance Kingston s Elite Pro Ultimate Flash cards and Hi Speed SuperSpeed DataTraveler USB Flash drives are faster than many standard Flash products and many competitive products Kingston
8. write to the drive over its useful life time Flash memory endurance is primarily reduced by die shrinks in the NAND and by something called the Write Amplification Factor or WAF WAF is the difference between Host Writes and the total amount of data written to the NAND per write operation Flash memory devices like SSDs write in full blocks In order to write to a block that already contains some data requires the good data in the block to be combined with the new data and rewritten to the Flash For example if 2GB of data is written to the SSD the actual data written to the Flash may be 4GB In this case the WAF is 2 Depending on the SSD controller and the type of data being written random or sequential to the SSD the WAF very from as low as 5 to has high as 20 or 30 SSD Storage Controllers SSDs use sophisticated Flash controllers to communicate between the Serial ATA Host Controller and the Flash chips on the SSD This special chip manages all the reads from and writes to the Flash memory on the SSD The SSD controller also manages other important functions such as wear leveling and garbage collection to extend the life of the drive and help maintain consistent performance levels over the life of the drive Serial ATA SATA Host Interface All of Kingston s SSDs support the SATA host interface connection which allows Kingston SSDs to connect to most mainstream notebooks desktop and server computers built withi
9. Flash storage device The most common type of file management system for Flash storage devices is the File Allocation Table FAT which is also used on hard drives 5 Reserving some cells for use by the Flash storage device s controller e g for storing firmware updates and other controller specific information 6 Where applicable reserving some cells for special features For example the specification for Secure Digital SD cards requires reserved areas to support special copy protection and security features 3 0 Features of Kingston s Flash Storage Products Kingston s Flash storage devices offer many advantages for both consumer and industrial applications Flash Storage Device Warranty Kingston warrants that its Flash storage devices are free from defects in material and workmanship for the period specified below Product Lifetime Warranty The following Kingston products are covered by this warranty for the life of the product Memory modules including ValueRAM HyperXx Retail Memory and Kingston system specific memory Flash memory cards e g Secure Digital Secure Digital HC and XC CompactFlash MultiMediaCard SmartMedia and Flash adapters Five Year Warranty The following Kingston products are covered by this warranty for a period of five years from the date of purchase by the original end user customer USB DataTraveler drives and SSDNow KC100 Solid State Drives Three Year Warranty The following Kingston p
10. ability Flash memory is very reliable and many of the Flash storage device types also include Error Correction Code ECC checking and advanced wear leveling For example Kingston s CompactFlash cards have a rated error specification of less than one 1 bit in 1 000 000 000 000 000 bits read 1 bit per 10 bits read Kingston Flash Data Retention Kingston Flash Storage Devices primarily use MLC TLC Flash Memory Data retention on Flash memory is dynamic since the amount of time the memory has been cycled affects data retention Important information should always be backed up on other media for long term safekeeping Wear Leveling Technology Kingston Flash storage devices incorporate controllers utilizing advanced wear leveling technology which distributes the number of P E cycles program erase across the Flash memory evenly Wear leveling thus extends the useful life of a Flash memory card for details please see Kingston Flash Cell Endurance section next Flash Cell Endurance Non Volatile Flash Memory cells have a finite number of program erase p e cycles Simply put every time data is written to or erased from a Flash Storage Device the number of program erase cycles decrease and are eventually used up to the point that the Flash memory is no longer usable For Multi Level Cell MLC Flash between 3000 and 5000 write cycles per physical sector based on current lithography process 24nm and 25nm at the time of this writing Fo
11. as in the computer s DRAM memory is lost however when a Flash storage device is removed from a digital camera all data and pictures remains saved on the Flash storage device The ability to retain data is key for Flash memory applications such as digital film for digital cameras mobile phones tablets and other transportable devices There are two major technologies of Flash memory NOR and NAND Each technology has strengths that make it HPNOLOGY Flash Memory Guide AN PAPA Kingston ideal for different kinds of applications as summarized in the following table NOR Flash NAND Flash High speed Access Yes Yes Page Mode Data Access No Yes Random Byte Level Access Yes No Typical Uses Networking Device Memory Industrial Storage 4 1 NOR Flash Memory NOR named after the specific data mapping Not OR is a high speed Flash technology NOR Flash memory provides high speed random access capabilities being able to read and write data in specific locations in the memory without having to access the memory in sequential mode Unlike NAND Flash NOR Flash allows the retrieval of data as small as a single byte NOR Flash excels in applications where data is randomly retrieved or written NOR is most often found built into cellular phones to store the phone s operating system and PDAs and is also used in computers to store the BIOS program that runs to provide the start up functionality 4 2 NAND Flash Memory AND
12. ations However there is no guarantee that interference will not occur in a particular installation If this equipment does cause the harmful interference to radio or television reception which can be determined by turning the equipment off and on the user is encouraged to try to correct the interference by one or more of the following measures Reorient or relocate the receiving antenna Increase the separation between the equipment and receiver Connect the equipment into an outlet on a circuit different from that to which the receiver is connected Consult the dealer or an experienced radio TV technician for help You are cautioned that changes or modifications not expressly approved by the party responsible for compliance could void your authority to operate the equipment 9 2 INDUSTRY CANADA IC STATEMENT This Class B digital apparatus complies with Canadian ICES 003 Cetappareilnum rique de la classe B estconformea lanorme NUM 003 du Canada 10 0 For More Information For additional information on Kingston products please visit kingston com Flash Appendix USB Performance The Universal Serial Bus USB is emerging as the preferred interface to connect Flash card readers to computers The latest USB specification is USB 3 0 The older specification was USB 2 0 The USB 3 0 specification includes the USB 2 0 speeds for backward compatibility reasons USB 2 0 is backward compatible with USB 1 1 however USB 3 0 will
13. device combining an embedded Flash controller and MLC NAND memory with an industry standard eMMC 4 XX interface Kingston eMMC provides up to 128GB of NAND Flash memory for storage applications The eMMC intelligent controller manages interface protocol data storage retrieval error correction code ECC algorithms defect handling diagnostics power management clock control and many other processes and functions eMMC Flash drive empowers mobile multimedia driven applications such as music photo video TV GPS games email etc The eMMC architecture fully emulates a hard disk to the host processor enabling read write operations that are identical to a standard sector based hard drive In addition Kingston s eMMC controller employs virtual mapping dynamic wear leveling static wear leveling and automatic block management to ensure the highest data reliability while maximizing endurance HPNOLOGY Flash Memory Guide NA EOP Kingston INTERFACE VOLTAGE PIN COUNT SIZE IN MM eMMC 4 41 1 8 and 3 3 Volts 153 amp 169 BGA 14x18x14 7 5 Solid State Drives SSD A solid state drive SSD is a data storage device that uses solid state memory to store data with the intention of providing access in the same manner as a traditional hard disk drive HDD As of 2007 most SSDs use non volitile NAND based Flash memory to retain data and contain no moving parts Compared to HDDs SSDs are typically less susceptible to physical shock are s
14. ecifics tablets PCs and other devices All else being equal the achievable performance level will be the minimum data transfer level supported by the host controller or the Flash card or USB Flash drive Connecting Flash cards to The USB 2 0 specification also includes the older USB 1 1 specification for backward computers through Kingston s compatibility reasons The latest USB specification is USB 3 0 The USB 3 0 specification Media Reader MobileLite and includes the USB 2 0 speeds for backward compatibility however USB 3 0 devices will not MicroSD readers work in USB 1 1 ports Connecting USB Flash drives USB Flash Drives and Digital Media Reader Writers require the following logos to indicate directly to a computer s USB slot performance levels USB logo transfers data at a maximum of 12 megabits per second 12Mb s enaa Bi 3 or 1 5MB s It is also referred to as Original USB or USB 1 1 and is also j compatible with USB 2 0 Full Speed with a maximum speed of 12Mb s or 1 5MB s Hl Speed USB logo transfers data at a maximum of 480 megabits per om TS second 480Mb s or 60MB s It is also called USB 2 0 Hi Speed Hi Speed USB is up to 40X faster than USB and fully backward compatible with USB through its USB 2 0 Full Speed mode with a maximum speed of 12Mb s or 1 5MB s Siren SuperSpeed USB logo Transfers data at a maximum of 5 Gigabits per USB second 5Gbps s or 625MB s SuperSpeed USB is more than 10X
15. elivers great performance in a standard case less form factor and less than half the size of a 2 5 SSD Slim SATA uses a standard SATA drive and power connection as a 2 5 SSD which makes it compatible with a wide variety of host systems Slim SATA is an industry standard JEDEC form factor MO 297 and provides 4 mounting locations to secure the drive to the system INTERFACE VOLTAGE PIN COUNT SIZE IN MM MO 300 SATA Rev 2 3 3 Volts 52 Pin PCle Mini Card 50 8 x 30 MO 297 SATA Rev 2 5 Volts 22 Pin SATA 54x39 Kingston works closely with global semiconductor and controller manufacturers to ensure that Kingston SSDs deliver superior price performance to its customers 8 0 Kingston Flash Media Readers Flash media readers allow Flash storage devices to be used as portable storage for computers as well as for uploading or downloading of pictures music and other data without requiring the original host device such as a digital camera or MP3 player and without any additional drain on its batteries Flash media readers can enable the transfer of data at higher speeds than a host device is capable of supporting for example a USB reader will be much faster than a host device such as a digital camera using a serial interface If a host device does not support high speed transfers the faster reader will significantly reduce the data transfer times Kingston offers Flash media readers for the convenient attachment of Flash storage devic
16. er alternative USB drives have far more storage capacity than that of a standard floppy disk or CD ROM drive replacement They provide an easy method for quick downloads and transferring digital files to and from your computer or device USB Flash drives incorporate NAND Flash and a controller in a capsulated case USB Flash drives work with the vast majority of computers and devices that incorporate the Universal Serial Bus interface including most PCs tablets and MP3 players Kingston offers a full line of DataTraveler Hi Speed and Super Speed USB Flash drives Some DataTraveler drives also support password protection and hardware based AES encryption for improved security For details please visit kingston com Flash dt_chart asp 7 2 CompactFlash CF Cards CF cards incorporate a controller and are about the size of a matchbook CompactFlash cards incorporate an Integrated Device Electronics IDE interface similar to hard drives and ATA PC Cards Kingston is a member of the CompactFlash Association which sets the specifications for CF cards Kingston offers standard CompactFlash cards as well as high performance Elite Pro and Ultimate lines Kingston s Elite Pro Ultimate CompactFlash cards are among the fastest available in the industry The high transfer rate is ideal for use on newer devices such as high megapixel digital cameras to ensure that the cameras save pictures faster and are quickly ready for the next shot CompactFlash
17. es to personal computers or notebooks For Flash media Kingston recommends the flexible and convenient Media Reader a single reader that supports multiple Flash card formats and can be connected to any computer with a Hi Speed USB 2 0 or USB 3 0 port Kingston HFN OLO Flash Memory Guide lye z BEL Kingston 9 0 offers a USB 3 0 Media Reader for high speed data transfers that are up to 10 times faster than USB 2 0 Media Readers Kingston also offers convenient portable readers MobileLite G3 and microSD SDHC Reader for high performance data transfers to systems supporting Hi Speed USB 2 0 and SuperSpeed USB 3 0 Electromagnetic Compatibility information to the user 9 1 FEDERAL COMMUNICATIONS COMMISSION FCC STATEMENT This device complies with Part 15 of the FCC Rules Operation is subject to the following two conditions 1 this device may not cause harmful interference and 2 this device must accept any interference received including interference that may cause undesired operation This equipment has been tested and found to comply with the limits for a Class B digital device pursuant to part 15 of the FCC Rules These limits are designed to provide reasonable protection against harmful interference in a residential installation This equipment generates uses and can radiate radio frequency energy and if not install and used in accordance with the instructions may cause harmful interference to radio communic
18. ilent have lower access and latency times and deliver much higher performance SSDs use the same interface and form factor as traditional hard drives thus making them easily replaceable in most computer platforms Kingston offers a broad range of solid state drives to suit the needs of business professionals consumers system ntegrators and enthusiast Kingston s business class SSDs are some of the fastest in the industry and carry a longer warranty Kingston s consumer and system builder SSDs offer a good balance of price and performance while enthusiast will enjoy the ultra fast performance and styling of Kingston s HyperX SSDs The Flash memory chips used in SSDs There are primarily two types of Flash memory used in SSDs Multi Level Cell MLC and Single Level Cell SLC Both types of Flash memory offer different performance and endurance characteristics Due to the high cost of SLC Flash memory MLC is becoming the more common Flash memory used in SSDs built for client based notebook and desktop PCs SSDs that are designed for servers will use a new Flash memory process called Enterprise MLC Flash memory eMLC that will offer higher endurance and be more suitable for high end server workloads SSD Endurance SSD endurance is the amount of time an SSD can be expected to function normally given a write workload SSD endurance is commonly classified in Total Bytes Written TBW to the drive This is the total amount of data you can expect to
19. n the last several years Kingston SSDs are compatible with most SATA revision 2 3Gbps and SATA revision 3 6Gbps host controllers Most SATA host controllers provide for backward compatibility however if a SATA host controller is limited to specific read and write speeds using a faster SSD will not result in faster data transfers For example if a SATA Rev 3 SSD is attached to a SATA Rev 2 host controller data transfers will only be as fast as the host controller Flash Memory Guide R NA EAP Kingston NOLOGY INTERFACE VOLTAGE PIN COUNT SIZE IN MM SATA Rev 2 5 Volts 22 Pin SATA 69 85 x 100 x 9 5 SATA Rev 3 5 Volts 22 PinksAlA 69 85 x 100 x 9 5 7 6 mSATA MO300 and Half Slim M0297 Solid State Drives Kingston offers integrators and system builders with a small form factor mSATA and Half Slim SATA SSDs for commercial applications MO 300 mSATA or Mini SATA was announced by the Serial ATA International Organization in September 2009 Applications include netbooks ultrabooks and other devices that require a smaller solid state drive The connector is similar in appearance to a PCI Express Mini Card interface and is electrically compatible however the data signals need to go to the sata host controller instead of the pci express host controller Not all mini PCle connections support SATA so check with your system provider for more details MO 297 Slim SATA is a solid state drive with a purpose built form factor that d
20. ng the capability to store more data in a single chip 5 1 Die Stacking Many semiconductor manufacturers use a die stacking technique to double a Flash memory chip s capacity After the semiconductor wafer fabrication process they cut out the Flash memory silicon die and then attach or stack two separate dies together HFN OLO Flash Memory Guide ly z BEL Kingston For example when a semiconductor manufacturer stacks two 16 gigabit dies together they form a single 32 gigabit Flash memory chip Die stacking allows for cost reduced chip alternatives to the larger capacity single die chips called monolithic chips Stacking two 16 gigabit chips together for example typically costs far less than buying a low volume monolithic 32 gigabit chip The 32 gigabit chip can then be used to build a 4GB Flash card single chip card or a 8GB Flash card two chips on one card Die stacking is similar to the DRAM chip stacking technology that Kingston utilizes to produce high end server modules As a result Kingston s die stacked Flash cards are reliable and deliver high performance 5 2 Multi Level Cell MLC Triple Level Cell TLC Flash Technologies NAND and NOR Flash memory chips store one 1 bit value a 0 or a 1 in each cell In multi level Flash technology two 2 values are stored into each cell In triple level Flash technology three 3 values are stored into each cell Kingston has inco
21. r Single Level Cell SLC Flash up to 50 000 write cycles per physical sector For Triple level Cell TLC up to 1 000 write cycles per physical sector Lithography of the Flash Memory Die plays a key role in cell endurance and decreases as the size of the die gets smaller Write Amplification Factor Write Amplification Factor or WAF is present in all Flash Storage Devices The write amplification factor is the difference in the amount of data written by the host to the Flash memory and the amount of actually data written to the Flash memory chips All Flash devices write in full blocks which means that in order to write to a block that may already contain some data the Flash controller must move the existing data in the block usually to memory and combine it with the new data and write all the data back to the Flash memory For example a 2MB file could be written by the host to the Flash device however 4MB of total data may be written to the Flash memory to complete the write operation In this case you would have a write amplification factor of 2 In some cases the WAF can be as high as 20 or 30 Automatic Bad Sector Remapping Kingston Flash controllers automatically lock out sections with bad memory cells bad blocks and move the data to other sections space blocks to avoid data corruption During factory formatting as described in Section 2 spare blocks are set aside on the Flash storage device for remapping bad sectors over
22. roducts are covered by this warranty for a period of three years from the date of purchase by the original end user customer SSDNow Solid State Drives except for the SSDNow KC100 Two Year Warranty The following Kingston products are covered by this warranty for a period of two years from the date of purchase by the original end user customer MobileLite microSD Reader Media Reader Wi Drive and products under the Kingston Private Logo Program Kingston Private Logo Program products are limited to credit or refund during the two year warranty period One Year Warranty The following Kingston products are covered by this warranty for a period of one year from the date of purchase by the original end user customer DataTraveler Accessory Kit Wi Drive TravelLite SD MMC Reader and HyperX Fan For further details see Kingston com company warranty asp Solid State Flash storage devices as semiconductor storage devices have no moving parts and thereby are not subject to the mechanical failure issues of hard drives Their overall data reliability enabled them to dominate the convenience oriented portable memory products market operating silently with a zero decibel noise level Small Physical Size or Form Factor Flash storage devices are designed to be easily transported Convenience is an important criterion especially for consumer and corporate applications HFN OLO Flash Memory Guide ly z BEL Kingston High Data Reli
23. rporated both MLC TLC Flash memory into its line of standard Flash cards SSDs and DataTraveler USB Flash drives 6 0 Flash Storage Device Performance Flash card storage device performance depends on the following three factors The specific Flash memory chips used Generally there is a tradeoff between the high speed and more expensive Single Level Cell SLC Flash chips and the standard speed and more affordable Multi Level Cell MLC Triple Level Cell TLC or Multi Bit Cell MBC Flash chips The Flash storage device s controller Today s Flash storage devices have a built in Flash memory controller This special chip manages the interface to the host device and handles all the reads from and writes to the Flash chips on the Flash storage device If the host controller is capable of supporting faster data transfer speeds the use of optimized Flash controllers can result in significant time savings when reading or writing data into the Flash memory The host device to which the Flash storage device is connected to If the host device computer digital camera cell phones etc is limited to specific read and write speeds using faster Flash storage devices will not deliver higher performance For example using a USB 3 0 Flash drive on a computer that supports only USB 2 0 speeds will not result in faster transfers In addition computers need to be properly configured to support faster transfers in both hardware and software In the case
24. s such as in Security systems Military systems Embedded computers Solid state drives Networking and communication products Wireless communication devices Retail management products Point of Sale Devices e g handheld scanners 2 0 SSD Flash Card and USB Flash Drive Capacity Some of a Flash storage device s listed capacity is used for formatting and other functions and thus is not available for data storage When a Flash storage device is designed and manufactured steps are taken to ensure that the device operates reliably and to permit the host device computer digital camera tablets mobile phone etc to access the memory cells i e to store and retrieve data on the Flash storage device Formatting includes the following operations 1 Testing each memory cell in the Flash storage device 2 Identifying all defective cells and taking steps to ensure that no data will be written to or read from a defective cell 3 Reserving some cells to serve as spares Flash memory cells have a long but finite lifetime Therefore some cells are held in reserve to replace any memory cells that may fail over time HFN OLO Flash Memory Guide ly z BEL Kingston 4 Creating a File Allocation Table FAT or other directory To enable Flash devices to conveniently store and access customer files a file management system must be created to allow any device or computer to identify the files stored in the
25. s engineers test and select high performance controllers to ensure that Kingston s Flash cards are among the performance leaders Please see the Appendix for information about USB Hi Speed and Super Speed USB performance Kingston standard Flash products offer moderate performance levels for general purpose applications Low Power Consumption Unlike standard DRAM memory that needs to be constantly powered on to maintain its data Flash memory is non volatile and does not require power to maintain its data Flash memory s low power consumption results in longer battery life for the host device Plug and Play Support Kingston s Flash memory line supports plug and play With plug and play technology and compatible computer operating systems a Flash storage device can be inserted into a computer or a Flash media reader and be quickly recognized and accessed by the computer Hot Swapping Support Hot swapping allows for plugging or unplugging Flash storage devices into a compatible computer or reader without needing to power off and restart the computer This feature enhances the portability and convenience of Flash storage devices for transferring data pictures or music between two computers or devices 4 0 Non Volatile NOR and NAND Flash Technologies Unlike Dynamic Random Access Memory DRAM Flash memory is non volatile Non volatile memory retains data even without being powered on For example when a computer is turned off all data that w
26. that deliver a minimum data transfer rate for optimum performance with SDHC and SDXC devices Although identical in size to today s standard SD card the new SDHC and SDXC cards are designed differently and are only recognized by SDHC or SDXC host devices To ensure compatibility look for the SDHC and SDXC logo on cards and host devices cameras camcorders etc microSD SDC are the mobile platform form factor of the SD card for use in cell phones and other portable devices microSD are a fraction of the size of a standard SD card and when used with the supplied adapter can be used in standard SD device slots for example in Flash media readers microSDHC cards offer higher storage for more music more videos more pictures more games more of everything for today s mobile world In addition Kingston microSDHC cards use new speed class ratings known as Class 4 and 10 that deliver a minimum data transfer rate for optimum performance with microSDHC devices The microSDHC card allows users to maximize storage for today s revolutionary mobile devices INTERFACE VOLTAGE PIN COUNT SIZE IN MM Secure Digital SDHC 2 7 3 3 Volts 9 32x24x2 1 Secure Digital SDXC 2 7 3 3 Volts 9 20x 215 14 microSD microSDHC e 2 7 3 3 Volts 8 I5x 11x1 7 4 Embedded MultiMediaCard eMMC Kingston eMMC is an Embedded Flash Drive EFD optimized for mobile handsets and consumer electronic devices eMMC is a hybrid
Download Pdf Manuals
Related Search