"Our new flash disk controller is the fastest available on the market to date for NAND type memory. It supports host transfer rates up to 16.6 MB/s and flash transfer rates up to 20 MB/s," said Elaine Iba, product marketing manager at SSI. "The controller's extensive on-chip hardware automates data transfer while minimizing microprocessor supervision and power consumption. It is the most capable high capacity flash disk controller available today.

Included in the list of 36C3950 capabilities is an extensive error detection and correction feature which employs a BCH code for on-the-fly correction of up to three bits for every 256 bytes of data. The probability is as low as one in 10E15 that an error will be uncorrectable, and one in 10E20 that an error will go undetectable.

Another outstanding capability is the 36C3950s power management scheme which minimizes battery drain in portable environments. Power reduction is achieved by two levels of power control. The first level attains a moderate power savings while maintaining minimal microprocessor communication; the second level maximizes the power savings by disabling all inputs to the device.

Iba observed that "The 36C3950 is the ideal component for implementing disk flash memory cards, especially when one takes advantage of our complimentary reference design of a high-performance, high-capacity PCMCIA-compliant solid state memory card. The reference design includes all necessary hardware and firmware information needed to design and build a flash disk card, and greatly reduces time-to-market of such a system for any customer."

"The firmware supporting our 36C3950 devices for command decoding and block management is some of the most sophisticated available in the industry," Iba noted. Extensive memory management facilities accommodate defective blocks in the flash memory array, and provide the cycling and wear leveling required to extend flash disk life for years," she said.

The 36C3950 is SSI's second standard product offering to the flash controller market. Earlier this year SSI introduced the 36C3951 flash disk controller for NOR type memories such as that produced by Intel.

Silicon Systems new 36C3950 flash disk controller is available in a 144 lead TQFP package for less than $30 in low quantities (000s). The 36C3950 is currently sampling, with volume deliveries scheduled for Q4 1996.

Silicon Systems, Inc., the mass storage subsidiary of Texas Instruments Incorporated, provides advanced semiconductor solutions for hard disk drives, tape drives, high density floppy disk drives, and optical disk drives. SSI innovations in read channels, controllers and preamps are complemented by TI's leadership in DSP solutions and global semiconductor manufacturing capabilities.