While many in today’s world seek to increase their own personal or political power, those of us in the high-tech industry know that reduced power is often more desirable. Consequently, among the many low-power systems, components, and storage devices designed to boost performance is ACT/Technico’s Flash PMCStor. The solid-state PMC module, providing up to 128 GB NAND flash, delicately utilizes under 5 W power when in operating mode. However, the conduction- and convection-cooled unit is anything but delicate and is touted to deliver mass storage capabilities within the most rugged military environments.
Designers can tuck the Flash PMCStor into boards featuring PMC sites – or into any SBC in the VME, VPX, VXS, or CompactPCI form factors. Taking advantage of the latest in USB flash disk controllers, the Flash PMCStor offers two memory choices: When it performs in RAID mode as a single drive, FlashPMCStor operates at up to 30 MBps. Conversely, the PMC module can perform as a four-flash-bank array at 15 MBps per array when viewed as separate USB drives. Also provided are write protect, wear leveling, bad block correction, and error detection, along with three fast USB ports: two via the rear PN4 I/O connector and one front-panel type ‘A.’ Flash PMCStor can also support PCI bus clock frequencies all the way up to 66 MHz at either 64 or 32 bits wide in non-Monarch mode.