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SuperTalent shows lower-cost PCIe-based flash storage

The memory specialist says its RAIDDrive Upstream will transfer a gigabyte of data per second and could ship by April. It's showing the device at CeBIT.

Stephen Shankland Former Principal Writer
Stephen Shankland worked at CNET from 1998 to 2024 and wrote about processors, digital photography, AI, quantum computing, computer science, materials science, supercomputers, drones, browsers, 3D printing, USB, and new computing technology in general. He has a soft spot in his heart for standards groups and I/O interfaces. His first big scoop was about radioactive cat poop.
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SuperTalent's forthcoming RAIDDrive UpStream is a PCIe-based system with an array of four SSDs for high performance. The company showed it off at CeBIT.
SuperTalent's forthcoming RAIDDrive UpStream is a PCIe-based system with an array of four SSDs for high performance. The company showed it off at CeBIT. Stephen Shankland/CNET

HANOVER, Germany--SuperTalent showed off a forthcoming product at CeBIT, a PCI Express flash storage system that beats out conventional SSDs in performance but that doesn't cost as much as the company's existing PCIe products.

The RAIDDrive UpStream uses a SandForce controller to handle data-transfer speeds of 1GBps. That's roughly twice the speed of SSDs that, like the pokier but cheaper hard drives they typically replace, use the SATA interface.

The product should go on sale in weeks, said product marketing director Peter Carcione in an interview here. "I'm hoping the end of April," he said. Price hasn't been set yet.

The system gets high performance by combining four storage drives in a single RAID (redundant array of inexpensive disks) group. Competitor OCZ has a two-drive RAID system, but the RAIDDrive UpStream should shake up the competition, he predicted. "This will be an upsetter."

SuperTalent also showed a product that has been announced, the higher-end RAIDDrive II, which Carcione said "just started shipping." It comes in capacities up to 2TB by packing in eight SSDs onto a single PCIe card. Transfer speeds are 2.4GBps for writing data and 2.8GBps for writing. It costs about $5,000, though, so casual users need not apply.

The PCIe SSDs only work on Windows, he added.

SuperTalent's RAIDDrive II, with capacities up to 2TB and and read speeds of about 2.8GBps, is now shipping.
SuperTalent's RAIDDrive II, with capacities up to 2TB and and read speeds of about 2.8GBps, is now shipping. Stephen Shankland/CNET