Features - Storage Innovations:

AMCC RAISES THE BAR FOR RAID 5 DATA PROTECTION

Applied Micro Circuits Corp (AMCC) announced the availability of its new AMCC StorSave Platform for its line of 3ware 9000 series RAID controllers, enabling maximum data protection and high performance Serial ATA (SATA) network storage solutions. The AMCC StorSave Platform combines firmware and a Battery Backup Unit (BBU) that maximizes data protection without sacrificing performance.

The AMCC StorSave Platform supplies power to the cache memory module in the event of a system power loss and includes proprietary features that utilize a write journaling technique. AMCC delivers this ability for SATA RAID, allowing the controller to use controller and drive's write caching for best performance while still preventing data loss in the event of a system power failure. When fully charged, the battery preserves the contents of the controller cache memory for up to 72 hours. When power is restored, cached data is then written to the disk array providing uninterrupted data storage.

"Our innovative, AMCC StorSave Platform, represents another breakthrough for the evolution of SATA-based network storage and positions AMCC as the data protection leader in the SMB and enterprise-class SATA RAID markets," said Scott Cleland, director of marketing at AMCC Storage Business Unit. "AMCC now delivers high performance, capacity and maximum protection, enabling SATA RAID to become a truly viable enterprise storage solution."

Traditionally in RAID 5 environments without BBU, manufacturers recommend setting controller cache to "write-through" and disabling "disk cache." This practice mitigates system and drive resets and/or power failures that may put the data in disk cache and controller cache at risk. However, with "cache off," system performance suffers during standard I/O operations. Disk "cache off" also contributes to lower system performance during RAID 5 degraded mode operations and rebuilds.

AMCC StorSave Platform-enabled products protect data that has not been committed to disk media in both controller and disk caches and increases the reliability of a 3ware SATA RAID subsystem environment. The AMCC StorSave Platform enhances performance by enabling "disk cache" to remain on during all RAID operations and also maintains the controller cache setting to "writeback." AMCC recommends controller cache and disk cache remain on during SATA RAID operations as well as providing increased levels of array performance during degraded RAID 5 operations.

The AMCC StorSave Platform includes proprietary, advanced data protection features such as disk drive power on reset protection, dynamic sector repair, extensive drive timeout recovery, out of band signaling retry, write journaling and BBU.