Fusion-io offers solid state storage solutions based on NAND flash that provide a level of integrity and availability for mission-critical data that exceeds today's solid state storage solutions and significantly surpasses that of enterprise-class rotating magnetic storage devices.
With throughput and seek times many times faster than the fastest disk arrays, it is little wonder that enterprise data centers have been keen to include NAND flash as part of their server infrastructure. The primary reason NAND flash has not been widely adopted in the computer industry is its reputation for unreliability. There is a long-standing view that NAND flash storage works well for non-mission-critical applications, such as media storage devices (where the occasional bit error generally translates into a slight audio hiss or a stray errant pixel in a video), but cannot be relied upon for applications where a bit error could crash an operating system or compromise the integrity of critical data.
System architects face a number of storage-related challenges and NAND flash technology presents its own set of unique problems. But Fusion-io has developed patent-pending techniques to create NAND flash-based storage with reliability equal to or exceeding that of disk-based storage. This paper describes several inventions and advancements Fusion-io has introduced to ensure data is not corrupted or lost. Additionally, this paper discusses the probability of catastrophic storage device failure and how Fusion-io's architecture ensures predicable, controlled management of early device failure, long-term device attrition and data changes due to external and data transport interference.
SMB Data Storage Research Library
