DensBits solution claims 10,000 P/E cycles with TLC flash

DensBits has released the first TLC embedded Flash controller solution that claims to deliver over 10,000 program-erase cycles with the latest 2Xnm and 1Xnm process TLC Flash, including ONFI 2.3 and Toggle NAND 2.0. For comparison, 20-29mm flash is rated to 3,000 erase cycles for MLC flash and just 750 erase cycles for current TLC controllers.

TLC Flash stores 3-bits per cell and is 30% cheaper to produce than MLC for the same capacity, which stores just 2-bits per cell. Up until now TLC had very poor Flash endurance and performance that made it unsuitable for use in Solid State Drives. DensBits TLC Flash Solution features its trademarked Memory Modem technology, which uses proprietary ECC (including LDPC), DSP and Flash Management to overcome the current TLC erase cycle limitations, while claiming to boost TCL program performance by over 60%.

DensBits Flash controller, the DB3610 claims to be able to deliver up to 95MB/s write, 65MB/s read and 4KB Random access of 4,000 read IOPS and 1,100 write IOPS. While well-behind what most modern SSDs can achieve, these IOPS figures are still well ahead of what any HDD can achieve and this performance is more than adequate for use in Smartphones and Tablets.