@Intel and Micron 3D V-NAND SSD – How 2.5 inch 10TD Processor SSD extend Moore's Law against @Samsung in Storage Wars

“3D is going to be one of the ways to go to keep Moore's Law going”

Associate professor of microelectronic Engineering at the Rochester Institute of Technology,

Michael Jackson, commenting on the Intel and Micron Partnership to develope High Density SSD (Solid State Drives)

Ever dreamed to superfast super-large SSD (Solid State Drive) Hard drive?

Well, on Thursday March 26^th 2015 Intel, Micro and Toshiba have decided to turn it up thirty two (32) to forty eight (48) notches and make 10TB hard-drive the size of a regular thumb drive a mainstream reality for laptops, Tablets and the next generation of Storage Devices as stated in the article “Storage that's both fast and roomy? It's on the way”, published March 26, 2015 9:31 AM PDT by Stephen Shankland, CNET News.

On one end of this promise of superfast super-compact Terabyte SSD is Intel and Micron, who have teamed up to create this SSD wonder. Their technology is based on Intel's 22nm Ivy Bridge Processors with 3D architecture introduced back in 2011 as explained in my blog article entitled “Intel & Poison Ivy Bridge Processors - 22nm in an Iso-Linear of Their Own”.

These Ivy Bridge Processors have a 3D architecture on the chip substrate with so called Tri-Gate Transistors that enable layers upon layers of transistors to be built. The other end of the 3D V-NAND revolution is being powered by Toshiba, who on Thursday March 26^th 2015 will also be delivering their first samples to PC and Laptop makers.

So how does Intel's 22nm Ivy Bridge Processors with 3D architecture, commercially called V-NAND (Vertical Not AND), help to boost Moore’s Law?

Intel and Micron make V-NAND SSD – 10TD Harddrives on a 2.5 inch Processor to compete against Samsung

The logic is obvious as it is simple. Most processors and memory are built planar i.e. flat arrangement of transistors on the silicon substrate as explained in the article “Intel and Micron announce 3D NAND production, open gates to 10TB SSDs”, published March 26, 2015 By Matt Smith, DigitalTrends.

With this new 22nm process that has 3D Transistor design added in, it’s possible to stack Transistor on top of each other, making the same area of substrate onto the silicon hold more transistors and thus allowing Intel-Micron to double the amount of bits that can be stored.

Let’s assume that you can fit one tri-gate V-NAND (Vertical Not AND) Transistor into a single cell on a single layer and each cell represents one (1) NAND Transistor on that capable of storing one (1) bit of data.

Using the Intel-Micron approach, it becomes possible to stack two (2) bits in each cell vertically if you have two (2) layers. This results in Processors and SSD's that can store a total of 256 GB and if upped to three (3) bits per vertical cell, up to 384GB.

In practical terms, that’ll 10 terabytes (10TB) for a SSD with more than thirty two (32) layers and 2.5-inch of surface area. Now that’ll awesome! Best of all, Moore’s Law can continue on ad infinitum by merely adding more layers.

Intel-Micron partnership can create as many as thirty two (32) layers of 3D V-NAND Flash, matching Samsung’s efforts thus far. Toshiba, who are also competing with Intel-Micron and Samsung for the same V-NAND based SSD market, are pushing the envelope with 3D based NAND Flash that has up to some forty eight (48) layers of 3D V-NAND Flash. 

Also Samsung's technology uses the charge-trap approach whereas the Intel-Micron partnership uses the Floating Gate approach, an older technology that should result in lower prices and thus a competitive advantage again Samsung.

Intel-Micron vs Samsung – Toshiba joins in to go after High-Capacity 3D V-NAND Market

They definitely need that pricing advantage; Samsung has had their V-NAND 3D Technology for SSD out since May 2014  as stated in the Samsung Press Release article “Samsung Starts Mass Producing Industry’s First 32-Layer 3D V-NAND Flash Memory, its 2nd Generation V-NAND Offering”, published May. 29. 2014, Samsung.

This technology made it’s official appearance on the tech scene in December 2014 in the form of the Samsung's SSD 850 Evo family as stated in the article “Samsung SSD 850 Evo brings 3D V-NAND tech to consumer drives”, published  December 9, 2014 By Sean Portnoy, ZDNet  and  “SSDs could get cheaper with Samsung's cutting-edge TLC V-NAND tech”, published Oct 9, 2014 7:09 AM by Brad Chacos, PCWorld.

Computer manufacturers can expect to start using this improved 3D V-NAND flash Processors and Memory by the end of 2015 in everything from improved Laptop, smartphone and Tablet hard-drives to MP4 players for HD Audio.

Combined with Intel’s new Core M 14nm Processors aka Broadwell as described in my blog article entitled “Intel Core M Processor codenamed Broadwell – How Fanless, Smaller and Thinner proves that If Life Gives you Lemons, Make Lemonade”, Intel is almost guaranteed to get back into the Mobile Computing Game!

At which point you'll start seeing SSD with memories possibly as high as 10TB stored in space as small as a typical Thumb Drive. A 10TB Thumb Drive may be in your future real soon….