Swissbit Introduces "powersafe" for Advanced Power Loss Protection in Industrial SSDs

By Tiera Oliver

Associate Editor

Embedded Computing Design

April 12, 2022

News

Swissbit Introduces "powersafe" for Advanced Power Loss Protection in Industrial SSDs

For maximum protection, especially in mission-critical applications, Swissbit has now introduced "powersafe", an additional PLP (Power Loss Protection) level that also secures data as it transfers from host to controller (Dynamic Data) or from DRAM to NAND (Cached Data).

The new feature provides PLP protection for SSDs that are designed for high reliability and long product lifecycles. 

The secret to the high performance of the "powersafe" feature is the combination of sophisticated firmware and hardware features. Highly reliable tantalum capacitors that store energy while the SSD is in operation form the basis. In the event of a sudden power outage, the stored charge is used to safely write both dynamic data and data in the DRAM cache to the NAND flash array. Intelligent power management within the firmware ensures that the power supply disconnects from the host upon reaching a critical threshold and connects to the regulated voltage of the capacitors instead. This provides the SSD with sufficient power to safely execute write commands and flush cached data.

For the development of "powersafe", Swissbit applied tests that go far beyond the industry standard. With 10,000 test cycles, during which only write processes are carried out during a power outage, Swissbit has ensured a high level of repeatability and reliability. In addition, short idle times between the individual test cycles put even more pressure on the design to ensure that "powersafe" can handle even the most demanding workloads. 


For selected SSD series, Swissbit offers "powersafe" as an optional feature, identified by the suffix (P) within the product name. The first in line is the X-75 product series, which is available immediately with the extended PLP protection option both for the 2.5″ variant and the M.2 form factor. The 3D NAND (TLC) based SSDs with SATA III interface offer the highest endurance and reliability across the full industrial temperature range with capacities from 240 to 1,920 GB.

In addition, Swissbit will present the N-30, a new PCIe SSD module series as a "powersafe" variant, in the third quarter 2022. The N-30m2P (TLC) will be available with capacities from 240 GB to 4 TB and corresponding pSLC variants (N-36m2P).

"powersafe" is available immediately as an optional feature for selected Swissbit SSD series.

Tiera Oliver, Associate Editor for Embedded Computing Design, is responsible for web content edits, product news, and constructing stories. She also assists with newsletter updates as well as contributing and editing content for ECD podcasts and the ECD YouTube channel. Before working at ECD, Tiera graduated from Northern Arizona University where she received her B.S. in journalism and political science and worked as a news reporter for the university’s student led newspaper, The Lumberjack.

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