16Gb NAND Mass Production Begins

16Gb NAND Mass Production Begins

Techtree News Staff, Apr 30, 2007 1729 hrs IST

Samsung Electronics has reportedly announced being the first company to begin mass production of 16Gb NAND flash memory chips.

Samsung Electronics has reportedly announced being the first company to begin mass production of 16Gb NAND flash memory chips. The company said it will fabricate the chips in 51 nanometers (nm), till date known as the finest process technology for mass production of memory.

According to Samsung, it's new 16Gb NAND flash memory chips boast a multi-level cell structure that facilitates capacity expansion by offering 16Gb of memory on a single memory card.

By applying 51nm process technology, Samsung said it has accelerated read and write speeds of the 16Gb chips by around 80 percent over existing MLC data processing speeds.

NAND flash memory reads and writes data in units called 'pages'.

While the 60nm NAND flash memory has a 2KB page size, the 51nm version is said to process data in 4KB pages, which is almost double the former rate.

At the same time, 51nm 16Gb NAND flash memory chips retain 4 bit error-correcting code (ECC) capabilities like that of 60nm NAND flash chips. Hence, customers can continue using existing system interfaces with the help of only minor firmware upgrades.

Migration to 16Gb technology is expected to further boost the ever increasing demand for high-density data storage in high-end music phones, and other such. And, products that feature extended recording times, including mid to high range digital cameras, are poised to benefit from the high capacity and performance of 16Gb NAND flash memory.

Samsung said it expects demand for 16Gb NAND flash memory to grow rapidly to the extent the new chips will get pushed into the mainstream market beginning late this year.