AMD today announced its Radeon R7 line of mainstream solid-state drives. Built by OCZ, the drives feature Toshiba-made MLC NAND flash, and OCZ's Indilinx Barefoot 3 M00 processors. Built in the 7 mm-thick 2.5-inch form-factor, the drives feature SATA 6 Gb/s interface, and are available in three capacities, 120 GB, 240 GB, and 480 GB.

All three offer sequential read speeds of up to 550 MB/s; while the 120 GB variant offers up to 470 MB/s of sequential writes; the 240 GB and 480 GB ones offer up to 530 MB/s. Their 4K random read performance numbers are up to 85,000 IOPS, up to 95,000 IOPS, and up to 100,000 IOPS, respectively; while the 4K sequential write performance for all three are rated at up to 90,000 IOPS. The Radeon R7 is essentially an OCZ Vector 150 with lighter processor clocks, and could be priced accordingly.

AMD's Radeon brand is turning out to be its only hope in capturing high-end gaming PC sales. The brand now covers AMD's high-performance GPUs, system memory modules, and now, client SSDs. The company is giving final touches to three client SSD models in the 2.5-inch SATA form-factor, bearing the Radeon R7 brand, featuring capacities of 120 GB, 240 GB, and 480 GB.

All three feature SATA 6 Gb/s interface, and offer sequential read speeds as high as 550 MB/s, sequential writes of up to 470 MB/s on the 120 GB variant; and up to 530 MB/s on both the 240 GB and 480 GB ones. The three offer 4K random access throughput of up to 85,000 IOPS, 95,000 IOPS, and 100,000 IOPS, respectively; with 4K QD32 steady-state throughput of 12,000 IOPS, 20,000 IOPS, and 23,000 IOPS, respectively. The three are based on OCZ's Indilinx Barefoot 3 processor, driving Toshiba-made 19 nm MLC NAND flash chips. The three will be formally launched on the 13th of August, 2014.

Here are some of the first pictures of OCZ Vector 180, the company's upcoming high-end consumer SSD in the 2.5-inch form-factor, with SATA 6 Gb/s interface. This drive is so durable and resistant to bad power, that OCZ is classifying it as both consumer-enthusiast and entry-enterprise (fit for servers). The drive features OCZ-Indilinx Barefoot 3 M00 series processor, with what appears to be LPDDR3 cache, and a power-outage mitigating logic. When it senses a power-outage or unstable power, the drive finishes all outstanding read/write operations under power from of a capacitor bank, and "parks" itself, to prevent data loss. It features Toshiba MLC NAND flash built on the 19 nm silicon fabrication process. The drive comes in capacities of up to 960 GB, and offers sequential transfer rates of up to 550 MB/s, and 4K random access throughput of up to 100,000 IOPS.

Once a leading SSD vendor, OCZ is finding itself in trouble from two fronts, an increasingly competitive market landscape with the entry of big names such as Samsung, Seagate, and WD; and legal irritants with the SEO. The company is reportedly putting its consumer SSD business up for sale, and Toshiba is emerging to be a front-runner for buying it out. Such a deal could see Toshiba acquiring OCZ's consumer SSD division, and the various brands associated with it, including its Indilinx-Barefoot derived SSD controllers, which are still quite competitive. SSDs could proliferate further with the upcoming SATA-Express standards.

OCZ is giving away copies (U-play keys) of the hit first-person shooter title Far Cry 3 to new and existing owners of its Vector 256 GB and 512 GB solid-state drives (SSDs). A page has been set up where owners of the drives can enter purchase details of their drives to redeem their keys. Based on its newest Indilinx silicon, the Vector line of SSDs is OCZ's fastest in its consumer lineup.

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OCZ Technology Group, Inc. (NASDAQ: OCZ), a leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today announced that it will demonstrate a pre-production version of its new flagship Vector SSD Series for PCI Express (PCIe) interfaces at the upcoming Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2013, Venetian Hotel, Las Vegas, Nevada, from January 8th through 11th. In addition to showcasing the PCIe-based Vector Series, OCZ will also present its portfolio of enterprise and consumer SSDs, as well as enterprise software used to cache, virtualize or accelerate key applications and associated data.

Driven by its cutting-edge Indilinx Barefoot 3 controller, which has received worldwide accolades for industry-leading performance, enhanced reliability/endurance, and differentiated features, the PCIe-based Vector SSD Series has improved input/output operations per second (IOPS) burst performance and consistently delivers superior 'real-world' sustained performance regardless of whether the data streams are in compressed or uncompressed formats.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today announced the availability of its new SATA III-based Vector SSD Series featuring the company's next-generation Indilinx Barefoot 3 controller. OCZ's worldwide technology hardware and firmware teams developed the new controller silicon and firmware completely in-house to enable full design control over the Vector SSD Series roadmap, while delivering exceptional I/O performance, enhanced reliability and endurance, and a host of differentiated features to empower high performance laptops, desktops, and workstations with superior storage capabilities.

OCZ Vector SSDs provide exceptional input/output operations per second (IOPS) performance and the cutting-edge Barefoot 3 controller consistently delivers superior sustained performance over time regardless of whether the data streams are in compressed or uncompressed formats. As a result, this groundbreaking SSD series provides faster file transfers and boot-ups, and a quicker, more responsive storage experience.

Yesterday at the Intel Developer Forum 2012 in San Francisco the OCZ Technology Group (OCZ for short) provided a quick peek at its upcoming solid state drive named Vector. Coming in a 2.5-inch form factor, the Vector features a Barefoot 3 controller (designed by Indilinx from top to bottom, unlike the Barefoot 2 which has Marvell technology), 2x nm MLC NAND, and a SATA 6.0 Gbps interface. Unfortunately OCZ didn't say anything about the drive's performance.

The Vector is set to be released in Q4 in at least two capacities - 256 GB and 512 GB.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, will showcase its latest storage products, encompassing a mix of both solid state drives and software solutions, at this year's Flash Memory Summit, Booth #208, Santa Clara Convention Center, Santa Clara, California, from August 21st through August 23rd.

Demonstrating SSD products along with recent partner implementations, OCZ will showcase a comprehensive lineup of innovative solutions for business, server, and OEM clients. This includes product presentations of both the impending Intrepid 3 SATA III-based SSD solution based on the company's Indilinx Everest 2 architecture, along with the company's leading PCI Express (PCIe)-based Z-Drive R4 featuring new Linux Acceleration software (LXL) that unleashes the full performance potential of infrastructures that use this popular open source operating system. Live technical demos of LXL and Z-Drive R4 SSDs will include a VDI boot storm, efficient SQL CPU utilization, and vMotion and Fault Tolerance support.

Hard drive prices refuse to budge after last year's floods that struck manufacturing facilities in Thailand, even as manufacturers turn record profit. The solid-state drive market, on the other hand, is finally rolling with competition, high volume production, and advancements in NAND flash technologies. With memory majors such as Hynix adding new NAND flash manufacturing facilities to their infrastructure, SSD is expected to finally get its big break in the mainstream market.

SSD prices, according to price aggregators, are on a free-fall. Models which once held relative pricing as high as $2 per gigabyte, and going deep within the $1 mark. For example, Crucial's widely-praised M4 256 GB SSD has a price per GB of 'just' $0.82, and a market price around $200, something unheard of, for a 256 GB SSD with transfer rates of over 500 MB/s. With SSD major OCZ Technology releasing new generations of drives under the Vertex 4 and Agility 4 series that use Indilinx processors, older Vertex 3 and Agility 3 models are being phased out, some of these are seeing sub $1/GB prices. Intel is also responding to market trends, with prices of its SSD 520 series dropping sharply. Find a boat-load of stats at the source.

OCZ introduced a new high capacity variant of its Octane consumer SSD series, the OCT1-25SAT3-1T. Built in the 2.5-inch form-factor with SATA 6 Gb/s interface, the new Octane variant provides 1 TB of unformatted capacity. Based on the Indilinx Everest processor, the drive packs 25 nm MLC NAND flash, and utilizes 512 MB of DRAM cache. It is rated to provide sequential transfer speeds of up to 460 MB/s (reads), 330 MB/s (writes), with 4K read/write random access performance of up to 24,000 IOPS and 32,000 IOPS, respectively. All modern consumer SSD features are present, including TRIM, NCQ, ECC, and 256-bit AES data-encryption. Slated for mid-May, the Octane 1 TB by OCZ won't exactly be cheap.

For those who thought with the Indilinx buyout and release of Everest and Kilimanjaro series NAND flash controllers, OCZ is on course of becoming a largely self-sufficient SSD industry player, here's a revelation. Its new Everest series silicon, used in recently-launched SSD families (such as Octane and Vertex 4), is essentially a re-badged Marvell controller (found on SSDs such as Crucial M4, Intel SSD 510), with custom firmware developed by OCZ. This discovery by Anandtech was confirmed by OCZ (Indilinx).

The Indilinx Everest (Octane and Petrol series) and Everest 2 (Vertex 4 series), are both re-badged Marvell chips with Indilinx firmware. Although it doesn't change anything, it perfectly explains how OCZ could come up with two "new" SSD controllers (Everest and Everest 2) almost instantly, after the Indilix acquisition. Everest 1 is essentially a higher-clocked Marvell 88SS9174, while Everest 2 could very well be a re-badged Marvell 88SS9187, according to the source.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, today introduced Indilinx Everest 2, its next-generation SSD platform that delivers an industry-best performance of 120,000 random input/output operations per second (IOPS) for SATA-based drives.

In addition to this unprecedented transactional performance, the Everest 2 features the most advanced flash management capabilities which can significantly extend NAND flash life and enhance SSD reliability. This innovative controller platform will debut in OCZ's new Vertex 4 SSD product line.

The Indilinx Everest 2 family of solid state drive processors establishes a new computing and storage paradigm by delivering breakthrough performance and uncompromising reliability to next-generation SSDs. Combining a 400M Hz dual-core CPU, 6 Gbps SATA Revision 3.0 interface, and support for the latest, most advanced NAND flash memory technology available, Everest 2 exceeds the needs of the most demanding SSD environments.

OCZ released the Arowana Flash Translation Layer (FTL) firmware update for SSDs running Indilinx Barefoot controllers, and 34 nm NAND flash. The update was announced in May, 2011, and released for the OCZ Vertex Plus family, but it's only now that users of the original Barefoot-controlled drives get a firmware to update their drives with. The new 3.55 firmware significantly improves sequential and random-seek performance. The screenshots below (in order) are of a Barefoot-driven OCZ Vertex drive with the old firmware (IDE), new firmware (IDE), and new fimware (AHCI). To learn more about the update, and how to go about do it to your drive, visit this page. Like most other SSD firmware updates, the process erases everything on your drive, so be sure to make a backup.

OCZ is also working on a high-capacity SSD line, targeting data-centers that seek higher performance and capacity, called Chiron. Built in the 3.5-inch form-factor with a 6 Gb/s serial interface (not sure if it's SAS or SATA), the Chiron is a complex SSD, which consists of multiple SSD sub-units, each driven by OCZ-Indilinx Everest controllers, maintained in an abstract RAID configuration by a localized RAID controller. The drive is available in capacities as high as 4 TB, and provides sequential performance as high as 560 MB/s, with 4K access performance of 100,000 IOPS.

As promised, OCZ Technology is showing off at CeBIT 2012 its newest Vertex Series solid state drive, the Vertex 4. Pictured below, the upcoming SSD is based around the Indilinx Everest 2 platform, it features synchronous MLC NAND Flash memory (SLC can be used for enterprise-oriented models), and is capable of transfer speeds of up to 550 MB/s and up to 90,000 IOPS.

The Vertex 4 drive on display at CeBIT has a 2.5-inch form factor, a SATA 6.0 Gbps interface, and, according to the live demos, it delivers sequential read/write speeds of 367/305 MB/s and up to 80,000 IOPS for 4k random reads.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a worldwide leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs) for computing devices and systems, will showcase its innovative client and enterprise SSDs at this year's CeBIT tradeshow in Hannover, Germany. OCZ's latest products and technology demonstrations will be on display at the event in Hall 17, Booth D31.

With new cutting-edge technology in the client space, OCZ will display the upcoming Vertex 4 SSD Series based on the SATA 6 Gbps Indilinx Everest 2 platform, revealing industry-leading performance and superior data management for all file types and sizes.

In its CeBIT invitation circular, Patriot Memory unveiled names of three new client SSD product lines, which it will launch in Hanover. These include new high-performance client SSD lines, the Wildfire Pro, and Wildfire SE; and a new mainstream client SSD line called Magma. With no other details, we're left to only speculate. Patriot's flagship SandForce SF-2281 driven Wildfire series features among some of the highest performing SATA 6 Gb/s client SSDs. The Wildfire Pro and SE, in all probability, could be higher-performing parts, with higher sequential speeds, and random access performance. With Magma, Patriot could design a client SSD using a controller of another make than SandForce; probably Marvell, or even OCZ-Indilinx.

Indilinx, a leading provider of solid state drive (SSD) processors and a subsidiary of OCZ Technology Group, announces OCZ Indilinx SSDs based on the acclaimed Everest Series SATA 3.0 (6 Gbps) platform are shipping in LG Electronics' thinnest notebook yet, the Super Ultrabook Z300 based on the Intel Ultrabook initiative.

"We are excited to continue our partnership with LG Electronics and provide our Indilinx Everest based OEM SSDs for integration into the company's exciting new Super Ultrabook Z300," said Ryan Petersen, CEO of OCZ Technology. "These custom OEM Indilinx SSDs are the ideal solution for the Z300's ultra slim and stylish form factor, and help deliver a superior overall computing experience for customers with quicker transfer speeds and faster boot up."

Leaked last week, OCZ's newest solid state drive, the Indilinx Everest-based 'Petrol' has now been made official and is confirmed to reach distribution channels in the 'coming weeks'.

The Petrol targets 'cost-sensitive' applications and has a 2.5-inch form factor, a SATA 6.0 Gbps interface, 2xnm asynchronous MLC NAND Flash memory (backed by the life span-enhancing NDurance technology), a MTBF of 1.25 million hours, TRIM support, and three years worth of warranty.

Now that the Octane models are out and about, the OCZ Technology Group is preparing the launch of a second line of solid state drives based on the Indilinx Everest platform, the more value-minded Petrol series. Like the Octane SSDs, the Petrol drives feature a 2.5-inch form factor, a SATA 6.0 Gbps interface, and make use of the NDurance technology technology which increases the life span of NAND flash memory by as much as 2 times.

The Petrol models also have 2xnm asynchronous MLC (multi-level cell) NAND Flash memory (the Octane line uses synchronous MLC NAND), a MTBF of 1.25 million hours, TRIM support, and are backed by a three-year warranty.

Anandtech posted the first set of performance figures of OCZ Octane. The enthusiast community is looking at the outcome of OCZ Octane eagerly, because it is based on OCZ's own newest high-performance SATA 6 Gb/s SSD processor, the Indilink Everest, the first major Indilinx controller after OCZ's acquisition of the company. It adds to the options available to enthusiasts, between SandForce SF-228x based SSDs, and Marvell 88SS9174.

The [p]reviewer put the 512 GB 6 Gb/s variant of this drive though the site's "Heavy Workload 2011" test suite, in which it edged past Intel SSD 510 250 GB, but fell behind OCZ Vertex 3 MaxIOPS 240 GB and Kingston HyperX 240 GB, both driven by SandForce SF-2281 processors. So far the performance yield looks encouraging, considering that OCZ has managed such performance on a drive with relatively higher capacity. Apart from the Indilinx Everest, OCZ Octane features 512 MB of cache and Intel 25 nm Sync MLC NAND flash memory. OCZ will also introduce a value variant that uses the SATA 3 Gb/s interface and Async MLC NAND flash. Complete reviews of this drive will surface in the coming days.

Over the weekend, OCZ's newest consumer SSD line, Octane, quietly crept up shelves. It was released in late October. Octane is a significant product for OCZ despite having successful SandForce-driven lines such as Vertex 3 and Agility 3, because it's the first fruition of its acquisition of Indilinx, a company behind SSD controllers. Octane is available in a wider range of capacities than the other SATA 6 Gb/s 2.5" SSDs in OCZ's stable: 128, 256, 512 GB and 1 TB. It does away with targeting the sub $150 market using 80 GB or 64 GB variants, and starts right with 128 GB, priced at $199.99 (an increasingly popular price-point for those building $1500-ish gaming PCs), the 256 GB model goes for $369.99 (a decent price compared to 240 GB SandForce and Marvell based SSDs), 512 GB for $879.99, and we're yet to get pricing on the 1 TB model, it will be released to the market a little later.

Indilinx' latest SSD controller, with the most up-to-date feature-set, the Indilinx Everest, is at the heart of these drives. This is what makes the OCZ Octane a litmus test for OCZ's move to acquire Indilinx at a time when there's no dearth for high-performance SSD controllers such as the SF-228x. Indilinx Everest features a dual-core ARM ASIC, with up to 512 MB of cache (notice there's no overprovisioning by default), advertised speeds of up to 560 MB/s (read), up to 400 MB/s (writes), lowest latencies in the industry, 8 NAND flash channels with 16-way interleaving, and proprietary NDurance Technology that increases NAND life up to 2X of the rated P/E cycles, apart from industry standards such as SMART, NCQ, and TRIM.

OCZ Technology Group, Inc., a leading provider of high-performance solid-state drives (SSDs), today launched the Indilinx Everest-based Octane SATA 3.0 and SATA 2.0 SSD series, striking the ideal balance between capacity, physical size, and speed. In addition to being the world's first SSD to achieve up to a 1TB capacity in a compact 2.5 inch format, OCZ's Octane SSD series combines high-speed data transfer rates with record-breaking access times to provide a superior user experience and improved application performance.

"OCZ has reached an important milestone in the development of its own controller technology," said James E. Bagley, Senior Analyst with Storage Strategies NOW. "The high sustained performance, even with compressed files, the rapid boot feature and high access speeds using SATA 3.0 protocol puts their controller technology in the major league."
"Until now SSDs have been tailored for specific applications, forcing users into a product which maximizes performance for a narrow band of applications, but is significantly lacking in others," said Ryan Petersen, CEO of OCZ Technology. "The Octane Series solves this problem by providing the highest level of performance across varied workloads including mixed file sizes and mixed compressible and uncompressible data, all while nearly doubling NAND flash endurance."