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Smartphones to get better flash drives

by on20 August 2009

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Managed NAND


Memory chip
makers are about to offer more sophisticated flash drives for smartphones similar to the technology that will be comparable to the solid-state drives found in laptops today.

Smart phones use flash drives, which use unsophisticated techniques for reading and writing data. Brian Shirley, vice president of Micron's memory group said the technology is not very different from that used in basic cell phones or digital cameras “raw NAND”.

But he thinks that everyone will move to managed NAND. Currently this technology is used on basic flash drives and pricey solid-state drives (SSDs) used in laptops and servers. It involves using sophisticated controller chips and firmware, which manage how the data is read and recorded.

Shirley did not think that smart phones will necessarily reach this level of sophistication but it would begin to approach it. The iPhone uses raw NAND with a separate controller to boost performance. But even Apple is looking at getting better performance, Shirley said.

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