14 DAY TRIAL // After introducing a series of 2.5-inch solid state drives for harsh operating environments, Super Talent has now developed and announced a new range of SSD solutions that sport a similar ruggedized construction but use the 1.8-inch form factor.
Super Talent's new line of SSDs is called the MasterDrive KX3 and the company guarantees that these can operate in temperatures ranging from -40 to +85 degrees Celsius, compared to the 0-70 C range supported by regular solid state drives.
In order to achieve this feat, Super Talent has designed the new SSDs to feature a special metal enclosure and used only carefully selected components.
When combined with their low 3.3V voltage and 5mm thickness, the high operating temperature range makes the drives well suitable for being used in thin and light notebook and tablet devices.
At the heart of the MasterDrive KX3 drives stands an unnamed industrial controller, that Super Talent claims it sports low write amplification and 2-way wear-leveling, in order to increase the drive's longevity and its performance.
The controller can be paired together with 32, 68, 128 or 256 GB of MLC (multi-level cell) NAND Flash memory and is seconded by a 128MB DRAM cache.
Its performance varies according to the size of the SSD, but the largest drives are capable of reaching sequential read speeds of 250MB/s, while the maximum write speeds are rated at 140MB/s.
“From our embedded flash disk modules (FDM) to our DuraDrive line of 2.5” SSD, Super Talent is committed to providing a full line of industrial temperature rated products,” said Michael Shin, VP of Engineering at SuperTalent.
All Super Talent MasterDrive KX3 come in the 1.8-inch form factor and feature a SATA II (3Gbps) interface.
No information regarding the release date, or pricing, of the drives was disclosed by the company.