APRO, the world leading supplier of NAND Flash Storages for industrial & military applications is now releasing PHANES-K Series MLC & aSLC CFast™ cards.

APRO PHANES-K Series MLC & aSLC CFast™ cards use PHISON controller and Toshiba Flash IC, providing both MLC & aSLC at the sequential read/write speeds up to 555MB/s and 465MB/s.

The firmware of PHANES-K Series MLC & aSLC CFast™ cards are designed with below technologies to ensure reliability and increase the lifespan for NAND flash IC on heavy workload.

aSLC Technology: The aSLC can be considered as an extended version of the MLC. While MLC contains both fast and slow pages, aSLC only utilizes fast pages for programming. The concept of aSLC is demonstrated in the Figure 1 below. The first and second bits of a memory cell represent a fast and slow page respectively, as shown in the left table. Since only fast pages are programmed when applying aSLC, the bits highlighted in red are used, as shown in the right table. As a result, aSLC provides better performance at same capacity and endurance than MLC does. Moreover, the aSLC performs similarly to SLC based CFast Cards, yet more cost effective.

LDPC ECC: The LDPC (low-density parity check error correction code) technology, comparing to the existing error correction code (ECC), has more excellent error correction capability for longer code lengths, and it can greatly improve the life cycle of flash memory which means more errors can be corrected on each page to maintain a longer lifespan of the flash memory.

Power Loss Data Protection: In order to ensure that the last read/write command can be completed, the firmware-based power loss data protection will immediately stop reading or writing command when it senses the unstable power or insufficient wattage. Therefore, the data can be safely and completely saved in the CFast™ card. Once the power is restored, the system will move on with the process.

Static & Dynamic Wear Leveling: The advanced wear leveling algorithm is used to effectively spread the usage across the whole medium of flash memory. Besides, the static & dynamic wear leveling also improves the lifespan of NAND flash memory.

Garbage collection & TRIM: PHANES-K Series MLC & aSLC CFast™ cards use garbage collection & TRIM to reduce the amount of garbage in order to decrease the unnecessary wear of the flash IC.

S.M.A.R.T.: The user can check the health condition of the CFast™ card any time by the implemented S.M.A.R.T. function. It can not only predict the lifespan of CFast™ card, but collect the data to know the usage of CFast™ card, letting users replace with the new product at the proper time. Or, you can also provide the relevant data to APRO engineer to do the technical analysis, and APRO will offer the effective solution.

APRO PHANES-K Series MLC & aSLC CFast™ cards are fully compliant with CFast2.0 specification and ATA8-ACS2 command set and are designed with 7-pin data and 17-pin power connectors. Combining of CF card's form factor and SATA interface makes APRO PHANES-K Series MLC & aSLC CFast™ cards improve traditional CF card under the conditions of small form factor and harsh environment.

In addition, APRO PHANES-K Series MLC & aSLC CFast™ cards also conform to the SATA 3.2 (6.0Gb/sec) specification with low power consumption and provide compatibility with 3.0Gb/s and 1.5Gb/s interface as well.

Moreover, to ensure the reliability of quality and ability in different environment temperatures, APRO chooses strictly the high-end components and conform to the standard of the industrial system. APRO PHANES-K Series MLC & aSLC CFast™ cards are designed to be used not only in the standard temperature 0°C ~ +70°C but also in wide temperature -40°C ~ +85°C. Furthermore, APRO applies the conformal coating to the PCBA of CFast™ cards to combine the advantages of moisture, dirt, and dust prevention and chemical pollution. The conformal coating can also prevent the corrosion from soldering, becoming an isolation and eliminating the electromagnetic interference.

The capacities are available as follows:
PHANES-K Series MLC CFast™ card: 32GB, 64GB and 128GB
PHANES-K Series aSLC CFast™ card: 16GB, 32GB and 64GB

About CFast™ card

CFast™ card is based on SATA bus instead of the old PATA / IDE bus. CFast™ card combines with the form factor of CF card and SATA interface to take advantages of SATA interface and small form factor. With the features of low power consumption, small form factor, long lifespan, anti-vibration, high shock resistance, and withstanding extreme temperature and harsh environment, the CFast™ card has become the optimal solution to improve CF card in industrial application. CFast™ card is normally applied to camera, surveillance server, and ticket vendor.