ST launches 90nm hard disk drive system chip

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ST launches 90nm hard disk drive system chip [Copy link]

ST (STMicroelectronics) launched a 90nm hard disk drive system chip on May 25, showing the industry the company's ability to design and manufacture hard disk drive (HDD) system chips (SoC) using 90nm technology. The new product integrates ST's IP (intellectual property) in the hard disk controller, read channel, serial ATA interface (SATA) and memory. This is the first product of its kind on the market to use 90nm manufacturing technology.

The T90 read channel IP was developed by ST and supports data rates from 300Mbit/s to 1.7Gbit/s. Coupled with SATA performance, this channel strengthens the design's leading position in the market as an optimized solution for 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch disk drives for laptops, desktops and servers. The

read channel encodes and decodes the data transmitted between the head preamplifier and the SATA interface and memory, an operation that requires advanced mixed-signal technology, an area in which ST has extensive design and technical experience.

This 90nm design is based on ST's successful Tintoretto read/write channel architecture, which features high data transfer rates and low power consumption in all hard disk drive modes. T90 supports 10-bit rate code, reverse encoding, media noise optimized data detection, advanced defect scanning, horizontal recording, longitudinal recording, and self-servo write technology. ST's 90nm firmware-compatible read channel development program will meet the performance needs of consumer products and computer-specific disk drives, and some products will be launched by the end of this year.

The embedded hard disk controller (HDC) is used to manage data flow and control head positioning during tracking and seeking operations. The new product's HDC is based on field-proven ARM technology and has a built-in 32-bit high-performance 450MHz CPU core.