Backed by an industry-proven 1.5Ghz embedded SERDES, the bridge chips' dual SATA II compliant core and Phy support a data transmission rate of up to 150Mbytes/sec. Hardware accelerated RAID functionality is offered by the chips, comprising disk striping, mirroring and spanning. Alternatively, one SATA port can be configured as a host-facing interface for eSATA to SATA connections.
Both FireWire interface standards are supported by the bridge chips: FireWire400 by the OXUF924DSa and FireWire800 by the OXUF924DSb. The chips' embedded IEEE1394 Phy interface and Link layer operates at up to 400Mbits/sec and 800Mbits/sec respectively, while hardware acceleration optimises reads, writes and small data block transfers to assure industry-leading data throughput.
Supporting both full and high speed operating modes, and using the mass storage device protocol, the chips' 480Mbits/sec USB2.0 Link and Phy ensure fast read and write transfers and maximum possible host performance. The interface is backwards compatible with USB1.1 and is supported by an integral 18Kbyte data cache.
ARM7 based and integrating 8Kbyte of closely-coupled RAM, a 1Mbyte external flash interface and 12 GPIOs, these dual SATA bridge chips provide developers with significant opportunities for product differentiation. A 12Mbits/sec embedded UART is provided for firmware code development and debug, while field upgrades are also simple to implement via the chips' FireWire or USB ports.
To ensure rapid product development, the OXUF924DSa and DSb share a common software base with other Oxford Semiconductor devices. In addition, the bridge chips are backed by a complete software development kit and evaluation boards.
Oxford Semiconductor's VP of Marketing Mark Glover commented, "The performance of the latest SATA hard disk drives exceeds the capability of USB2.0. In response, leading motherboard manufacturers are already introducing FireWire800 boards, and our bridge chips are the first to enable external storage manufacturers to produce SATA based products today with high speed FireWire800 and eSATA connectivity built-in."
Through distribution channels the price of the OXUF924DSa (FireWire400) is $8.70 in 10,000 piece quantities and the price of the OXUF924DSb (FireWire800) is $11.90 in 10,000 piece quantities.
Contact:
Oxford Semiconductor Andy Thorne, +44 (0)1235 824 900 E-mail: Email Contact Web: http://www.oxsemi.com or Publitek Limited Rob Davies, +44 (0)1225 470 000 E-mail: Email Contact Web: http://www.publitek.com