Symwave delivers USB-attached-SCSI performance demo with Renesas Electronics

SuperSpeed USB Developers Conference, LAGUNA NIGUEL, USA & TAIPEI, TAIWAN: Symwave Inc., a leading silicon supplier of system solutions for USB 3.0 storage devices, announced the collaborative demonstration of USB-Attached-SCSI Protocol (UASP) at the SuperSpeed USB Developers Conference with Renesas Electronics Corp., a leading provider of semiconductor solutions.

The conference is being held at Shangri-La’s Far Eastern Plaza Hotel in Taipei, Taiwan. The conference provides detailed information about SuperSpeed USB (USB 3.0) and UASP specifications and serves as an excellent venue to showcase the technology advancements of both Symwave and Renesas Electronics.

The UASP revision 1.0 specification was released by the USB-IF on February 10, 2010 and enables several significant improvements over legacy mass storage protocols. These advancements include increased data throughput performance and optimized power efficiency.

The implementation of UASP for mass storage applications requires both USB devices that support the UAS protocol and a USB host adapter and driver. The collaborative UASP demonstration will showcase Symwave’s USB Implementers Forum (USB-IF) certified USB SW631x family of devices that support UASP with a simple device firmware upgrade and Renesas Electronics’ USB-IF certified USB xHCI host controller (part number µPD720200), and associated UASP drivers.

“Symwave has been a supportive development partner of Renesas Electronics’ UASP solutions and we are pleased to demonstrate the results of our collaboration at this USB-IF developers conference,” said Kunio Mori, Associate General Manager of Industry & Network Business Division at Renesas Electronics.

“UASP is a major advancement for USB based storage devices and working with Symwave will ensure our UASP solutions are fully interoperable and have peak performance with current and future deployed devices.”

“Symwave has worked closely with Renesas Electronics since the launch of their widely adopted xHCI host controller,” said John O’Neill, Symwave vice president of marketing. “This collaboration has yielded impressive end-to-end performance gains using the now released UAS protocol. As both Symwave and Renesas Electronics formally release our UASP solutions in the near future, our joint efforts pave the way for a successful and rapid adoption of UASP by external mass storage device OEMs.”

Symwave’s USB 3.0 device controller
Symwave was the first semiconductor supplier to publicly demonstrate a USB 3.0 device in November 2008 and then again, the first to demonstrate the world’s first USB 3.0 storage controller in January 2009.

Over the past 18 months, Symwave has actively participated in the promotion of USB 3.0 technology and the establishment of USB-IF certification standards. In December 2009, the Symwave SW6316 device received USB-IF USB 3.0 (SuperSpeed) certification and is shipping in volume mass production to leading external storage OEMs world-wide.

Renesas Electronics' USB 3.0 host controller
As a member of the USB-IF since 1996, the former NEC Electronics has played a leading role both in defining the USB standards and in developing USB technology. In 2009, the company introduced the industry's first USB xHCI host controller (part number µPD720200).

The host controller is the industry's first certified USB 3.0 commercially available product and represents the first step to broad adoption among host and peripheral device manufacturers.

Having shipped over three million units of its µPD720200 host controller, Renesas Electronics Corp., formed through the merger of NEC Electronics Corp. and Renesas Technology Corp., is now targeting monthly production of two million units starting April 2010 and aims to continually dedicate itself to achieving advancement and standardization of USB.