IDT launches world’s highest performance Gen 3 PCI Express switch for SSD storage arrays and cloud computing apps

IDF 2011 San Francisco, SAN JOSE, USA: Integrated Device Technology Inc. (IDT) has released the world’s highest performance family of Gen 3 PCI Express (PCIe) switches targeted at solid-state drive (SSD) storage arrays and cloud computing applications. The new family of switches builds upon IDT’s leadership in high-performance, scalable PCIe Gen 1 and Gen 2 switches, supporting a capacity up to 64 lanes and 16 ports with additional protocol enhancements for improved efficiency and reduced power consumption.

IDT’s 89H64H16G3 is a 64-lane, 16-port Gen 3 PCIe switch, capable of up to 128 Gigabytes per second (GBps) switching capacity – the highest in the industry, making it the most scalable and highest-performance single-chip Gen 3 PCI Express solution on the market. The device conforms to the latest Gen3 PCIe specification providing 8Gbps link speed to enable the fastest PCIe connectivity possible for next generation enterprise server and storage systems.

Added Gen 3 protocol enhancements improve overall efficiency and reduce power consumption, a critical factor for energy-conscious enterprise and cloud computing data centers. The device has been sampling to IDT’s lead customers for several months.

“The future of Cloud Computing and PCIe SSDs rely on the advancements of PCI Express technology. As the leader in PCIe solutions, our customers rely on IDT to deliver the cutting-edge ICs needed to support their next generation designs,” said Kam Eshghi, senior director of Marketing for the Enterprise Computing Division at IDT. “Our latest PCIe Gen 3 switches build upon our industry-leading portfolio of PCIe solutions and complement the industry’s first PCIe Gen 3 signal conditioning re-timers that IDT announced last November.”

“IDT continues to be a strong contributor to the PCIe ecosystem,” said Jim Pappas, director of Technology Initiatives, Intel. “As the demand for enterprise storage and computing hardware grows, PCI Express will continue to be a critical system interconnect protocol. Intel is encouraged to see IDT's growing portfolio of PCIe Gen 3 switches and retimers.”

The new family of IDT switches also includes clock isolation, offering the ability to operate with independent spread spectrum clocks (SSCs), as well as multicast for a significant gain in performance. Moreover, the switch incorporates a multi-root partitioning feature that allows designers to reduce system cost by replacing multiple PCIe switches with a single monolithic solution.