JMicron JMF612 Solid State Drive Processor

Western Digital depends on the JMicron JMF612 Solid State Drive controller inside their WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD, 256GB model SSC-D0256SC-2100, to produce 250MBps reads and 170MBps write transfers. JMicron has also secured their JMF612 processor in the A-DATA S596, the upcoming Corsair Reactor SSD series, and the yet-to-ever-release Active Media Predator-X7. While the SSD industry grows daily, only a few select manufacturers offer popularly-accepted Flash NAND SSD controllers. The most popular consumer controllers at the moment are: Indilinx IDX110M00-FC "Barefoot", Intel PC29AS21AA0, JMicron JMF612, Toshiba T6UG1XBG, Samsung S3C29RBB01-YK40, Marvell 88SS8014-BHP2, SandForce SF-1200/1500, and the Marvell 88SS9174-BJP2 SATA 6Gb/s SSD processor.

The WD SiliconEdge-Blue features the branded Western Digital Pearl Rev-2 printed circuit board (PCB), with part code 900-700-800A. In most respects, the Pearl-R2 PCB follows in the design of several past SSD products. Illustrated from the top-view image above, you'll notice that the Western Digital circuit board utilizes a dense component layout for the Samsung flash NAND modules and JMicron SSD controller. The 2nd-generation SATA-3.0Gbps JMicron JMF612 SSD processor is joined by up to sixteen flash NAND modules (Samsung K9MDG08U5M MLC flash memory used here), and a single SDRAM chip for buffered transactions. Western Digital offers their WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD in 256, 128, and 64GB capacities, with each using a different NAND part.

Western Digital has laser-etched the JMicron JMF612 processor with their own parts code, which reveals the 'VAIL 1.07' followed by the manufacture data code (2009 production week 45) and the 571J09111 reference code. The JMicron JMF612/Western Digital VAIL-1.07 is a 208-pin LQFP 28x28mm processor package, and is compliant with Universal Serial Bus specification revision 2.0, USB Mass Storage Class specification version 1.0, and Serial ATA International Organization revision 2.6. The JMicron JMF612 32-bit embedded SSD processor features an embedded data buffer of 32KB masked program ROM and 128KB of integrated system RAM, and supports Native Command Queuing (NCQ) with 32 command slot, TRIM garbage collection, and Self-Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Technology (SMART) command set.

JMicron, the name known for data-write stuttering problems in the past, have learned that a large cache buffer helps to tame supply line demands. Elite Semiconductor Memory Technology supplies a single DDR2-800 400MHz SDRAM 1.8-volt IC module on the 256GB-capacity WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD, which is marked as ESMT part M14D5121632A-2.5B. ESMT lists this module as a 512MB part, which would result in one of the largest cache buffers we've tested; however Western Digital does not include a cache buffer specification for their SiliconEdge-Blue series on any product documentation.

Sixteen multi-layer NAND flash modules branded as 128GB Samsung K9MDG08U5M-PCB00 parts combine for 256GB of total storage space, but only 238GB of this capacity will be usable since Western Digital reserves 18MB of NAND flash for TRIM garbage-collection cleaning and bad block allocation. Each MLC NAND module is lead-free and RoHS-compliant, and operates on 2.7V~3.6V.

While the JMicron JMF612 processor is an ambiguous component available market-wide, Benchmark Reviews respects that our sample was fitted to the WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD series. Please continue on for details and performance results for this Solid State Drive...

WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD

Western Digital has been the leading name in consumer storage technology since the early 1970's. Just in time for their 40th anniversary, the WD SiliconEdge-Blue Solid State Drive debuts as the first consumer SSD they've ever offered. Based on the JMicron JMF612 SATA-3Gbps SSD processor, the SiliconEdge-Blue promises 250/170MBps read and write transfers with 5000-4KB IOPS. Benchmark Reviews recently tested the WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD, 256GB model SSC-D0256SC-2100, against a myriad of high-performance solid-state enthusiast storage devices.

Western Digital, the company behind the WD brand name, have joined into the foray of Solid State Drive manufacturers. Long known for their popular WD VelociRaptor series of high-performance Hard Disk Drive (HDD) products, the WD SiliconEdge-Blue now joins the family in 64, 128, and 256GB capacities.

WD SiliconEdge-Blue Features:

Support for advanced features including TRIM, NCQ, and S.M.A.R.T.

• Standard ATA-8 command specifically for SSDs supported by Windows 7
• Host uses TRIM to let SSD know which data blocks are no longer in use
• SSD can free up unused blocks to use for data management and maintaining drive performance
• Use of TRIM prevents slowdown of drive throughout its lifespan when it becomes full of data
• WD SiliconEdge Blue supports TRIM without the need of an external utility

WD SiliconEdge Blue Certified in WD FIT Lab:

• Over 130,000 hours of test time on this product
• WD exclusive firmware ensures maximum compatibility and reliability
• Tested on hundreds of netbooks, notebooks, PCs, and RAID systems for compatibility, reliability, and ease of integration
• Tested on 32-bit and 64-bit Windows XP, Vista, Windows 7, and Linux operating systems

About WD: Western Digital Corporation

WD is the brand name for Western Digital Corporation. WD, one of the storage industry's pioneers and long-time leaders, provides products and services for people and organizations that collect, manage and use digital information. The company produces reliable, high-performance drives that keep users' data accessible and secure from loss. WD applies its storage expertise to consumer products for external, portable and shared storage applications.

WD was founded in 1970. The company's storage products are marketed to leading systems manufacturers, selected resellers and retailers under the Western Digital and WD brand names. Visit the Investor section of the company's Web site (www.westerndigital.com) to access a variety of financial and investor information.

JMicron JMF612 Performance

The ATTO Disk Benchmark program is free, and offers a comprehensive set of test variables to work with. In terms of disk performance, it measures interface transfer rates at various intervals for a user-specified length and then reports read and write speeds for these spot-tests. There are some minor improvements made to the 2.34 version of the program, but the benchmark is still limited to non-linear samples up to 256MB. ATTO Disk Benchmark requires that an active partition be set on the drive being tested. Please consider the results displayed by this benchmark to be basic bandwidth speed performance indicators.

Our basic bandwidth speed tests begin with the WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD connected to the integrated Marvell SE9128 3rd-Generation SATA-6.0Gbps adapter, as the ATTO Disk Benchmark tools performs file transfers ranging from 0.5 KB to 8192 KB. The 256GB model SSC-D0256SC-2100 reveals 245 MBps maximum read speed that peaks at 128KB and plateaus from 256-8192 KB file chunks, and the 186 MBps peak write bandwidth plateaus from 64-8192 KB. The read-from results are extremely close and the write-to speeds surpass the stated 250/170 MBps maximum specified by Western Digital.

The latest edition of HD Tune Pro allows random access read and write testing, a feature not available to other similar software benchmark tools. HD-Tune is a low-level test that will not operate on a drive which contains a partition, so Benchmark Reviews uses DISKPART to prepare hardware and remove any partitions before conducting these tests. HD Tune Pro Random Access tests are divided into 512b, 4KB, 64KB, 1MB and random size test files sizes. The Random Access test measures the performance of random read or write operations. The amount of data which will be read varies from 512 bytes to 1 MB. Performance is reported in operations per second (IOPS), average access time, and average speed. Because it is our intent to compare one product against another, Benchmark Reviews has focused on 4KB and random transfer size IOPS performance.

Benchmark Reviews tested the 256GB WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD against a collection of top-performing desktop storage drives for our IOPS benchmarks. The HD-Tune 4KB random operational performance measured 4820 (18.83 MBps) read IOPS, and 2788 (10.9 MBps) for write. In comparison, the SATA 6Gb/s Marvell-based Crucial C300 offered 7941-IOPS (31 MBps) read and 2451 (9.6 MBps) write performance, while the Indilinx-based Corsair X256 scored 7444-IOPS (29.1 MBps) read and 16244 (63.5 MBps) write, whereas the Toshiba-based Kingston SSDNowV+ SNVP325 produced 4855-IOPS (19 MBps) read and 2583 (10.1 MBps) write.

The high-performance storage products tested with EVEREST Disk Benchmark are connected to the Marvell SE9128 3rd-Generation SATA-6.0Gbps adapter integrated on the Gigabyte GA-X58A-UD7 motherboard. Using the 1MB block size, read performance of the WD SiliconEdge-Blue 256GB Solid State Drive measured an average 238.1 MBps with a similar maximum peak of 240.3 MBps. Linear write-to tests were next...

The waveform chart below illustrates how the buffer fails to keep-up with transfers, and makes linear write performance appear unsteady. The results seen here are still relatively consistent compared to most other SSD products we've tested in the past. The WD SiliconEdge-Blue recorded an average linear write-to speed of 181.4 MBps, with a maximum performance of 183.9 MBps. The buffer appears to falter every 8MB or so; although performance is only momentarily impacted and the average is still better than WD's stated write-to performance.

The WD SiliconEdge-Blue delivered 245/186 MBps peak read and writes speeds within ATTO Disk Benchmark, trailed by 246/187 MBps in CrystalDiskMark, while Everest reported a 238/181 MBps linear bandwidth speed. The read performance appears to average 243 MBps, which is slightly below spec, while the 185 MBps average read is above it. Input/Output performance was modest in Iometer and HD-Tune produced 4820 (18.83 MBps) read-IOPS with 2788 (10.9 MBps) write, indicating that the 256GB SSC-D0256SC-2100 model would perform extremely well for enthusiast consumers but not offer the high operational functionality needed for Enterprise server application.

Benchmark Reviews has tested the WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD, and the performance results were worthy of high-performance enthusiast computing. Based on our benchmark tests, the 256GB model SSC-D0256SC-2100 delivers a noteworthy 0.18 ms response time which assures a nearly-instant reactions when called upon, and showed no signs of real-world data-write stuttering during our tests (although Everest linear write tests shows some moments where the buffer transitioned). Based on the SATA-3.0Gbps JMicron JMF612 processor, the WD SiliconEdge-Blue SSD delivers native TRIM garbage collection and SMART support with impressive transfer speeds. Although a mini-USB port is supported by this JMicron controller and would have been a nice touch, any SATA-to-USB adapter cable or enclosure can be used to simplify the transition from a hard drive (see our Windows 7 System Image Disc Recovery guide). One drawback to Western Digital SSDs is that they lack any publicly available firmware updates and there no enthusiast community supporting the company.

As of March 2010, Western Digital has stocked their WD SiliconEdge-Blue Solid State Drives with worldwide distributors. Benchmark Reviews tested the 256GB SiliconEdge-Blue (model SSC-D0256SC-2100) for this article, which NewEgg lists for $799. If you're not going to need that much premium-priced storage capacity there's also the 128GB SiliconEdge-Blue SSD available (SSC-D0128SC-2100) selling for $449, or the affordable 64GB version (SSC-D0064SC-2100) offered for $249. Since Western Digital products are sold nearly everywhere, you can compare prices online and save money by using the Benchmark Reviews shopping tool.

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