Intel Corp. and Micron Technology today unveiled a high speed NAND flash memory technology that can greatly enhance the access and transfer of data in devices that use silicon for storage. The new technology – developed jointly by Intel and Micron and manufactured by the companies' NAND flash joint venture, IM Flash Technologies (IMFT) – is five times faster than conventional NAND.

The new high speed NAND can reach speeds up to 200MB/s for reading data and 100MB/s for writing data, achieved by leveraging the new ONFI 2.0 specification and a four-plane architecture with higher clock speeds. In comparison, conventional single level cell NAND is limited to 40MB/s for reading data and less than 20MB/s for writing data.

“The computing market is embracing NAND-based solutions to accelerate system performance through the use of caching and solid-state drives. At up to five times the performance over conventional NAND, the high speed NAND from Intel and Micron, based on the ONFi 2.0 industry standard, will enable new embedded solutions and removable solutions that take advantage of high–performance system interfaces, including PCIe and upcoming standards such as USB 3.0,” said Pete Hazen, director of marketing, Intel NAND Products Group.

Substantially boosted performance of NAND flash memory devices will allow many devices to operate much faster and will enable new features or even types of devices.