Adaptec, Inc. today unveiled a technology at the heart of a new ASIC that it said optimizes Ultra320 SCSI performance by bolstering data transfer rates and minimizing the overhead of handling data and commands under the Ultra320 SCSI protocol.
According to Adaptec, its new Seamless Streaming technology maximizes Ultra320 SCSI data transfer rates by allowing a SCSI target, such as a disk drive, to stream packets of data for different commands with minimum switching time. To streamline data and command management, Adaptec said Seamless Streaming technology sends multiple commands in a single connection (Ultra160 technology allows the transfer of just one command per connection), eliminating latency between the commands and allowing up to 512 commands to be rapidly retrieved from its matrix command management queue.
Seamless Streaming technology is at the core of Adaptec’s new Ultra320 SCSI ASIC — the AIC-7902 — a dual-channel chip that is the foundation for a broad family of Adaptec Ultra320 SCSI and Ultra320 SCSI RAID controllers that the company said will begin launching early this year, as well as a key building block of a complete Ultra320 SCSI solution. According to the company, the chip supports all major operating systems and offers a forward pin-compatible path from the AIC-7899W for easy migration from Ultra160 to Ultra320 SCSI.