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Distro Issue 42 lands with the Engadget Summer Gear Guide, a handsome new look and more!

Billy Steele — Fri, 25 May 2012 09:15:00 EST

Get ready, folks. We've got quite the treat for you this week. Not only do we have a brand spanking new issue of our weekly for your peepers to consume this weekend, but we've redesigned said e-publication as well. Of course, the real star this week is the Summer Gear Guide. That's right, our editors have painstakingly selected their top choices in all of the major categories to keep you blazin' the balmy trail with the best gadget arsenal possible. To go along with the refined digs, we introduce some new pages this week, too. Time Machines will test your geek cred by removing the easily identifiable logos from a classic device for your trivia pleasure. We'll also go eyes-on each week with some quite dapper offerings to satisfy the design nerd inside us all. Speaking of recent additions, we break down our recent hands-on impressions while Reaction Time offers some thoughts on next-gen gaming and upcoming releases. Switched On chats about what's next for Facebook, the Stat tallies the rise of mobile apps in the last year, Fusion-io CEO and Chairman David Flynn admits his love of Flowbee in the Q&A and Sean Pryor returns for The Strip. So, what are you waiting for? Hit the download link below that you fancy the most and you'll have a copy of this week's e-magazine before you know it.

Distro Issue 42 PDF
Distro in the iTunes App Store
Distro in the Google Play Store
Distro APK (For sideloading)
Like Distro on Facebook
Follow Distro on Twitter

Distro Issue 42 lands with the Engadget Summer Gear Guide, a handsome new look and more! originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 25 May 2012 09:15:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io SDK gives developers native memory access, keys to the NAND realm

James Trew — Fri, 20 Apr 2012 02:07:00 EST

Thought your SATA SSD chugged along real nice? Think again. Fusion-io has just released an SDK that will allow developers to bypass all the speed draining bottlenecks that rob NAND memory of its true potential (i.e. the kernel block I/O layer,) and tap directly into the memory itself. In fact, Fusion-io is so confident of its products abilities, it prefers to call them ioMemory Application Accelerators, rather than SSDs. The SDK allows developers native access to the ioMemory, meaning applications can benefit from the kind of hardware integration you might get from a proprietary platform. The principle has already been demonstrated earlier this year, when Fusion-io delivered one billion IOPS using this native access. The libraries and APIs are available now to registered members of its developer program, hit the more coverage link to sign up.

Continue reading Fusion-io SDK gives developers native memory access, keys to the NAND realm

Fusion-io SDK gives developers native memory access, keys to the NAND realm originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 20 Apr 2012 02:07:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io announces ioFX, a super-SSD that's already garnered an Oscar

Daniel Cooper — Thu, 12 Apr 2012 08:30:00 EST

You've heard of Fusion-io, right? It produces super-SSDs with the teeth-whitening ioMemory that's so fast it can manage a billion input and output operations every second. Now it's bundling that gear into a workstation PCIe card for FX professionals and speed-conscious multi millionaires. Capable of delivering 1.5GB/s (we checked, GB/s) of bandwidth, it's capable of previewing 3D movie effects on the fly. The gear's even managed to cover itself in Academy awards after it was used by studio Pixomondo on the special effects for Martin Scorsese's "Hugo." A 420GB model will arrive in late Spring, setting you (or more likely, your departmental budget) back $2,495 with an inclusive one-year support contract.

Continue reading Fusion-io announces ioFX, a super-SSD that's already garnered an Oscar

Fusion-io announces ioFX, a super-SSD that's already garnered an Oscar originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 12 Apr 2012 08:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io breaks one billion IOPS barrier, pauses to congratulate itself

Darren Murph — Fri, 06 Jan 2012 20:35:00 EST

Let's get a little perspective, shall we? Corsair's Force Series 3 SSD -- a wholly awesome product in its own right -- is capable of hitting around 85,000 IOPS. On a good day. Fusion-io has been pushing the NAND storage envelope for years now, but even its recently-unveiled ioDrives deliver between 700,000 and 900,000 IOPS. Today, however, the company's pausing to pat itself squarely on the back -- and rightfully so. It managed to achieve one billion input and output operations per second in a technology demonstration conducted at DEMO Enterprise: An Evening of Innovation.

We're told that it was during a preview of the company's latency reducing Auto Commit Memory (ACM) extension, part of the Fusion ioMemory subsystem, and that it's "rethinking how to provide powerful modern CPUs with the data they need through sophisticated software architectures." The demo utilized eight HP ProLiant DL370 servers, each equipped with eight ioDrive2 Duos, to break the one billion IOP barrier when transferring 64 byte data packets. 'Course, that'd probably cost you a few dozen years of work if you were to buy such a setup yourself, but hey -- at least someone's working to eliminate the mechanical drive sooner rather than later, right?

Continue reading Fusion-io breaks one billion IOPS barrier, pauses to congratulate itself

Fusion-io breaks one billion IOPS barrier, pauses to congratulate itself originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 06 Jan 2012 20:35:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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NVIDIA, Fusion-io and HP drive a dozen 1080p streams on four displays at SIGGRAPH (video)

Darren Murph — Tue, 09 Aug 2011 17:50:00 EST

A dozen uncompressed 1080p video feeds, simultaneously running off a single workstation. Yep, you're looking at it. NVIDIA's showcase piece here at SIGGRAPH was undoubtedly this wall -- a monster that trumps even Intel's CES wall in terms of underlying horsepower. A relatively stock HP Z800 workstation was loaded with the NVIDIA QuadroPlex 7000 Visual Computing System (that's four GPUs, for those counting) in order to push four HD panels. A pair of Fusion-io's ioDrive Duos were pushing a total of three gigabytes per second, enabling all 12 of the feeds to cycle through with nary a hint of lag. We're still a few years out from this being affordable enough for the common Earthling, but who says you need to wait that long to get a taste? Vid's after the break, hombre.

Gallery: NVIDIA, Fusion-io and HP drive a dozen 1080p streams on four displays

Continue reading NVIDIA, Fusion-io and HP drive a dozen 1080p streams on four displays at SIGGRAPH (video)

NVIDIA, Fusion-io and HP drive a dozen 1080p streams on four displays at SIGGRAPH (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 09 Aug 2011 17:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io IPO filing discloses list of prestigious clients, led by Facebook

Vlad Savov — Thu, 10 Mar 2011 05:25:00 EST

Before last week, we'd gone well over a year without discussing solid state storage purveyors Fusion-io -- and their extremely expensive and expeditious flash drives -- but things seem to have been ticking along just fine behind the scenes. While the company's unlikely to have sold many ioDrives to good old Joe Consumer, its upcoming IPO application features an impressive list of corporate clients, highlighted by Facebook, its biggest customer, IBM, HP, and Credit Suisse -- the latter using Fusion-io technology to speed up the mathematical alchemy of making money where there was none before. Taken together with strategic investments from Samsung and Dell, these deals paint a rosy outlook for the Woz-employing startup, however it's worth noting that profitability is still a decent way away. Fusion-io's rapid growth is costing it more than it's making at the moment, which is most likely to have catalyzed its current decision to go public and collect its biggest round of investments yet. Let's hope the investor prospectus includes a forecast for when things like the ioXtreme might actually become affordable to non-millionaires, eh?

Continue reading Fusion-io IPO filing discloses list of prestigious clients, led by Facebook

Fusion-io IPO filing discloses list of prestigious clients, led by Facebook originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 10 Mar 2011 05:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Supermicro and Fusion-io team up to deliver new SuperServers

Michael Gorman — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 08:29:00 EST

Fusion-io's been in the flash memory game for some time, but until now it has been known primarily for screamingly fast PCI Express-mounted flash storage solutions with wallet-crushing prices. Those drives are primarily aimed at the enterprise market, so it seems logical for the company to now enter into an OEM agreement with Supermicro to make NAND Flash servers. The aptly, if not modestly, named SuperServers can perform over 2.2 million sequential I/O operations per second (IOPS) and over 1.4 million random IOPS -- for comparison, the OCZ SSDs we saw at CES are an order of magnitude slower in IOPS, and they aren't exactly sluggish. Supermicro also claims that the new servers speed up enterprise applications by ten times while using only one-tenth of the power. Impressive numbers to be sure, but we shudder to think of how much the SuperServers will cost. A second mortgage for a server's a sound financial decision, right? PR's after the break.

Continue reading Supermicro and Fusion-io team up to deliver new SuperServers

Supermicro and Fusion-io team up to deliver new SuperServers originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 02 Mar 2011 08:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io ioXtreme PCI Express SSD reviewed: wicked fast, bloody expensive

Darren Murph — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:23:00 EST

Okay, so maybe you didn't need a full-on review to tell you that Fusion-io's ioXtreme PCI Express SSD was staggeringly pricey, but at $11 per gigabyte ($895 for 80GB), you may want to turn a blind eye right now if you're short on disposable income. If you've managed to continue on, then you owe it to your collective senses to give the read link a look. The gurus over at HotHardware were able to get one of these lightning fast devices in for review, and while we were always assured that performance would be mind blowing, it's another thing entirely to see those promises proven in the lab. Critics found the card to be the "fastest overall SSD solution on the market today," with consistent 700MB/sec reads and 300MB/sec writes. Of course, they were still anxious to get their hands on a supposedly forthcoming update to make this thing bootable, and the omission of a RAID BIOS definitely put a small damper on things; still, it's hard to let annoyance such as those overshadow the monster performance numbers, but we'd recommend giving the full skinny a good lookin' at before committing your child's college education fund to a pile of NAND.

Filed under: Storage

Fusion-io ioXtreme PCI Express SSD reviewed: wicked fast, bloody expensive originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 16 Nov 2009 17:23:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io ioXtreme and ioXtreme Pro PCI Express SSDs sneak out

Darren Murph — Tue, 27 Oct 2009 15:21:00 EST

Mmm, flash. Fusion-io's product line has largely targeted enterprise users, but with the introduction of the ioXtreme PCI Express SSD back at E3, it was clear that the next-gen storage outfit was serious about breaking into the consumer market. Today, the 80GB ioXtreme and ioXtreme Pro (which was previously unheard of) have both broke cover over at Hot Hardware, with the former being useful for single-drive installs and the latter good for multi-drive setups. We should note that Fusion-io is obviously behind schedule on these, and there still doesn't look to be a definite price and release for the laypeople out there. That said, if the company's shipping out products that punch out an average write rate of 300MB/sec and read rate of 775MB/sec (yes, seriously), we'd say it's darn near ready for the real world.

Filed under: Storage

Fusion-io ioXtreme and ioXtreme Pro PCI Express SSDs sneak out originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 27 Oct 2009 15:21:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Samsung invests in Fusion-io, takes relationship to 'a new level'

Vlad Savov — Wed, 21 Oct 2009 04:55:00 EST

Specializing in PCI Express-mounted flash storage, Fusion-io has managed to not only survive in these tough economic times, but garner additional investments from some clearly impressed onlookers. Loathe to be left out of the loop, Samsung -- the world's biggest NAND flash manufacturer and also Fusion-io's chief supplier -- has thrown some cash at the young startup company, and declared that the pair are now officially dating. Or, in their parlance, they've agreed to "jointly evaluate technology for new SSD applications." Samsung won't have any board level influence, but providing a reliable supply chain and the clout of its name should ensure that Fusion-io is around long enough for us to eventually be able to afford an ioDrive.

[Via PC World]

Filed under: Storage

Samsung invests in Fusion-io, takes relationship to 'a new level' originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 21 Oct 2009 04:55:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fatal1ty teams with Fusion-io to launch 80GB ioXtreme PCI Express SSD

Darren Murph — Sat, 06 Jun 2009 23:29:00 EST

Up until now, Fusion-io's glorious creations have largely been priced out of consideration for general consumers. During E3, however, the storage gurus teamed up with Johnathan "Fatal1ty" Wendel in order to debut a consumer-level PCI Express SSD card. Engineered to provide wicked fast transfer rates within high-performance PCs, the ioXtreme is an 80GB PCI Express card that should make your traditional HDD seem absolutely antiquated. Better still, it's slated to ship next month for the not-too-terribly-egregious price of $895, which certainly gets you into the game for a lot less than OCZ's (admittedly more capacious) Z-Drive.

Gallery: Fatal1ty teams with Fusion-io to launch 80GB ioXtreme PCI Express SSD

Filed under: Storage

Fatal1ty teams with Fusion-io to launch 80GB ioXtreme PCI Express SSD originally appeared on Engadget on Sat, 06 Jun 2009 23:29:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io nabs more funding, teases new PCIe-based ioSAN

Darren Murph — Tue, 07 Apr 2009 14:52:00 EST

Given Fusion-io's dominance in the SSD-on-a-PCIe-card arena, we aren't at all shocked to hear that it just landed a nice fat check in its Series B funding efforts. $47.5 million, to be precise. According to the firm, it'll use the dough to buy bottled unicorns, a kilo of fairy dust and "increase production capabilities" in order to pump out more wares (and hopefully at lower prices). One of those products, we're told, will be the summer-bound ioSAN, which is explained as a "PCI Express-based product that extends the raw power of Fusion-io's solid-state technology across the network." In related news, the company also selected David Bradford to be its CEO, instantly making him one of the most fortunate bigwigs in the world right now.

[Via HotHardware]

Filed under: Storage, Networking

Fusion-io nabs more funding, teases new PCIe-based ioSAN originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 07 Apr 2009 14:52:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io breaks out roomy, nimble ioDrive Duo SSDs

Darren Murph — Wed, 11 Mar 2009 16:53:00 EST

While it's going to be tough for Fusion-io to get its ioDrive any faster in the near term, it ain't so tough to make the world's fastest storage more capacious. Shortly after pulling The Woz in as its chief scientist, said outfit has just revealed the next-generation ioDrive, predictably coined ioDrive Duo. The PCI Express-based solution throws 160GB, 320GB, 640GB or 1.28TB of stupid fast SSD storage directly onto your motherboard, enabling it to boast sustained read bandwidth of 1,500MB/sec and write bandwidth of 1,400MB/sec. The smallest three will be available next month for prices we don't even want to guess, while the 1.28TB model is slated to ship shortly after OCZ's 1TB Z Drive in the latter half of 2009.

[Via HotHardware]

Filed under: Storage

Fusion-io breaks out roomy, nimble ioDrive Duo SSDs originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 11 Mar 2009 16:53:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io's ioDrive tested: world's fastest storage confirmed

Thomas Ricker — Thu, 11 Dec 2008 05:30:00 EST

See all those little Samsung squares? That's NAND flash memory, 80 gigabytes worth on Fusion-io's ioDrive. Tweaktown got an exclusive look at the PCIe storage card and came away mightily impressed by its "near nonexistent latency." It's faster than the best SATA II SSD or fastest 15,000RPM drive loaded in an 8 drive RAID config. Put simply, it's the fastest storage device they've ever tested. Tweaktown was so impressed that they proclaim, "Fusion-io has raised the bar so high that once adopted, traditional solutions will be considered legacy products." Mind you, this is enterprise class storage designed for data center servers requiring ultra-fast IO. Still, the only thing preventing you from installing it inside your own 64-bit OS (only) gaming rig is the price: the 80GB ioDrive lists for about $3,000 on up to $14,400 for the 320GB model. Yeah, expensive, but not for your CIO. Eveyone else will have to wait for the consumer model said to be in the works. Hit the read link for all the benchmarks.

Filed under: Storage

Fusion-io's ioDrive tested: world's fastest storage confirmed originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 11 Dec 2008 05:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Video: Micron's Washington PCIe prototype SSD card is wicked quick

Darren Murph — Fri, 05 Dec 2008 09:10:00 EST

Up until now, Fusion-io's ioDrive has pretty much put every other SSD-on-a-PCIe-card to shame in terms of sheer performance, but it just might be looking at its first formidable competitor in the Micron Washington. The prototype device was recently showcased on video (posted after the break), and while we're not told how capacious it is, it is understood to be using 64-bit SLC NAND chips. When placed in a Xeon-powered server, the unit is able to achieve 150,000 to 160,000 random write IOPS with a bandwidth of 800MB/sec per card. Micron is convinced that it can reach a bandwidth of 1GB/sec and 200,000 IOPS with this technology, though Fusion-io's CTO proclaims that users can achieve "over 6GB per second" when using eight of its ioDrives in conjunction. Of course, the aforementioned ioDrive is actually shipping, whereas this elusive Washington doodad won't see commercial light until at least 2010.

[Via The Register, thanks Vik]

Continue reading Video: Micron's Washington PCIe prototype SSD card is wicked quick

Filed under: Storage

Video: Micron's Washington PCIe prototype SSD card is wicked quick originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 05 Dec 2008 09:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Fusion-io's ioDrive puts power of a SAN on a PCIe card

Darren Murph — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 09:22:00 EST

In a recent demonstration at DEMOFall '07, Fusion-io showed off its newest PCIe device, which reportedly "places the power of a SAN (storage area network) in the palm of your hand." Essentially, this single device boasts up to 640GB of storage capacity, delivers 100,000 IOPS (input / output per second) and can achieve sustained data rates of 800Mb/sec (read) and 600Mb/sec (write)." In marketing terms, the ioDrive can perform "nearly a thousand times faster than any existing disk drive," and it can reportedly be integrated into existing data centers or workstations without any alterations to your infrastructure. Next quarter, the outfit will begin shipping the card in 40GB, 80GB, 160GB and 320GB configurations (with the 640GB flavor to follow suit), but unfortunately, official prices have not yet been divulged. Oh, and be sure to check out a video of the ioDrive's unveiling here.

[Via TGDaily]

Filed under: Storage

Fusion-io's ioDrive puts power of a SAN on a PCIe card originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Sep 2007 09:22:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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