CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card User Manual

CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card

Introduction

Features

• Solid state design with no moving parts
• Industry standard CFast Type I form factor
• Capacities from 8GB to 128GB
• Compliant with Serial ATA 3.1 specifications
• ATA-8 compatible and CFast 2.0 compliant
• Supports Serial ATA Generation I/II/III transfer rate of 1.5/3.0/6.0 Gbps
• Support the ATA SMART Feature Set
• Support the ATA Security Feature Set
• Supports TRIM commands
• Supports NCQ, max. queue depth of 32
• ECC capable of correcting up to 66-bit errors per 1KB
• Enhanced error correction, < 1 error in 1014 bits read
• SATA partial and slumber modes supported
• Optional Write Protect feature
• Voltage support: 3.3V±5%.

Cactus Technologies® CFast card is a high-capacity solid-state flash memory product that complies with the Serial ATA 3.1 standard and is functionally compatible with a SATA hard disk drive. Cactus Technologies® CFast cards provide up to 128GB of formatted storage capacity. Cactus Technologies® CFast product uses high-quality Industrial Grade MLC NAND flash memory from Kioxia Corporation. In addition, it includes an on-drive intelligent controller that manages interface protocols, data storage and retrieval, as well as ECC, defect handling and diagnostics, power management, and clock control. The controller’s firmware is upgradeable, thus allowing feature enhancements and firmware updates while keeping the BOM stable.

Supported Standards

Cactus Technologies® CFast card is fully compatible with the following specifications:

• ATA 8 Specification published by ANSI
• Serial ATA 3.1 Specification published by the Serial ATA International Organization
• CFast 2.0 Specification published by CFA

Product Features

Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast card contains a high-level, intelligent controller. This intelligent controller provides many capabilities, including the following:

• Standard ATA register and command set (same as found on most magnetic disk drives).
• Manages details of erasing and programming flash memory independent of the host system
• Sophisticated defect managing capabilities (similar to magnetic disk drives).
• Sophisticated system for error recovery using g powerful error correction code (ECC).
• Intelligent power management for low-power operation.

Host and Technology Independence

Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast card appears as a standard SATA disk drive to the host system. The drive utilizes a 512-byte sector, which is the same as that in an IDE magnetic disk drive. To write or read a sector (or multiple sectors), the host computer software simply issues an ATA Read or Write command to the drive as per the SATA protocol.

The host software then waits for the command to complete. The host system does not get involved in the details of how the flash memory is erased, programmed, or read, as this is all managed by the built-in controller in the drive. Also, with the intelligent on-board controller, the host system software will not require changing as new flash memory evolves. Thus, systems that support the Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast products today will continue to work with future Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast cards built with new flash technology without having to update or change host software.

Defect and Error Management

Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast card contains a sophisticated defect and error management system similar to those found in magnetic disk drives. The defect management is completely transparent to the host and does not consume any user data space.

The soft error rate for Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast card is much lower than that of magnetic disk drives. In the extremely rare case where a read error does occur, the drive has sophisticated ECC to recover the data. These defect and error management systems, coupled with the solid-state construction, give Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast cards unparalleled reliability.

Power Supply Requirements

Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast card operates at a voltage range of 3.3 volts ± 5%.

Product Specifications

For all the following specifications, values are defined at ambient temperature and nominal supply voltage unless otherwise stated.

System Environmental Specifications

System Power Requirements

NOTES: All values quoted are typical at ambient temperature and nominal supply voltage unless otherwise stated. Sleep mode is specified under the condition that all drive inputs are static CMOS  levels and in a “Not Busy“ operating state.

System Performance

All performance timings assume the drive controller is in the default (i.e., fastest) mode

System Reliability

Physical Specifications

The following sections provide the physical specifications for Cactus Technologies® Industrial   MLC CFast products.

CFast Card Physical Specifications

Figure 2-1. Type I CFast Card Dimensions

Figure 2-2. Type I CFast Card Write Protect Switch Dimensions

Capacities

Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast cards are available in the following capacities:

• Std. Temp. 8GB 16GB 32GB 64GB 128GB
• Ext. Temp. 16GB 32GB 64GB 128GB

Interface Description

The following sections provide detailed information on the Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC CFast card interface.

CFast Pin Assignments and Pin Type

Cactus Technologies® CFast signal pinout conforms to CFA specifications. The signal/pin assignments and descriptions are listed in Table 3-5.

Table 3-5. CFast Pin Assignments and Pin Type

1. These signals are provided for backwards compatibility with CFast v1.1; these signals may be used for different purposes in the future.
2. IFDet shall be connected to GND on Cfast v2.0 compliant devices. The
3. DEVSLP feature is not supported; pin PC3 shall be No Connect.

Electrical Specifications

The following table defines all D.C. Characteristics for the CFast products. Unless otherwise stated, conditions are:

Vcc = 3.3V ± 5%
Ta = -40°C to 85°C

Absolute Maximum Ratings

AC Characteristics

Cactus Technologies® CFast products conform to all AC timing requirements as specified in the CFA specifications. Please refer to that document for details of AC timing for all operation modes of the device.

ATA Drive Register Set Definition and Protocol

The communication to or from the CFast card is done using FIS. Legacy ATA protocol is supported by using the legacy mode defined in the SATA specifications. In this mode, the FIS has defined fields that provide all the necessary ATA task file registers for control and status information. The Serial ATA interface does not support Primary/Secondary or Master/Slave configurations. Each SATA channel supports only one SATA device, with the register selection as defined by the ATA standard.

ATA Task File Definitions

The following sections describe the usage of the ATA task file registers. Note that the Alternate Status Register of legacy ATA is not defined for SATA drives.

Data Register

The Data Register is a 16-bit register, and it is used to transfer data blocks between the SSD data buffer and the Host.

Error Register

This register contains additional information about the source of an error when an error is indicated in bit 0 of the Status register. The bits are defined as follows:

Feature Register

This register provides information regarding features of the SSD that the host can utilize.

Sector Count Register

This register contains the number of sectors of data requested to be transferred on a read or write operation between the host and the SSD. If the value in this register is zero, a count of 256 sectors is specified. If the command was successful, this register is zero at command completion. If not completed, the register contains the number of sectors that need to be transferred in order to complete the request.

Sector Number (LBA 7-0) Register

This register contains the starting sector number or bits 7-0 of the Logical Block Address (LBA) for any SSD data access for the subsequent command.

Cylinder Low (LBA 15-8) Register

This register contains the low-order 8 bits of the starting cylinder address or bits 15-8 of the Logical Block Address.

Cylinder High (LBA 23-16) Register

This register contains the high-order bits of the starting cylinder address or bits 23-16 of the Logical Block Address.

Drive/Head (LBA 27-24) Register

The Drive/Head register is used to select the drive and head. It is also used to select LBA addressing instead of cylinder/head/sector addressing. The bits are defined as follows:

• Bit 7 This bit is set to 1.
• Bit 6 LBA is a flag to select either Cylinder/Head/Sector (CHS) or Logical Block Address Mode (LBA). When LBA=0, Cylinder/Head/Sector mode is selected. When LBA=1, Logical Block Address is selected. In Logical Block Mode, the Logical Block Address is interpreted as follows:
  • LBA07-LBA00: Sector Number Register D7-D0.
  • LBA15-LBA08: Cylinder Low Register D7-D0.
  • LBA23-LBA16: Cylinder High Register D7-D0.
  • LBA27-LBA24: Drive/Head Register bits HS3-HS0.
• Bit 5 This bit is set to 1.
• Bit 4 (DRV): DRV is the drive number. This should always be set to 0.
• Bit 3 (HS3) When operating in the Cylinder, Head, Sector mode, this is bit 3 of the head number. It is Bit 27 in the Logical Block Address mode.
• Bit 2 (HS2) When operating in the Cylinder, Head, Sector mode, this is bit 2 of the head number. It is Bit 26 in the Logical Block Address mode.
• Bit 1 (HS1) When operating in the Cylinder, Head, Sector mode, this is bit 1 of the head number. It is Bit 25 in the Logical Block Address mode.
• Bit 0 (HS0) When operating in the Cylinder, Head, Sector mode, this is bit 0 of the head number. It is Bit 24 in the Logical Block Address mode.

Status Registers

These registers return the status when read by the host. Reading the Status register does clear a pending interrupt, while reading the Auxiliary Status register does not. The meaning of the status bit is described as follows:

• Bit 7 (BUSY) The busy bit is set when the device has access to the command buffer and registers and the host is locked out from accessing the command register and buffer. No other bits in this register are valid when this bit is set to a 1.
• Bit 6 (RDY) RDY indicates whether the device is capable of performing operations requested by the host. This bit is cleared at power up and remains cleared until the device is ready to accept a command.
• Bit 5 (DWF) This bit, if set, indicates a write fault has occurred.
• Bit 4 (DSC) This bit is set when the device is ready.
• Bit 3 (DRQ) The Data Request is set when the device requires that information be transferred either to or from the host through the Data register.
• Bit 2 (CORR) This bit is set when a Correctable data error has been encountered and the data has been corrected. This condition does not terminate a multi-sector read operation.
• Bit 1 (IDX) This bit is always set to 0.
• Bit 0 (ERR) This bit is set when the previous command has ended in some type of error. The bits i  the Error register contain additional information describing the error.

Device Control Register

This register is used to control the drive interrupt request and to issue an ATA soft reset to the drive. The bits are defined as follows:

• Bit 7: This bit is used in 48-bit addressing mode. When cleared, the host can read the most recently written values of the Sector Count,  Drive/Head, and LBA registers. When set, the host will read previously written values of these registers. A write to any Command block register will clear this bit.
• Bit 6 This bit is an X (Do not care).
• Bit 5 This bit is an X (Do not care).
• Bit 4 This bit is an X (Do not care).
• Bit 3 This bit is ignored by the drive.
• Bit 2 (SW Rst)This bit is set to 1 in order to force the drive to perform an AT Disk controller Soft Reset operation. The drive remains in Reset until this bit is reset to ‘0’.
• Bit 1 (-IEn) The Interrupt Enable bit enables interrupts when the bit is 0. When the bit is 1, interrupts from the drive are disabled. This bit is set to 0 at power-on and Reset.
• Bit 0 This bit is ignored by the drive.

Drive Address Register

This register is provided for compatibility with the AT disk drive interface. It is recommended that this register not be mapped into the host’s I/O space because of potential conflicts on Bit 7. The bits are defined as follows:

• Bit 7 This bit is unknown. Implementation Note: Conflicts may occur on the host data bus when this bit is provided by a Floppy Disk Controller operating at the same addresses as the SSD. The following are some possible solutions to this problem:
  1. Locate the SSD at a non-conflicting address (i.e., Secondary address (377) when a Floppy Disk Controller is located at the Primary addresses).
  2. Do not install a Floppy and an SSD in the system at the same time.
  3. Implement a socket adapter that can be programmed to (conditionally) tri-state D7 of I/0 address 3F7/377 when a SSD product is installed and conversely to tri-state D6-D0 of I/O address 3F7/377 when a floppy controller is installed.
  4. Do not use the SSD’s Drive Address register. This may be accomplished by either a)iff possible, program the host adapter to enable only I/O addresses 1F0-1F7, 3F6 (or 170- 177, 176) to the SSD, or b) if provide,d use an additional Primary/Secondary configuration in the SSD that does not respond to accesses to I/O locations 3F7 and 377. With either of these implementations, the host software must not attempt to use information in the Drive Address Register.
• Bit 6 (-WTG) This bit is 0 when a write operation is in progress;s, otherwise, it is 1.
• Bit 5 (-HS3) This bit is the negation of bit 3 in the Drive/Head register.
• Bit 4 (-HS2) This bit is the negation of bit 2 in the Drive/Head register.
• Bit 3 (-HS1) This bit is the negation of bit 1 in the Drive/Head register.
• Bit 2 (-HS0) This bit is the negation of bit 0 in the Drive/Head register.
• Bit 1 (-nDS1) This bit is 0 when drive 1 is active and selected.
• Bit 0 (-nDS0) This bit is 0 when the drive 0 is active and selected.

ATA Command Description

This section defines the ATA command set supported by the Cactus Technologies® CFast card.

ATA Command Set

Identify Drive—ECH

The Identify Drive command enables the host to receive parameter information from the drive. This command has the same protocol as the Read Sector(s) command. The CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card parameter words in the buffer have the arrangement and meanings defined in Table 5-7. All reserved bits or words are zero. Table 5-7 is the definition for each field in the Identify Drive Information.

Table 5-7. Identify Drive Information

S.M.A.R.T. Feature Set

Cactus Technologies® -240 Series CFast card supports S.M.A.R.T. attribute reporting. The following subcommands are supported when programmed into the Feature Register:

S.M.A.R.T Data Structure

The Read Data commands return 512 bytes of data in the following structure:

S.M.A.R.T. Attributes

The following table lists the attributes returned in bytes 2-361 of the 512-byte SMART data. Each attribute has 12 bytes; byte 0 is the Attribute ID, bytes 1-2 are status flags, and bytes 3-4 are reserved flags. The table below shows the definition of bytes 5-11:

Write Protect Feature

Cactus Technologies® -240 Series CFast card supports an optional Write Protect function using a physical write protect switch. When the switch is toggled to the WP position, the card is write-protected. The setting of the switch is sensed only during power-up time; changing the CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card setting of this switch after power-up will not alter the write-protect behavior. However, to avoid any unintended side effects, it is recommended that this switch not be toggled when power is applied to the card.

When the write-protect function is enabled, all data write commands to the card will be accepted, but the write data will be silently discarded. The card will follow all the data transfer handshake and will return a successful status to the host. This method of handling write protection provides the best compatibility to host systems, as simply rejecting write commands and returning an error status may cause some operating systems to hang.

Appendix A. Ordering Information

Model KCXFY-240S-WP1 

Where: X is the drive capacities:

• 8G —————- 8GB
• 16G ————– 16GB
• 32G ————– 32GB
• 64G ————– 64GB
• 128G ———— 128GB

Where: Y is temperature grade: blank ———— standard temp.  I ——————- extended temp.Where: WP1 is optional Write Protect feature: blank ———— standard WP1 ————– w/ Write Protect switch

Example

1. 8GB CFast ———————————————————– KC8GF-240S
2. 16GB extended temp. CFast ———————————- KC16GFI-240S
3. 8GB CFast w/ Write Protect ———————————— KC8GF-240S-WP1

Technical Support Services

Email: tech@cactus-tech.com

Appendix Cactus Technologies® Worldwide Sales Offices

Email: sales@cactus-tech.com
Email: americas@cactus-tech.com

Limited Warranty

WARRANTY STATEMENT

Cactus Technologies® warrants its Industrial MLC Grade products to be free of any defects in materials or workmanship that would prevent them from functioning properly for two years from the date of purchase or when estimated TBW is reached, whichever occurs first. This CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card express warranty is extended by Cactus Technologies® Limited to customers of our products.

GENERAL PROVISIONS

This warranty sets forth the full extent of Cactus Technologies®’ responsibilities regarding the Cactus Technologies® Industrial MLC Grade Flash Storage Products. Cactus Technologies®, at its sole option, will repair, replace, cease, or refund the purchase price of the defective product. Cactus Technologies® guarantees our products meet all specifications detailed in our product manuals. Although Cactus Technologies® products are designed to withstand harsh environments CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card and have the highest specifications in the industry, they are not warranted to never fail, and Cactus Technologies® does not warrant against incidental or consequential damages. Accordingly, in any use of products in life support systems or other applications where failure could cause injury or loss of life, the products should only be incorporated in systems designed with appropriate redundancy, fault-tolerant tolerant or backup features.

WHAT THIS WARRANTY COVERS

For products found to be defective within two years of purchase, Cactus Technologies® will have the option of repairing, replacing, or refunding the purchase price of the defective product, if the following conditions are met:

• The defective product is returned to Cactus Technologies® for CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card failure analysis as soon as possible after the failure occurs.
• An incident card filled out by the user, explaining the conditions of usage and the nature of the failure, accompanies each returned defective product.
• No evidence is found of abuse or operation of products not in accordance with the published specifications, or of exceeding maximum ratings or operating conditions.

All failing products returned to Cactus Technologies® under the provisions of this limited warranty shall be tested to the product’s functional and performance specifications. Upon CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card confirmation of failure, each product will be analyzed, by whatever means necessary, to determine the root cause of failure. If the root cause of failure is found to be not covered by the above provisions, CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card then the product will be returned to the customer with a report indicating why the failure was not covered under the warranty. This warranty does not cover defects, malfunctions, performance failures, or damages to the unit resulting from use in other than its normal manner, misuse, accident, or neglect; or improper alterations or repairs. Cactus Technologies® Limited may repair or replace, at its discretion, any product returned by its customers, even if such product is not covered under warranty, but is under no obligation to do so.

RECEIVING WARRANTY SERVICE

According to Cactus Technologies®’s warranty procedure, a defective product should be returned only with prior authorization from Cactus Technologies® Limited. Please CACTUS Industrial MLC-240S Series CFast Card contact Cactus Technologies® Customer Service department (tech@cactus-tech.com) with the following information: product model number and description, nature of defect, conditions of use, proof of purchase, and purchase date. If approved, Cactus Technologies® will issue a Return Material Authorization or Product Repair Authorization number with shipping instructions.

FAQs

What is the CACTUS MLC-240S CFast card used for?

An industrial-grade flash storage device, the MLC-240S Series CFast card is intended for use in embedded systems, industrial automation, transportation, defence, and medical applications where high performance, durability, and dependability are essential.

What type of NAND flash is used in this CFast card?

It makes use of MLC (Multi-Level Cell) NAND flash, which strikes a compromise between long durability and cost effectiveness, making it perfect for moderate to high write workloads in industrial settings.

What form factor and interface does it use?

With its SATA III (6Gbps) interface and adherence to the CFast 2.0 standard, the card provides fast data transfers and is compatible with CFast slots found in industrial devices.

Does the card support power loss protection (PLP)?

Power Loss Protection is a feature of certain MLC-240S CFast models that protects in-flight data in the event of unplanned power outages. For confirmation, consult the particular part number or datasheet.

. What capacities are available for this series?

Capabilities typically vary from 4GB to 512GB, contingent on the particular setup. The read/write intensity and storage requirements of your application will determine the capacity to use.

Is data encryption supported?

Some devices can have hardware encryption with AES-256. To find out if encryption is available, consult Cactus Technologies or the datasheet for your product.

Can the CFast card be used as a boot device?

Indeed. Systems that allow booting via SATA-based CFast interfaces can use the MLC-240S CFast card as a bootable device.

How is endurance compared to consumer-grade cards?

This card’s MLC NAND and industrial firmware provide much greater write endurance than their consumer counterparts, allowing for thousands of program/erase (P/E) cycles and improved data retention under load.