Texas Memory Systems 320 User Manual

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Chapter 1  – Introduction 
 
1.1   Overview 
The RamSan-3xx series solid-state disk uses SDRAM (memory) as its 
primary storage.  This technology enables practically instantaneous data 
access, which results in dramatic application performance increases. 
 
Texas Memory Systems (TMS) designed the RamSan to be highly available 
and fault tolerant.  The system has higher availability than RAID or JBOD 
systems because the primary storage media is SDRAM, which does not 
require moving parts.  Additionally, SDRAM has a very high mean time 
between failures (as high as several hundred years) according to some 
studies.  The mechanical components in the RamSan are redundant and 
hot swappable. 
 
The RamSan-320/325’s internal disk drives provide a fully non-volatile 
solution.  The RamSan-320/325 has three modes of operation: Active 
Backup
TM
 mode, DataSync mode, and Mirror mode.  For more information 
on these three modes, see Section 6.9  - Setting Backup Mode
 
The RamSan complements existing disk drives, JBOD, or RAID, in 
performance sensitive applications.  Servers perceive the RamSan as 
another attached SCSI disk drive.  For some applications, the RamSan is 
the only storage system required.  For applications that store terabytes of 
data, storage administrators add the RamSan to systems that include 
RAID or JBOD. 
 
Connect the RamSan via Fibre Channel to host servers, NAS filers, or 
storage network switches and hubs.  If you have specific compatibility 
questions, please contact Texas Memory Systems. 
 
Use the RamSan in a variety of applications.  If hard disk drives slow 
down your application, there is a good chance that the RamSan can speed 
it up. 
 
RamSan-300/320/325 User’s Manual 
 
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