Smart Response Technology - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Computing

Computing is usually defined as the activity of using and improving computer hardware and software. It is the computer-specific part of information technology...

, Smart Response Technology (SRT) (pre-launch name SSD Caching) is a proprietary caching mechanism

Cache

In computer engineering, a cache is a component that transparently stores data so that future requests for that data can be served faster. The data that is stored within a cache might be values that have been computed earlier or duplicates of original values that are stored elsewhere...

introduced in 2011 by Intel for their Z68 chipset (for the Sandy Bridge

Sandy Bridge

Sandy Bridge is the codename for a microarchitecture developed by Intel beginning in 2005 for central processing units in computers to replace the Nehalem microarchitecture...

–series processors), which allows a SATA

Sata

Sata is a traditional dish from the Malaysian state of Terengganu, consisting of spiced fish meat wrapped in banana leaves and cooked on a grill.It is a type of Malaysian fish cake, or otak-otak...

solid-state drive

Solid-state drive

A solid-state drive , sometimes called a solid-state disk or electronic disk, is a data storage device that uses solid-state memory to store persistent data with the intention of providing access in the same manner of a traditional block i/o hard disk drive...

(SSD) to function as cache for a (conventional, magnetic) hard disk drive.

SRT is implemented in the device driver

Device driver

In computing, a device driver or software driver is a computer program allowing higher-level computer programs to interact with a hardware device....

and firmware

Firmware

In electronic systems and computing, firmware is a term often used to denote the fixed, usually rather small, programs and/or data structures that internally control various electronic devices...

(option ROM

Option ROM

An Option ROM typically consists of firmware that is called by the system BIOS. For example, an adapter card that controls a boot device might contain firmware that is used to connect the device to the system once the Option ROM is loaded....

) that ships with the Z68 motherboard

Motherboard

In personal computers, a motherboard is the central printed circuit board in many modern computers and holds many of the crucial components of the system, providing connectors for other peripherals. The motherboard is sometimes alternatively known as the mainboard, system board, or, on Apple...

s. It is available only when the (integrated) disk controller is configured in RAID

RAID

RAID is a storage technology that combines multiple disk drive components into a logical unit...

mode (but not AHCI or IDE modes). Write-back or write-through caching strategy can be selected by the user. The maximum utilizable cache size on the SSD is 64 GB. Caching is done at the logical block addressing

Logical block addressing

Logical block addressing is a common scheme used for specifying the location of blocks of data stored on computer storage devices, generally secondary storage systems such as hard disks....

(LBA) level, not the file level.

Shortly before the announcement of the new chipset, Intel also introduced the Intel 311 (Larson Creek), a 20 GB single-level cell (SLC) solid-state drive, which it markets as suitable for caching.

See also