Fadu’s FC5161 SSD Controller Unveiled in Western Digital’s PCIe Gen5 Enterprise Drives

When Western Digital rolled out its Ultrastar DC SN861 SSDs earlier this year, the mystery surrounding the controller tech got tech enthusiasts buzzing. Many assumed it was a homegrown piece of gear, but a recent deep dive into the device has revealed something unexpected. Turns out, Western Digital opted for a controller crafted by Fadu, a South Korean company that’s been making a name for itself in the enterprise SSD arena since 2015.

Geared for the heavy-hitters in hyperscale datacenters and enterprise settings, the Western Digital Ultrastar DC SN861 SSD is right in line with the shift towards PCIe Gen5 storage solutions. As highlighted in Storage Review’s latest teardown, these drives sport the Fadu FC5161 NVMe 2.0-compliant controller. This powerhouse controller supports a whopping 16 NAND channels via an ONFi 5.0 2400 MT/s interface. It also brings to the table a slew of enterprise features like OCP Cloud Spec 2.0, SR-IOV, support for up to 512 name spaces through ZNS, along with advanced security, telemetry, and power loss protection—capabilities you won’t find in your average controller or even in Western Digital’s earlier products.

Performance-wise, the Ultrastar DC SN861 SSDs don’t pull any punches. They hit sequential read speeds up to 13.7 GB/s and write speeds up to 7.5 GB/s. In terms of handling random data, expect up to 3.3 million IOPS for 4K reads and up to 0.8 million for writes. These drives come in a variety of capacities, ranging from 1.6 TB to 7.68 TB, and can handle one to three full drive writes per day over five years. They’re available in both U.2 and E1.S form factors.

Each form factor caters to different needs. Western Digital has fine-tuned the E1.S version with features like FDP and specific cloud performance enhancements, making it ideal for cloud-centric tasks. On the other hand, the U.2 form factor is tailored for high-performance enterprise tasks and cutting-edge applications like AI technology.

The Ultrastar DC SN861 stands out with its impressive feature set and enterprise-grade oomph. Plus, it boasts a reduced idle power consumption of just 5 watts, notably lower than its predecessor, the SN840, by 1 watt. While this may seem minor, for hyperscalers deploying thousands of drives, every watt saved is pivotal for total cost of ownership calculations.

Currently, the Ultrastar DC SN861 SSDs are on the market but to a select clientele, including major players like Meta. Pricing details remain under wraps and will likely vary based on order size and volume.

Sources: Fadu, Storage Review.