AMCC Unveils Controller

SUNNYVALE, Calif. -- Applied Micro Circuits Corporation (AMCC) (NASDAQ:AMCC) today announced the immediate availability of the 3ware(R) 9650SE-24M8, a powerful new 24-port RAID controller, the latest in its line of RAID 6 controllers. AMCC now offers the broadest line of PCI Express-to-SATA II RAID controllers, with 2-, 4-, 8-, 12-, 16- and now 24-port offerings.

RAID 6 safeguards data against two drive failures for maximum fault tolerance. The 9650SE controllers minimize the RAID 6 write performance penalty, inherent to many competing offerings, by uniquely calculating double-parity simultaneously, rather than consecutively.

"The introduction of the 24-port model comes on the heels of AMCC shipping our 2 millionth SATA port, as well as being named by Gartner Dataquest the channel market share leader for SATA hardware RAID controllers," said Scott Cleland, director of marketing for AMCC. "We are striving to offer our customers t he broadest choice when it comes to hardware-based high performance, scalable RAID." Gartner Dataquest's report, "Market Share: Host Bus RAID Controllers, Worldwide, 1998-2005," shows AMCC as the SATA RAID market share leader in the channel(1).

Maximum Performance, Unmatched Scalability and Simplified Multi-lane Connectivity

The 3ware 9650SE-24M8 delivers RAID 6 throughput speeds of over 700MB/s, up to 300 percent faster than competing controllers. The superior performance results from AMCC's eighth generation StorSwitch(TM) non-blocking switch fabric architecture. The controller's Multi-Lane(TM) M8 cable/connector system utilizes innovative Molex(TM) iPass(TM) technology. The 24-port cabling system uses only 3 connectors to attach to 24 drives, perfect for high density environments.Silicon Mechanics, a leading integrator of rack-optimized servers, storage, and high-performance computing products, is offering multiple configurations of the 3ware 9650SE in its Rackform server line. "Our customers like the flexibility offered by AMCC's broad line of 3ware 9650SE controllers," said Jack Kintz, vice president of product development for Bothell, Washington-based Silicon Mechanics. "The new 24-port model provides our customers with a new level of scalability and performance for their enterprise-level networks. The controller's ease-of integration features and cable management make our design and integration faster and more secure."

Applied Micro Circuits Corp. (AMCC)