What Is Intelligent Power Consumption and Why Does It Matter?
For embedded storage devices, power consumption is a key concern. Drawing a significant amount of power from the host device can trigger a long list of issues. One of the benefits of flash storage is that it generally has low power needs, especially when compared to other forms of storage. However, in addition to remaining low, power consumption should also be smart. Intelligent power consumption makes flash memory an ideal alternative to more power-hungry memory options, which helps small host applications and large data centers alike. Here is what you need to know.
RAM versus Flash Memory
RAM, or random-access memory, is a volatile form of storage that offers fast processing times, but has massive power demands. Since it is a form of volatile storage, RAM needs power in order to maintain the data it is storing. For many host devices, this can be problematic, and when large sets of data are involved, RAM’s power usage can be particularly inefficient.
Flash memory is non-volatile storage, which means that it maintains data without power. Although some people hesitate to use flash in place of RAM because RAM is faster, the differences in speed occur at a level that is generally not perceptible to human users. RAM may be thousands of times faster than flash at performing an operation, but both kinds of memory may complete the operation in fractions of a second. This means that the difference is not something that is usually noticeable.
Intelligent Power Consumption Benefits
Applications are becoming smaller with little room for error and few extraneous components. However, the need for fast performance is only increasing. This is where intelligent power consumption truly shines. The reduced demands for power of flash memory when compared to RAM allow OEMs to build more efficient applications while maintaining performance and reliability.
At Delkin, our embedded storage systems have minimal power consumption needs, so your host application can perform efficiently. If you have questions about selecting embedded storage or the benefits of intelligent power consumption, get in touch with our team today.