Solid-State-Drive qualification and reliability strategy

As NAND flash memories have scaled the margin between NAND capability and system requirements have been significantly reduced. Understanding Solid-State-Drive (SSD) reliability and qualification requirements has become more critical since these impact the NAND flash design tradeoffs. Unrealistically high expectations result in excessive margin that could have been used in other areas, while too low of a requirement puts the system at risk for excessive field failure. The reliability and qualification requirements for SSDs will be reviewed and discussed in order to give an overview of what constitutes an effective qualification/reliability strategy for SSDs.