Samsung's triple-treat mobile memory

Stephen Withers
Thursday, 31 May 2007 13:39

Your IT - Mobility

Samsung's new moviMCP multi-chip package for mobile phones packs 4G of flash memory with its associated controller, 128M of DRAM for the phone's CPU and a further 256K of flash for general handset operations into a small footprint.

The chipset will allow the design of smaller phones with a given memory capacity, and in some cases will do away with the need for a removable memory card.

Another possibility is that it will allow the design of low-end phones with a significant amount of memory, while more advanced models will retain the card slot due to the flexibility this provides the user.

"We've now perfected a memory chip that allows handset manufacturers to significantly reduce development time while deploying an extremely robust design that will result in higher performance for smaller phones, with higher storage capacities," said Jim Elliott, director, flash marketing director, Samsung Semiconductor.

Samsung's use of the eMMC (embedded MultiMediaCard) interface frees phone designers from the chore of developing interface software for each type of NAND flash memory.

Most moviMCP chipsets will go into 3G mobile phones. The parts are currently available to manufacturers in sample quantities.