Apart from the existing 3V 512Mb W25Q512JV, the1.8V W25Q512NW SPI NOR Flash also features pin-to-pin compatibility, enabling customers to upgrade to higher flash storage capacities without having to change the footprint of their designs. This will enable customers to extend the life of their products, speed time to market, and save development time and effort by having one single flash platform that can be used across future product roadmaps.
“Emerging 5G applications require both high-quality and high-density SPI NOR flash,” said Winbond. “Our W25Q512NW SPI NOR Flash delivers on all these requirements, while also providing the best solution in the industry and ensuring the reliable supply capacity that is backwards and forwards compatible to the lowest to the highest flash densities available.”
The W25Q512NW is able to support up to 166 MHz SDR and 80MHz DDR in high read-speed, and can achieve high performance on XIP (eXecute In Place) and Instant-on with QPI. It can also be stacked to 1Gb and 2Gb, which gives designers more flexibility to extend the density up to 2Gb and better performance on Read-While-Write.
The two-die device, for example, will support Read While Write operation for OTA updating without suspension of read operations and with no risk of losing the existing firmware image in the event of an unexpected power interruption, providing fast and stable live OTA (Over-The-Air) system firmware update.
This compatibility is seen as being somewhat of a 'game-changer' for customers designing applications such as 5G modem, 5G edge computing, cloud server, fibre optic modems, and smart IoT segments where they typically increase code-storage flash density 2X every 2 years. This also helps the OEM software teams to develop application-code well-suited for new code releases with multiple new feature-set without compromising on Code Storage Flash Memory density limitations.
