1.\u00a0 Western Digital purchased SiliconSystems.<\/p>\n
2.\u00a0 After the acquisition Western Digital discontinued production of the PCMCIA ATA Cards.\u00a0 They still continue to offer compact flash cards…For now..<\/p>\n
3.\u00a0\u00a0 The old “-3012” series SiliconSystems cards are no longer available.\u00a0 The new series is the 4000 series.\u00a0 Typically a 6-8 week lead time when purchased in quantities of 60 or more.<\/p>\n
4.\u00a0 Why off the shelf cards are not compatible\u00a0 as drop in replacements?\u00a0 SiliconSystems used a proprietary combination of flash and controller to assemble their cards and drives.\u00a0 Many solution providers ensured that their hardware required only SiliconSystems cards to operate.<\/p>\n
5. Are any of their options such as SiPurge, SiDestroy still available?\u00a0 There other drives on the market that offer these features.\u00a0 However, they are very expensive and typically cost prohibitive to anyone except the military.<\/p>\n
6. Can I make any changes to adapt to these new cards?\u00a0 Yes, typically it was the software that was configured to look for certain sectors on the SiliconSystems card.\u00a0 If you have access to the code you can change it to write to any sector of a card.<\/p>\n
7.\u00a0 As the market for flash memory decreases the cost associated to develop, manufacture and promote these products continue to increase.\u00a0 In a shrinking market it is difficult for companies to spend millions of dollars and operate in the black.\u00a0 As a result we will continue to see legacy products disappear from the marketplace.<\/p>\n
What options are available to continue to service and maintain legacy hardware still in operation today?\u00a0 In the past five years we have had PCMCIA cards make a resurgence.\u00a0 Specially industrial grade high temperature rated PCMCIA cards.\u00a0 Older voice PBX\u00a0 systems, routers and large scale locomotives all still require this form factor.\u00a0 In all of these sectors it is not cost effective to upgrade the hardware to accommodate a card with a modern chip configuration.<\/p>\n