MASS MEMORY TECHNOLOGY

THIS PROJECT PROVIDES RECOMMENDATIONS REGARDING FUTURE MASS MEMORY IMPROVEMENTS TO THA AN/SQQ-89 SURFACE SHIP ASW COMBAT SYSTEM. AREAS OF IMPROVEMENT INCLUDE COST, VOLUME, WEIGHT, MEMORY CAPACITY, READ/WRITE TIME, SEEK AND LATENCY MINIMIZATION, AND MULTI-COMPUTER ACCESS. METHODS OF ACHIEVING FASTER ACCESS TIME ARE EXPLORED IN DEPTH ALONG WITH TECHNIQUES FOR PROVIDING MULTICOMPUTER ACCESS TO A COMMON DATABASE. A FEASIBILITY STUDY OF USING LARGE QUANTITIES OF RANDOM ACCESS MEMORY AS A "DISK LIKE" FUNCTION IS INCLUDED. THE FEASIBILITY STUDY INCLUDES COST, RELIABILITY, AND SPEED TRADEOFFS FOR DATA WHICH CAN BE STORED IN VOLATILE MEMORY. COMPUTER MODELLING WILL BE THE BASIS OF COMPARISON. THE PHASE I EFFORT IS PRIMARY ANALYTICAL IN NATURE. PERFORMANCE IMPEDIMENTS WITHIN THE UYH-3 DISK SUBSYSTEM AS APPLIED TO THE AN/SQQ-89 SYSTEM WILL BE QUANTIFIED SO THAT RECENT AND PROJECTED ADVANCES IN TECHNOLOGY CAN BE EXPLORED FOR PERFORMANCE IMPROVEMENT. THE RESULTS WILL LEAD TO RECOMMENDATIONS FOR ENHANCEMENT. THESE RECOMMENDATIONS WILL BE THE BASIS FOR A PHASE II PROPOSAL. THE PHASE II EFFORT WILL PROVIDE PROTOTYPE HARDWARE REALIZATION OF THE ENHANCEMENTS AND DEMONSTRATION OF THE VALIDITY OF THE ANALYTICAL PREDICTION.