Areca Technology Corporation (ARECA), a leading provider of internal, external and Thunderbolt RAID controllers, today announced the general availability and shipping of the RAID storage: ARC-8050T3U Thunderbolt 3 port to offer both Thunderbolt and USB protocol for increasing compatibility among USB based hosts. In short: ARC-8050T3U is based on Thunderbolt 3 technology, backwards compatible with USB 3.2 Gen 2, USB 3.2 Gen 1 and USB 2.0.

The ARC-8050T3U connecting to a Thunderbolt 3 computer port is the native Thunderbolt 3 connectivity–connecting ARC-8050T3U to a USB only computer port is considered a typical native USB 3.2 Gen 2 connectivity. The advancement of 10Gbps USB3.2 Gen 2 connectivity allows the ARC-8050T3U RAID storage to transfer end-to-end 10Gbps storage speed between the storage enclosure and the USB only host system. You can simply connect to any Thunderbolt 3 computer or USB only computer using the same 40Gbps passive cable from thunderbolt 3 port on the ARC-8050T3U. In the future new 1-2m TBT 40Gbps Thunderbolt™ 3 cable will be updated to support Thunderbolt, USB, DP for increasing cable length.

The ARC-8050T3U offers a high performance storage device perfect for the creative professionals, media and Mac enthusiasts who are looking for a Thunderbolt 3 computer, and USB only computer to share or access data in their storage device through same RAID device Thunderbolt 3 port . Today’s TB3 RAID storage only works with computers featuring Thunderbolt 3 ports. By contrast, the ARC-8050T3 can fall back for use as a USB-C sink, allowing it to offer "basic compatibility" with USB-C ports. The ARC-8050T3U RAID storage family is used the same market well proven ARC-8050T3 RAID controller’s based board and software package. It also consists of five models: the -4, the -6, the-8, the-12 and the -24 with four, six, eight, twelve and twenty-four 2.5/3.5” hot-swappable bays, respectively.

Intelligent power On/Off function on storage turns power in unison with the host computer power status. It can intelligently power down the unit after the thunderbolt host shuts down everything for data integrity. ARC-8050T3U also supports a battery backup option that protects all data in cache memory in the event of unexpected power outage. The board-level hardware encryption manages any kinds of drives attached to ARC-8050T3U-4/6/6M/8/12(R)/24R without impacting the performance for higher levels of security.

ARC-8050T3U RAID storages are available immediately, shipping in October 2019.

One 10.0 Gbps USB 3.1 Port
- R0 Xfer Speed: 1046MB/S (read), 1055MB/S (Write)
- R5 Xfer Speed: 1046MB/S (read), 936MB/S (Write)

Areca Technology Corporation (ARECA), a leading provider of internal, external and Thunderbolt RAID storage, today announced the availability of an ARC-8050U3-6 10Gbps USB 3.1 compact tower RAID storage. With USB3.1 to PCIe 3.0 bridge and Areca existing high performance hardware RAID engine, ARC-8050U3-6 RAID box delivers the performance enhancement of USB 3.1 at the best of cost/performance value. The advancement of 10Gbps USB3.1 connectivity allows the ARC-8050U3-6 RAID storage to transfer end-to-end 10Gbps storage speed between the storage enclosure and the host system and fully backward compatible with USB 3.0/USB 2.0 interconnection.

The ARC-8050U3-6 is a 6-bay tower RAID storage which supports both USB 3.1 Gen 2 and 12Gb/s SAS interface. The USB 3.1 Gen 2 is a leading-edge technology which can make the bandwidth of USB 3.0 increase from 5Gbps to USB 3.1 with 10Gbps. Via ARC-8050U3-6, the interface can reach the R0 transfer speed to 1046MB/S in reading and 1055MB/S in writing and the R5 transfer speed to 1046MB/S in reading and 936MB/S in writing. It’s the most effective in both cost and performance consideration. The ARC-8050U3-6 also supports a battery backup option that protects all data in cache memory in the event of unexpected power outage. The controller-level ROC hardware encryption manages any kinds of drives attached to ARC-8050U3-6 without impacting the performance for higher levels of security.

The ARC-8050U3-6 is an OS independent, with no additional software or driver installation required, and is also used on any Thunderbolt™ 3 USB-C port. It supports RAID levels 0, 1, 10, 1E, 3, 5, 6, Single Disk or JBOD. Configuration and monitoring can be managed either through the LCD control panel or LAN port. The intelligent cooling continuously adapts to environmental conditions by automatically controlling the speed of the cooling fans for the rapid growing demand from the video editing markets. The ARC-850U3-6 is available immediately, shipping in September 2018.