Abstract: A mass storage device and method for storing data originally written to a volatile memory with byte level I/O protocol commands to a non-volatile memory using block level I/O protocol commands. The mass storage device includes a host interface for communicating with the host computer system, at least one non-volatile memory, at least one volatile memory, a memory controller configured to accept block level I/O protocol commands from the host computer system to read data from and write data to the non-volatile memory, and additionally accept byte level memory I/O commands from the host computer system for reading data from and writing data to the at least one volatile memory, and means for retrieving the data written by the host computer system using the byte level memory I/O commands from the volatile memory and writing the data retrieved from the volatile memory to the at least one non-volatile memory.

Abstract: A mass storage device and method for storing data originally written to a volatile memory with byte level I/O protocol commands to a non-volatile memory using block level I/O protocol commands. The mass storage device includes a host interface for communicating with the host computer system, at least one non-volatile memory, at least one volatile memory, a memory controller configured to accept block level I/O protocol commands from the host computer system to read data from and write data to the non-volatile memory, and additionally accept byte level memory I/O commands from the host computer system for reading data from and writing data to the at least one volatile memory, and means for retrieving the data written by the host computer system using the byte level memory I/O commands from the volatile memory and writing the data retrieved from the volatile memory to the at least one non-volatile memory.

Abstract: A network attached storage device that has dual network ports and internal network bridge with a method for automatically configuring a distributed file system allowing multiple devices to be connected directly to computer clients while presenting an amalgamation of all the devices into a single large storage element. Electronic files stored on the storage element are automatically replicated so that a failure of one of the network attached storage devices will not result in the loss of data, and the multiple devices will automatically incorporate additional units to present a larger amalgamated storage element to the computer clients. These methods simplify the use of the storage devices and allow multiple computer clients simultaneous very fast access to files on the local devices.