Dell Acceleration Appliance for Databases 2.0 and Microsoft SQL Server 2014: ...Principled Technologies
As this guide has shown, installing and configuring a Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 with SQL Server 2014 powered by the Dell Acceleration Appliance for Databases is a straightforward procedure. A key benefit from implementing DAAD 2.0 into your infrastructure is the ability to accelerate workloads without a complete storage area network redesign. This can be ideal for businesses that have snapshot and deduplication features within their software stack or are looking to improve database performance without investing in large storage solutions that may contain features they do not need. Consider DAAD 2.0 for your business—a storage acceleration solution that requires only 4U of rack space and can potentially give your database workloads a boost.
Minimizing licensing costs for enterprise applications is vital to organizations looking to keep costs down. When your applications use per-core licensing, choosing higher-performance servers with fewer cores dramatically reduces your software-related spending. The Dell PowerEdge M820 blade solution with Compellent storage could deliver up to $96,236 in savings as compared to a single HP ProLiant BL680c G7 solution, and if consolidating multiple workloads, could deliver even more savings in licensing costs when running Microsoft SQL Server in a virtualized scenario – all while maintaining or exceeding previous performance levels.
Resource balancing comparison: VMware vSphere 6 vs. Red Hat Enterprise Virtua...Principled Technologies
Having ample resources to handle user requests is a necessity of modern virtualization solutions. Allocating and distributing those resources evenly, however, is imperative to the success of your business’s virtualized environment. In our tests, after powering on the other two servers in our three-node cluster and adding resource management features, VMware vSphere 6 improved performance by 183 percent over its baseline configuration of one active server and no resource management features. RHEV 3.5, in contrast, delivered only a 79 percent increase over its baseline. As you design your business’s infrastructure and applications, improvements such as those offered by VMware vSphere 6 DRS and Storage DRS can play a critical role by offering your users better application experiences. Optimized and modern resource management provided by VMware DRS can also help to lower your IT purchase and maintenance costs by reducing the number of servers necessary to run your applications.
Dell Acceleration Appliance for Databases 2.0 and Microsoft SQL Server 2014: ...Principled Technologies
As this guide has shown, installing and configuring a Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 with SQL Server 2014 powered by the Dell Acceleration Appliance for Databases is a straightforward procedure. A key benefit from implementing DAAD 2.0 into your infrastructure is the ability to accelerate workloads without a complete storage area network redesign. This can be ideal for businesses that have snapshot and deduplication features within their software stack or are looking to improve database performance without investing in large storage solutions that may contain features they do not need. Consider DAAD 2.0 for your business—a storage acceleration solution that requires only 4U of rack space and can potentially give your database workloads a boost.
Minimizing licensing costs for enterprise applications is vital to organizations looking to keep costs down. When your applications use per-core licensing, choosing higher-performance servers with fewer cores dramatically reduces your software-related spending. The Dell PowerEdge M820 blade solution with Compellent storage could deliver up to $96,236 in savings as compared to a single HP ProLiant BL680c G7 solution, and if consolidating multiple workloads, could deliver even more savings in licensing costs when running Microsoft SQL Server in a virtualized scenario – all while maintaining or exceeding previous performance levels.
Resource balancing comparison: VMware vSphere 6 vs. Red Hat Enterprise Virtua...Principled Technologies
Having ample resources to handle user requests is a necessity of modern virtualization solutions. Allocating and distributing those resources evenly, however, is imperative to the success of your business’s virtualized environment. In our tests, after powering on the other two servers in our three-node cluster and adding resource management features, VMware vSphere 6 improved performance by 183 percent over its baseline configuration of one active server and no resource management features. RHEV 3.5, in contrast, delivered only a 79 percent increase over its baseline. As you design your business’s infrastructure and applications, improvements such as those offered by VMware vSphere 6 DRS and Storage DRS can play a critical role by offering your users better application experiences. Optimized and modern resource management provided by VMware DRS can also help to lower your IT purchase and maintenance costs by reducing the number of servers necessary to run your applications.
Dell PowerEdge M520 server solution: Energy efficiency and database performancePrincipled Technologies
As energy prices continue to rise, building a power-efficient data center that does not sacrifice performance is vital to organizations looking to keep costs down while keeping application performance high. Choosing servers that pair high performance with new power-efficient technologies helps you do so. In our tests, the Dell PowerEdge M520 with Dell EqualLogic PS-M4110 arrays outperformed the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8 server with HP StorageWorks D2200sb arrays by 113.5 percent in OPM. Not only did the Dell PowerEdge M520 blade server solution deliver higher overall performance, it also did so more efficiently, delivering 79.9 percent better database performance/watt than the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8 solution.
Populating your data center with new, more powerful and energy efficient servers can deliver numerous benefits to your organization. By consolidating multiple older servers onto a new platform, you can save in the areas of data center space and port costs, management costs, and power and cooling costs.
In our tests, we found that the Lenovo ThinkServer RD630 could consolidate the workloads of three HP ProLiant DL385 G5 servers, while increasing overall performance by 82.6 percent and reducing power consumption by 58.8 percent, making the ThinkServer RD630 an excellent choice to reduce the costs associated with running your data center.
Boosting virtualization performance with Intel SSD DC Series P3600 NVMe SSDs ...Principled Technologies
When it comes time to make your server purchase or if you’re looking for an easy way to boost performance of existing infrastructure, consider upgrading your server’s internal storage. As our hands-on tests with a Dell EMC PowerEdge R630 environment running VMware Virtual SAN proved, Intel SSD DC P3600 Series NVMe SSDs could increase virtualized mixed-workload performance by as much as 59.9 percent compared to SATA SSDs while allowing you to run a large additional number of VMs. When you improve performance for your virtualized workloads, your employees and customers will benefit. By increasing performance with Intel NVMe SSDs on your Dell EMC PowerEdge R630 servers, you can potentially slash wait times and do more work on your servers without having to expand your infrastructure with additional storage arrays, which can translate to happier users and a more efficient infrastructure.
Database performance and memory capacity with the Intel Xeon processor E5-266...Principled Technologies
The Dell PowerEdge M620 offers 24 memory slots, 50 percent more than the 16 slots offered by the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8, which enables the Dell solution to provide greater performance while delivering memory error protection. We found that the Dell PowerEdge M620 solution, built on the new Intel Xeon processor E5-2600v2 Series, delivered 182.2 percent more database performance and 92.0 percent faster response times than the previous version Intel Xeon E5-2640 processor-based HP ProLiant BL460c Gen 8 solution, while providing 12.5 percent more available memory and error protection. The additional memory capacity of the Dell solution allowed us to engage FRM technologies and still have more overall RAM capacity compared to the 16-slot HP server. The Dell PowerEdge M620 offered maximum memory capacity and protection with Fault Resilient Memory to keep your database workloads running strong and available for your business needs.
The Open Channel architecture is providing a new model for the control and operation of individual SSD devices in data centers which serve multiple tenants and applications.
Being able to do without expensive and cumbersome external storage arrays can only benefit your organization. With Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs, you can get powerful virtualized database performance for all your production databases from within your server.
In our tests, the Dell PowerEdge R720 with Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs was able to support up to 328,774 orders per minute. Comparing these results to previously published test results for a differently configured R720 server shows that the PowerEdge R720 with Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs delivered exceptional virtualized database performance.
When we ran a separate test routing the reads and writes to disk by using significantly less RAM, the PowerEdgeR720 with PCIe Express Flash SSDs delivered similar high performance levels. Testing with these reduced amounts of memory demonstrated the ability of Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs to successfully drive database performance without relying solely on memory for performance.
For database applications in a virtualized infrastructure, the Dell PowerEdge R720 with Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs can provide you the performance you need without the costs and hassles of external storage with a large number of disks.
Laptop drive performance comparison: Seagate Solid State Hybrid Drive vs. har...Principled Technologies
Across the three laptop systems we tested, the Seagate SSHD configuration outperformed both hard drive configurations. It booted and launched applications as much as 31.8 percent more quickly and delivered general performance increases of up to 503.3 percent.
By speeding up the tasks that users perform day in and day out, the Seagate Solid State Hybrid Drive can boost productivity and let you spend more of your day working and less of it waiting.
Dell PowerEdge R920 running Oracle Database: Benefits of upgrading with NVMe ...Principled Technologies
Strong server performance is essential to companies running Oracle Database. The new Dell PowerEdge R920 provides strong performance in its base configuration with 24 SAS hard disks, but this performance gets an enormous boost when running the configuration containing NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs. In our testing, the upgraded configuration of the Dell PowerEdge R920 delivered 14.9 times the database performance of the base configuration. In addition, in testing the raw I/O throughput of the NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs, we saw as much as 192.8 times the IOPS as compared to the base configuration. Given that the storage subsystem is critical in servers and specifically database applications, the performance improvements offered by NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs can lead to great service improvements for your customers, making this upgrade a very wise investment.
What’s Silicon Power SSD? How many types of this brand of solid state drive? How to upgrade from an old drive to this kind of SSD? Remove your doubts here.
What is driving the need for solid state storage? Flash is a major disruptor of the storage industry. What is available in solid state technology? What does the future hold?
www.unitiv.com
Flash for the Real World – Separate Hype from RealityHitachi Vantara
Join us for a live webcast and hear Hu Yoshida, Chief Technology Officer of Hitachi Data Systems, discuss the real world criteria for making an effective decision when evaluating flash storage. With all the noise in the market it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction in order to evaluate the performance, efficiency and economic trade-offs for flash storage.
Specifically, you’ll learn how to determine if flash storage will help you:
Actually achieve the performance you need as you compare technology options.
Realize efficiency gains that extend beyond the promise of flash performance.
Make the economic case for real-world business decisions before taking the leap.
Dell PowerEdge M520 server solution: Energy efficiency and database performancePrincipled Technologies
As energy prices continue to rise, building a power-efficient data center that does not sacrifice performance is vital to organizations looking to keep costs down while keeping application performance high. Choosing servers that pair high performance with new power-efficient technologies helps you do so. In our tests, the Dell PowerEdge M520 with Dell EqualLogic PS-M4110 arrays outperformed the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8 server with HP StorageWorks D2200sb arrays by 113.5 percent in OPM. Not only did the Dell PowerEdge M520 blade server solution deliver higher overall performance, it also did so more efficiently, delivering 79.9 percent better database performance/watt than the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8 solution.
Populating your data center with new, more powerful and energy efficient servers can deliver numerous benefits to your organization. By consolidating multiple older servers onto a new platform, you can save in the areas of data center space and port costs, management costs, and power and cooling costs.
In our tests, we found that the Lenovo ThinkServer RD630 could consolidate the workloads of three HP ProLiant DL385 G5 servers, while increasing overall performance by 82.6 percent and reducing power consumption by 58.8 percent, making the ThinkServer RD630 an excellent choice to reduce the costs associated with running your data center.
Boosting virtualization performance with Intel SSD DC Series P3600 NVMe SSDs ...Principled Technologies
When it comes time to make your server purchase or if you’re looking for an easy way to boost performance of existing infrastructure, consider upgrading your server’s internal storage. As our hands-on tests with a Dell EMC PowerEdge R630 environment running VMware Virtual SAN proved, Intel SSD DC P3600 Series NVMe SSDs could increase virtualized mixed-workload performance by as much as 59.9 percent compared to SATA SSDs while allowing you to run a large additional number of VMs. When you improve performance for your virtualized workloads, your employees and customers will benefit. By increasing performance with Intel NVMe SSDs on your Dell EMC PowerEdge R630 servers, you can potentially slash wait times and do more work on your servers without having to expand your infrastructure with additional storage arrays, which can translate to happier users and a more efficient infrastructure.
Database performance and memory capacity with the Intel Xeon processor E5-266...Principled Technologies
The Dell PowerEdge M620 offers 24 memory slots, 50 percent more than the 16 slots offered by the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8, which enables the Dell solution to provide greater performance while delivering memory error protection. We found that the Dell PowerEdge M620 solution, built on the new Intel Xeon processor E5-2600v2 Series, delivered 182.2 percent more database performance and 92.0 percent faster response times than the previous version Intel Xeon E5-2640 processor-based HP ProLiant BL460c Gen 8 solution, while providing 12.5 percent more available memory and error protection. The additional memory capacity of the Dell solution allowed us to engage FRM technologies and still have more overall RAM capacity compared to the 16-slot HP server. The Dell PowerEdge M620 offered maximum memory capacity and protection with Fault Resilient Memory to keep your database workloads running strong and available for your business needs.
The Open Channel architecture is providing a new model for the control and operation of individual SSD devices in data centers which serve multiple tenants and applications.
Being able to do without expensive and cumbersome external storage arrays can only benefit your organization. With Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs, you can get powerful virtualized database performance for all your production databases from within your server.
In our tests, the Dell PowerEdge R720 with Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs was able to support up to 328,774 orders per minute. Comparing these results to previously published test results for a differently configured R720 server shows that the PowerEdge R720 with Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs delivered exceptional virtualized database performance.
When we ran a separate test routing the reads and writes to disk by using significantly less RAM, the PowerEdgeR720 with PCIe Express Flash SSDs delivered similar high performance levels. Testing with these reduced amounts of memory demonstrated the ability of Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs to successfully drive database performance without relying solely on memory for performance.
For database applications in a virtualized infrastructure, the Dell PowerEdge R720 with Dell PCIe Express Flash SSDs can provide you the performance you need without the costs and hassles of external storage with a large number of disks.
Laptop drive performance comparison: Seagate Solid State Hybrid Drive vs. har...Principled Technologies
Across the three laptop systems we tested, the Seagate SSHD configuration outperformed both hard drive configurations. It booted and launched applications as much as 31.8 percent more quickly and delivered general performance increases of up to 503.3 percent.
By speeding up the tasks that users perform day in and day out, the Seagate Solid State Hybrid Drive can boost productivity and let you spend more of your day working and less of it waiting.
Dell PowerEdge R920 running Oracle Database: Benefits of upgrading with NVMe ...Principled Technologies
Strong server performance is essential to companies running Oracle Database. The new Dell PowerEdge R920 provides strong performance in its base configuration with 24 SAS hard disks, but this performance gets an enormous boost when running the configuration containing NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs. In our testing, the upgraded configuration of the Dell PowerEdge R920 delivered 14.9 times the database performance of the base configuration. In addition, in testing the raw I/O throughput of the NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs, we saw as much as 192.8 times the IOPS as compared to the base configuration. Given that the storage subsystem is critical in servers and specifically database applications, the performance improvements offered by NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs can lead to great service improvements for your customers, making this upgrade a very wise investment.
What’s Silicon Power SSD? How many types of this brand of solid state drive? How to upgrade from an old drive to this kind of SSD? Remove your doubts here.
What is driving the need for solid state storage? Flash is a major disruptor of the storage industry. What is available in solid state technology? What does the future hold?
www.unitiv.com
Flash for the Real World – Separate Hype from RealityHitachi Vantara
Join us for a live webcast and hear Hu Yoshida, Chief Technology Officer of Hitachi Data Systems, discuss the real world criteria for making an effective decision when evaluating flash storage. With all the noise in the market it can be difficult to separate fact from fiction in order to evaluate the performance, efficiency and economic trade-offs for flash storage.
Specifically, you’ll learn how to determine if flash storage will help you:
Actually achieve the performance you need as you compare technology options.
Realize efficiency gains that extend beyond the promise of flash performance.
Make the economic case for real-world business decisions before taking the leap.
Learn how upcoming changes in the persistent memory market will affect deployments of in-memory computing and traditional applications. Using software innovations from SanDisk and the broad portfolio of flash storage hardware options, customers and developers can optimize applications for “flash extended memory”, the intersection of in-memory computing and persistent memory technologies.
Solid State Drives - Seminar for Computer Engineering Semester 6 - VIT,Univer...ravipbhat
Solid state is term that refers to electronic circuitry that is built entirely out of semiconductors.
A Solid-State Drive (SSD) is a data storage device that uses solid state memory to store persistent data and SSDs use same I/O interfaces developed for hard disk drives.
In this presentation, Kevin Wagner from Diablo Technologies describes the company's new Memory Channel Flash Solution.
Diablo leveraged its extensive experience in advanced memory channel interfaces and protocols to deliver a superior system architecture that directly attaches persistent memory to the host processors of a server or storage array. This innovative approach utilizes the industry standard DIMM form factor and native CPU memory interface, allowing MCS to be a drop-in replacement for standard RDIMMs. The architecture delivers the highest, most economical scaling of any enterprise storage solution on the market today, with persistent latencies approaching that of DRAM and linear scaling of throughput with additional modules.
“Flash SSDs boost system performance, and flash over PCIe is even faster, but the best performance will come from flash on the memory channel," said Jim Handy, Director at Objective Analysis. "Diablo is on the right path by providing a way to plug flash right into the DDR memory buses on today's servers.”
View the presentation video: http://inside-bigdata.com/slidecast-diablo-memory-channel-flash-technology-is-big-data-for-less/
Evaluating MLC vs TLC vs V-NAND for Enterprise SSDs – WhitepaperSamsung Business USA
Choosing the right grade of SSD for your enterprise applications requires an understanding of the differences between various NAND technologies. This whitepaper explains the fundamental characteristics of 2-bit-per-cell MLC and 3-bit TLC NAND types, as well as the inherent scaling limitations of planar NAND and how vertical NAND (V-NAND) technology solves these issues with an innovative vertical structure.
How Persistent Memory Will Bring an Entirely New Structure to Large Data Comp...inside-BigData.com
In this deck from the Persistent Memory Summit 2017, Steve Pawlowski from Micron presents:
The Revolution of Memory and Storage Side Processing - How Persistent Memory Will Bring an Entirely New Structure to Large Data Computing.
"As data proliferation continues to explode, computing architectures are struggling to get the right data to the processor efficiently, both in terms of time and power. But what if the best solution to the problem is not faster data movement, but new architectures that can essentially move the processing instructions into the data? Persistent memory arrays present just such an opportunity. Like any significant change, however, there are challenges and obstacles that must be overcome. Industry veteran Steve Pawlowski will outline a vision for the future of computing and why persistent memory systems have the potential to be more revolutionary than perhaps anyone imagines."
Watch the video presentation: http://wp.me/p3RLHQ-gff
Sign up for our insideHPC Newsletter: http://insidehpc.com/newsletter
A NEW MULTI-TIERED SOLID STATE DISK USING SLC/MLC COMBINED FLASH MEMORYijcseit
Storing digital information, ensuring the accuracy, steady and uninterrupted access to the data are
considered as fundamental challenges in enterprise-class organizations and companies. In recent years,
new types of storage systems such as solid state disks (SSD) have been introduced. Unlike hard disks that
have mechanical structure, SSDs are based on flash memory and thus have electronic structure. Generally
a SSD consists of a number of flash memory chips, some buffers of the volatile memory type, and an
embedded microprocessor, which have been interconnected by a port. This microprocessor run a small file
system which called flash translation layer (FTL). This software controls and schedules buffers, data
transfers and all flash memory tasks. SSDs have some advantages over hard disks such as high speed, low
energy consumption, lower heat and noise, resistance against damage, and smaller size. Besides, some
disadvantages such as limited endurance and high price are still challenging. In this study, the effort is to
combine two common technologies - SLC and MLC chips - used in the manufacture of SSDs in a single
SSD to decrease the side effects of current SSDs. The idea of using multi-layer SSD is regarded as an
efficient solution in this field.
A NEW MULTI-TIERED SOLID STATE DISK USING SLC/MLC COMBINED FLASH MEMORY
brief_ssd_dynamic_write_accel
1. 1
A MICRON TECHNICAL
MARKETING BRIEF
Introduction
Dynamic write acceleration is a new feature
available on Micron client SSDs. This brief describes
the technology and the applications for which
it is intended, as well as a brief explanation of
implications for applications for which this feature
was not designed.
Dynamic write acceleration may or may not be
enabled on a given Micron SSD, depending on form
factor and capacity. For example, on the M600 client
SSD, the 2.5-inch, 512GB and 1TB drives do not have
the feature enabled; all other M600 capacities and
form factors do have the feature enabled. Check the
product data sheet to verify support for this feature.
Feature Description
To date, performance gains on MLC-based SSDs
have primarily been achieved by reducing overhead
and increasing parallelism in NAND to match drive
performance as close as possible to the theoretical
capability of the underlying hardware. Theoretical
hardware capabilities are based on many
factors, including capabilities of individual NAND
components, quantity of NAND components,
NAND Flash channel speeds and quantities.
When the number of NAND components in the SSD
is limited, as may be the case with small-density
SSDs, the theoretical capability of the underlying
hardware may become a limitation. This can be
circumvented by using a higher number of smaller-
capacity NAND components to increase the amount
of parallelism for the same amount of storage;
however, this often adds cost because the lowest-
cost-per-gigabit NAND parts also tend to be the
largest-capacity parts.
Dynamic write acceleration changes this paradigm.
It is engineered to enable SSD performance beyond
conventional hardware capabilities. It adapts NAND
usage to fit the intended user environment without
sacrificing user-accessible storage capacity.
Feature Terminology
In explaining the dynamic nature of this technology,
the following terms are used:
>> Logical Saturation – The portion of user logical
block addresses (LBAs) that contain data
>> Physical Saturation – The portion of physical
NAND locations that contain data
>> Interface Idle Time – Periods of time between
commands greater than 50ms
>> Acceleration Capacity – Current availability of
NAND blocks that may be used to accelerate write
performance
Adaptive Use of an SSD’s
Native NAND Array
Advancements in NAND technology pioneered by
Micron enable mode switching between MLC and
SLC modes of operation at the block level. At any
given time, any portion of the NAND array may be
used as either high-speed SLC or high-density MLC.
A MICRON
TECHNICAL
MARKETING
BRIEF
Optimized Client Computing With
Dynamic Write Acceleration
Dave Glen, SSD Applications Engineer
2. 2
A MICRON TECHNICAL
MARKETING BRIEF Optimized Client Computing With Dynamic Write Acceleration
acceleration capacity at different levels of logical
saturation, relative to a competing static cache
technology. Designed acceleration capacity is used
in both cases because runtime conditions may
produce different high-performance capacity in
either technology.
The competing technology shown uses a fixed
capacity of media for acceleration, which is made
available to the SSD by limiting the user-accessible
capacity of the drive.In comparison, dynamic write
acceleration provides high-performance capability
by leveraging unused space. This approach provides
maximum performance when available and
maximum capacity when needed.
Impact on Intended
Usage Environments
Optimized for High-Performance
Client Computing
Dynamic write acceleration leverages certain
characteristics found in typical client computing
environments, including:
>> Host implementation of TRIM commands in
all relevant hardware and software layers:
Trim is essential because it provides a mechanism
Acceleration is achieved using on-the-fly mode,
switching between SLC and MLC in the firmware
to create a dynamic pool of high-speed SLC NAND
blocks. This performance pool changes in size and
physical location in a way that leverages client
computing usage environments.
When acceleration capacity is available, new data
will be written in SLC NAND, which produces an
increase in physical saturation greater than the
corresponding increase in logical saturation because
SLC is less dense than MLC.
Drive firmware may use interface idle time to
reduce physical saturation and recover acceleration
capacity. This process may consist of migrating
data written as SLC to high-density MLC mode or
removing obsolete copies of data from the NAND.
The acceleration capacity that is recovered before
the operation completes is dependent on runtime
parameters, such as physical and logical saturation,
and is optimized to balance burst performance
availability and long-term drive endurance.
Since the SSD firmware may use any portion of
the NAND array as either SLC or MLC, acceleration
capacity is often significantly larger than competing
technologies that use a static pool, or cache, for
acceleration. The figure below shows the designed
Acceleration
Capacity at 50% full
Acceleration
Capacity at 50% full
Acceleration
Capacity at 75% full
Acceleration
Capacity at 75% full
Acceleration
Capacity at 90% full
Acceleration
Capacity at 90% full
Acceleration
Capacity at 95% full
Acceleration
Capacity at 95% full
Dynamic Write Acceleration Competing Static Technology
FIGURE 1: Effects of Logical Saturation on Designed Acceleration
Capacity vs. Static Cache
Note: Data reflects approximate performance.
3. 3
A MICRON TECHNICAL
MARKETING BRIEF Optimized Client Computing With Dynamic Write Acceleration
>> Frequent periods of interface idle time occur
between write bursts: Interface idle time allows
the drive to decrease physical saturation and
increase acceleration capacity for future bursts.
From a user standpoint, these characteristics happen
behind the scenes. In nearly every case, modern
operating systems submit TRIM commands when files
are deleted without the need for user interaction.
Leveraging these fundamental workload
characteristics enables dynamic write acceleration
to boost performance beyond the conventional
limits of MLC hardware. The table below shows the
performance gains achieved in a 128KB sequential
workload for a Micron SSD with dynamic write
acceleration (M600) versus one without (M510).
Though there are differences between these two
products, they contain the same number of NAND
components and feature a similar controller, so the
underlying hardware capability is comparable.
Optimized for Mobile Applications
Physical size and energy consumption are critical
characteristics for mobile applications. Heat production
is also critical because of space constraints. Mobile
SSD form factors like the M.2 enable SSD designs to
occupy an ever-shrinking physical space. As dimensions
decrease, thermal considerations become critical
because there is a smaller surface area available for
dissipating device-generated heat.
for reducing logical saturation when users delete
files. Without trim, logical saturation would
continue to increase as the drive is used, resulting
in diminished acceleration capacity. This may
occur even if the partition information shows the
volume to be mostly empty.
>> Drives are operated in a non-filled state for
the majority of the drive lifespan: Maintaining
a non-filled state is advantageous since
acceleration capacity is linked to logical saturation.
Users may still notice performance boosts with
drives up to 99% filled, but the duration of the
performance boosts would be reduced compared
to the drive being in a less filled state.
>> Write operations tend to occur in bursts:
Burst-oriented operations are unlikely to exceed
the acceleration capacity. On the other hand,
if sustained write traffic continues beyond the
current acceleration capacity, performance dips
may occur.
CAPACITY PRODUCT
SEQUENTIAL
WRITE (MB/s) GAIN
128GB M600 466 2.4X
128GB M510 187 2.4X
256GB M600 514 1.5X
256GB M510 333 1.5X
TABLE 1: Sequential Write Performance Comparison
CAPACITY
M.2
PRODUCT
SEQUENTIAL
WRITE POWER
(mW)
PERFORMANCE
DURING
MEASUREMENT
(MB/s)
TIME TO WRITE
1GB OF DATA
(s)
ENERGY PER
GB WRITTEN
(J)
128GB M600 2287 462 2.165 4.950
128GB M510 2155 186 5.376 11.586
256GB M600 2566 510 1.961 5.031
256GB M510 3025 335 2.985 9.030
512GB M600 2562 508 1.969 5.043
512GB M510 3794 509 1.965 7.454
TABLE 2: 128KB Sequential Write Performance/Power Comparison
4. 4
A MICRON TECHNICAL
MARKETING BRIEF
Logical Saturation
0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
500
400
300
200
100
0
WriteBandwith(MB/s)
Optimized Client Computing With Dynamic Write Acceleration
During accelerated performance, data is written in
high-speed SLC mode, which requires less energy to
write the same amount of data compared to MLC. To
demonstrate the difference, the table below shows
power/performance measurements of an M.2 M600
SSD with dynamic write acceleration compared to the
prior generation M510/M550 SSD without.
Reducing energy consumption also reduces the
amount of heat generated by the device, producing
a double benefit for mobile applications. For this
reason, the M.2 and mSATA form factors have the
feature enabled for all capacities on the M600.
Impact on Unintended
Usage Environments
Sustained Sequential Write Traffic
Some environments consist of sustained write
traffic in repeating address sequences without
interface idle time for periods which may exceed the
acceleration capacity of the drive. This contradicts
the characteristics of high-performance client
computing that the feature was designed for.
Consider the test results shown in Figure 2 below,
based on a single drive fill of a 128GB M600 SSD
with dynamic write acceleration. Prior to performing
the test, the drive was returned to fresh out of box
(FOB) conditions by performing an ATA SECURITY
ERASE command, which returns logical and physical
saturation to zero.
FIGURE 2: Sustained Sequential Write Traffic on 128Gb
M600 SSD for One Drive Fill
Note: Data reflects approximate performance.
Three distinct performance regions are evident in
the figure. The first is the accelerated region, which
persists until 46% logical saturation or 59GB are
written in total. The second is the non-acceleration
region, where data is written in MLC to slow down
the rate of physical saturation. The third region,
starting at 58% logical saturation or 74GB written
in total, occurs when the drive must transform data
written as SLC into MLC mode at the same time that
new data is being written by the host.
If the drive were filled a second time in the same
address sequence, without first decreasing logical
and physical saturation, performance results would
alternate between regions 2 and 3.
Without dynamic write acceleration, performance
in a sequential fill from an FOB state would
correspond to consistent region 2 behavior, without
the accelerated region 1 or the reduced region 3.
Subsequent drive fills performed in the same write
address sequence as the first fill would also result in
continuous region 2 behavior.
Sustained Random Write Traffic
Sustained random write traffic is fundamentally
different than sustained sequential write traffic
because in the case of sequential traffic, the address
sequences repeat, while address sequences from
random access do not.