In March 2023, we reported that Pure Storage prepared to offer 300TB SSDs within 3 years.
While 300TB is absolutely an excellent quantity of storage, the business has actually exposed that it anticipates to be able to provide 1200TB SSD modules … ultimately.
Shawn Rosemarin, Pure VP for R&D, described to Blocks & & Files that the constraints of DRAM avoid industrial off-the-shelf (COTS) SSDs from going beyond 30TB capabilities. Generally, he stated, 1GB of DRAM is required for each 1TB of raw NAND capability, which indicates a 30TB drive would need 30GB of DRAM. The issue emerges when thinking about bigger capabilities, as the quantity of DRAM needed matches or perhaps goes beyond the quantity discovered in existing servers.
300TB and beyond
Rosemarin highlighted 3 primary concerns with utilizing more DRAM. DRAM stops working more regularly than NAND. DRAM is substantially more costly. DRAM’s energy effectiveness is much lower, leading to greater energy intake.
DRAM is needed for the Flash Translation Layer (FTL) software application, which works as firmware in the SSD’s controller. It permits inbound information to be composed to various physical flash pages despite the desired rational block. The DRAM holds the FTL mappings and metadata for this procedure, making it essential for SSD operation.
As SSD capabilities increase, the expense of DRAM ends up being a bigger part of the total SSD expense.
Pure Storage’s option to this issue is its Direct Flash Modules (DFMs), which do not depend on DRAM at the drive level. Rather, the FTL is done at the system-wide level in Pure’s controller and its software application. This technique, Pure claims, DFMs to increase capability much faster than off-the-shelf SSDs.
The business prepares to launch 150TB DFMs in 2025 and in its roadmap it states “by the time the market is commonly delivering 25-30TB HDDs and 30-60TB SSDs in 2026, we anticipate to deliver 300TB DFMs.”
That’s simply the start. He didn’t even hint at a timescale for it, Rosemarin informed Blocks & & Files, “We have every intent to scale beyond 300, to 600, and even to 1.2 petabyte per DFM.”
It will not be inexpensive obviously. In 2015, the company stated the price-per-gigabyte of its 300TB drive would be “less than” $0.15/ GB. Doing some basic estimations, and not considering inflation and whatever else that may happen before it even pertains to market, a 1.2 PB drive would be priced well north of $180,000.