October 3, 2010

Notes and links October 3 2010

Some notes, follow-up, and links before I head out to California: 

Comments

3 Responses to “Notes and links October 3 2010”

  1. Mike Pilcher on October 5th, 2010 6:55 am

    With Ray Lane joining HP, and HP moving harder into software, how long before Vertica is the new non-Stop SQL? A good technology buried in a machine and hidden from the market.

  2. Camuel Gilyadov on October 5th, 2010 8:57 am

    Minor correction: OCZ are trying to offer PCIe-like bandwidth for 3.5 inch form-factor drives.

    That is different from PCIe SSD, available from same OCZ and other companies for many years.

    The articles argues about some faster 20Gb/sec link interface which is apparently same as external PCIe interface standard. That 20Gb/sec link is than further compared to 6Gb/sec of SAS.

    However, the article (and OCZ press release) doesn’t mention that the new link runs 5Gb/sec versus 6Gb/sec per SAS. So in terms of pure wire efficiency it is in fact in disadvantage.

    It is not clear also why by the same token one cannot combine multiple SAS links and achieve even greater speed per link with same number of lanes and without requiring invention of yet another storage interface?

    Another interesting detail is that SAS interface haven’t gone anywhere. Flash chips still talks to multiple SAS controllers and SAS controllers still talk to RAID chip and RAID chip still talks to PCIe multiplexer. Business as usual here. So the proposed arrangement just moved RAID controller chip to the drive case and added another multiplexer chip in the critical data path.

    In my opinion: it is pointless to move chips back and forth between PCIe card to the drive case in the quest of optimal arrangement (or just novel arrangement?).

    What the industry really needs is a commodity FusionIO-like solution where SAS/SATA is eliminated altogether. Where native PCIe SSD controller talks directly to flash chips on one side and PCIe on the other. Such solution is leaner and doesn’t require any new standards. Neither any wires, neither 3.5 inch form-factor cases complicating airflow. A lot better power-efficiency. Lower latency. Higher throughput. More software control over flash-management issues that enables better optimization such as lighter wear-leveling for read-mostly analytic applications.

    Peace,
    Camuel.

  3. Washington Post’s Spy Talk: CIA drones could be grounded by software suit « Center for Intelligence News Study on October 11th, 2010 11:51 am

    […] Notes and links October 3 2010 (dbms2.com) […]

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