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Only a few weeks ago Samsung set a new record for SSD-drive capacity with its latest 30TB model. The achievement didn’t stand for long; US company Nimbus Data just shot past Samsung’s benchmark with the launch of a gargantuan 100TB drive.
The company says the “ExaDrive DC series raises the bar in SSD power efficiency, density, and write endurance”. At a 85% lower claimed power consumption than the competition (0.1 Watts/TB) the new drive is the world’s most efficient SSD which, according to Nimbus, means a 42% reduction cost of ownership per terabyte.
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With a mean time between failures (MTBF) of 2.5 million hours, or over 285 years, longevity of the drive should be ensured as well but the the ExaDrive’s selling point is of course capacity. According to the Nimbus press release the drive has “capacity to store 20 million songs, 20,000 HD movies, or 2,000 iPhones worth of data in a device small enough to fit in your back pocket.” As a photographer you’re unlikely to ever run out of space, even when shooting high-resolution Raw files or recording 4K video footage.
The ExaDrive DC100 comes with the same 3.5″ form factor, SATA interface and plug-and-play capability as most standard hard drives, allowing for easy installation. The ExaDrive DC100 will be available this summer. No pricing information has been provided yet but given it’s targeted at datacenter use the new drive likely won’t be cheap. More information is available on the Nimbus website.
Press Release:
Nimbus Data launches the world’s largest solid state drive – 100 terabytes – to power data-driven innovation
ExaDrive DC series raises the bar in SSD power efficiency, density, and write endurance
Irvine, CA, March 19, 2018 – Nimbus Data, a pioneer in flash memory solutions, today announced the ExaDrive® DC100, the largest capacity (100 terabytes) solid state drive (SSD) ever produced. Featuring more than 3x the capacity of the closest competitor, the ExaDrive DC100 also draws 85% less power per terabyte (TB). These innovations reduce total cost of ownership per terabyte by 42% compared to competing enterprise SSDs, helping accelerate flash memory adoption in both cloud infrastructure and edge computing.
“As flash memory prices decline, capacity, energy efficiency, and density will become the critical drivers of cost reduction and competitive advantage,” stated Thomas Isakovich, CEO and founder of Nimbus Data. “The ExaDrive DC100 meets these challenges for both data center and edge applications, offering unmatched capacity in an ultra-low power design.”
Optimized to Maximize Flash Storage Capacity and Efficiency
While existing SSDs focus on speed, the DC100 is optimized for capacity and efficiency. With its patent-pending multiprocessor architecture, the DC100 supports much greater capacity than monolithic flash controllers. Using 3D NAND, the DC100 provides enough flash capacity to store 20 million songs, 20,000 HD movies, or 2,000 iPhones worth of data in a device small enough to fit in your back pocket. For data centers, a single rack of DC100 SSDs can achieve over 100 petabytes of raw capacity. Data centers can reduce power, cooling, and rack space costs by 85% per terabyte, enabling more workloads to move to flash at the lowest possible total cost of ownership.
Plug-and-Play and Balanced Performance for Diverse Workloads
Featuring the same 3.5” form factor and SATA interface used by hard drives, the ExaDrive DC100 is plug-and-play compatible with hundreds of storage and server platforms. The DC100’s low-power (0.1 watts/TB) and portability also make it well-suited for edge and IoT applications. The DC100 achieves up to 100,000 IOps (read or write) and up to 500 MBps throughput. This equally-balanced read/write performance is ideal for a wide range of workloads, from big data and machine learning to rich content and cloud infrastructure.
“The release of such a high capacity flash device that is fully compatible with HDD form factors opens up the opportunity to turbo charge big data platforms while at the same time improving reliability, significantly reducing device count, increasing data mobility, and lowering the TCO of multi-PB scale storage platforms,” said Eric Burgener, research vice president of Storage at IDC. “Devices of this class will allow flash to cost-effectively penetrate a broader set of use cases outside of tier 0 and tier 1 applications.”
Superior Reliability and Complete Data Protection
The ExaDrive DC100 is protected by an unlimited endurance guarantee for 5 years. By doing away with confusing drive-writes-per-day restrictions, the DC100 offers peace of mind, reduces hardware refresh cycles, and eliminates costly support renewals. Embedded capacitors ensure that buffered data is safely protected if there is a sudden power loss. Encryption, multiple ECC processors, and a secure-erase feature ensure data security. The DC100 offers a mean time between failures (MTBF) of 2.5 million hours.
Availability, Certifications, and Pricing
The ExaDrive DC series includes both 100 TB and 50 TB models. It is currently sampling to strategic customers and will be generally available in summer 2018. Nimbus Data has qualified the DC series in storage and server enclosures from major vendors. Pricing will be similar to existing enterprise SSDs on a per terabyte basis while offering 85% lower operating costs. Overall, the ExaDrive DC series will cost 42% less per terabyte over a 5-year period compared to existing enterprise SSDs. This TCO advantage factors in the superior endurance, balanced read/write performance, power savings, cooling savings, rack space savings, component reduction, and lower refresh costs.
Articles: Digital Photography Review (dpreview.com)
