Data centers primarily use HDDs because they offer greater storage capacity than SSDs but are not the best choice for data-related tasks. Artificial intelligencebeing much slower and consuming more electricity.
Micron has just introduced the perfect solution for AI-related tasks. We talk about Micron SSD 6550 IONthe first SSD with 60 TB of storage that has an interface PCIe 5.0 x4.
This new storage unit is designed especially for teams with Artificial Intelligence inference and training workloads, where data is continually being read and written and greater speed results in a reduction in the time necessary to carry out these processes as well as savings in the electricity bill.
The fastest SSD on the market
This drive is available in the E3.S form factor, a format commonly used in data centers that need a lot of storage very quickly. Micron uses the technology 3D NAND 8th generation with 232 layers that combines high density storage, high performance and low power consumption.
According to the manufacturer, this unit offers a speed of 12 GB/s read and write using only 20W of power. For customers who need higher performance, a model that consumes 5W more is also available. The idle consumption of this unit is 4W, being 20% more efficient than other SSD units of the same capacity from other manufacturers.
Álvaro Toledo, vice president and general manager of Micron’s Data Center Storage Group, states that:
The Micron 6550 ION is a game-changer for high-capacity storage solutions to address the insatiable capacity and power demands of AI workloads.
Again, based on the information provided by this manufacturer, this new unit represents a 147% performance improvement in NVIDIA Magnum IO GPUDirect storage operations. In addition, it is 30% more efficient in deep learning Unet3D transfer tasks with sizes of 4 Kb. It consumes 209% less energy than commercially available models, and completes AI learning checkpoint tasks 151% faster.
Due to its form factor, a single rack with Micron 6550 ION units can accommodate up to 44.2 PBwhich represents a 67% increase in density compared to traditional 2U racks with 26.5 PB of storage.
This is a product intended for large data centers, so we do not know the price. If we take into account that 8 TB of PCIe 4.0 storage costs more than 1,000 euros, we can get a rough idea of what the unit could cost, and to which we must add that it is not sold in racks, not in individual units.
