Samsung Begins to Ship 15.36 TB SSD for Enterprise Storage Systems
by Anton Shilov on March 3, 2016 3:00 PM EST
Samsung on Thursday introduced its new lineup of high-capacity SSDs for enterprises. The new Samsung PM1633a family of drives includes the world’s first SSD that can store 15.36 TB of data and which leaves behind even the leading-edge hard drives. The solid-state drive not only offers the world’s highest-capacity, but also boasts with increased reliability and high performance. The manufacturer is already shipping the new SSDs to select customers.
The Samsung PM1633a 15.36 TB SSD can deliver up to 1200 MB/s sequential read performance and features random read and write speeds of up to 200,000 and 32,000 IOPS respectively, according to the manufacturer. The 15.36 TB SSD supports 1 DWPD (drive writes per day) throughout the period of several years (unfortunately, Samsung does not specify of how many), which indicates very high endurance. The new solid-state storage solution features SAS-12 Gb/s interface and is compatible with servers that support drives in 2.5”/15 mm form-factor. Samsung does not reveal power consumption of the PM1633a 15.36 TB SSD, but based on power requirements the SSD can consume up to 13.7W.
| Samsung PM1633a SSD Specifications | |||
| 15.36 TB | |||
| Controller | Samsung proprietary controller | ||
| NAND | Samsung's 256 Gb 48-layer TLC NAND | ||
| DRAM Cache | 16 GB DDR3 SDRAM | ||
| Sequential Read | 1200 MB/s | ||
| Endurance | 1 DWPD (Drive Writes Per Day) | ||
| Interface and Form-Factor | 2.5"/15mm SAS-12 Gbps | ||
The PM1633a drives are based on Samsung’s new proprietary controller that can concurrently access large amounts of high-density NAND flash with the help of a special firmware. Thanks to the new controller, the PM1633a SSDs are even faster than the PM1633 drives unveiled last August (sequential read and write speeds of up to 1100MB/s and 1000MB/s, up to 160/18 thousand random read/write IOPS). Typically, high-capacity SSDs do not offer truly high performance because of peculiarities of their internal architecture, but Samsung has managed to develop a controller that weds performance and capacity.
The Samsung PM1633a SSDs utilize the company’s third-generation 256 Gb TLC 3D V-NAND memory chips. The 256 Gb dies are stacked in 16 layers and form a single 512 GB package. Samsung uses 32 of such packages to build its most spacious SSD, leaving around 1 TB of NAND for overprovisioning. The giant drive also features 16 GB of DRAM cache to ensure smooth performance. The Samsung PM1633a 15.36 TB will be the second product to use the company's 48-layer TLC 3D V-NAND after the Portable SSD T3. Eventually, Samsung will further expand usage of this flash memory.
The advantages of 15.36 TB SSDs in the server space are hard to overestimate. There are 2U servers that can fit in 48 SAS3/12G storage devices (1, 2). Each of such machines can store 737.28 TB of data (if fully populated with Samsung’s new PM1633a SSDs), whereas a 42U cabinet featuring 21 of such servers will be able to store 15482 TB of data (15.4 PB). By contrast, storage capacity of a standard 42U storage rack based on 360 3.5” 10TB HDDs is around 3600 TB.
Samsung did not reveal the price of its 15.36 TB SSD, but is probably in the range of several thousands of dollars.
Later this year Samsung plans to add drives with 7.68 TB, 3.84 TB, 1.92 TB, 960 GB and 480 GB into its PM1633a lineup.
Source: Samsung
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Flunk - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
Still a great deal.jasonelmore - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
so your just guessing and trying to correct someone on a complete guess. where can i find more of your work?Samus - Friday, March 4, 2016 - link
Current enterprise drives sell around 60 cents a gigabyte. Samsung isn't going to have much luck selling a drive for nearly double that.chrnochime - Sunday, March 6, 2016 - link
LOL. Try $2.5/GB:http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=9S...
Levish - Tuesday, March 15, 2016 - link
I strongly doubt it being that it's TLC / 3D, although Samsung may scalp for a bit since they are the only game on the block with this type of drive with storage capacities but as soon as other companies join in on the fun you'll see these for somewhere in the middle of .25 and .60Shadowmaster625 - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
I'm not so sure I would want to deploy a 1U server with that much SSD packed into it. Someone is liable to simply walk out the door with it. 2 weeks later, 48 drives appear on craigslist.Kristian Vättö - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
Data centers aren't like your local Starbucks where you can just walk in and out.euler007 - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
That's still worth a lot more than the cash that most bank keep on hand. Security would need to stand up to motivated, equipped, informed robbers.RealBeast - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
Another good reason for me to test them for Anandtech.No robberies in my neighborhood. I have three vicious dogs and guns in every room -- it's a requirement for living in Texas. :) And then there's that thousand yard dash needed to get off my property.
Beany2013 - Thursday, March 3, 2016 - link
As Kristian notes, I think you're seriously underestimating the security that the sort of org who would be looking at this sort of storage.In my last place of work, the DC was shortly due to be fenced off from the public, but already had ram-proof pillars at the loading bay and front door, and had multiple heavy duty, heavily magnet-locked doors (with their own redundant power) that were access controlled by keycards configured from a single computer in the main office (behind several other of the same doors). The DC is remotely monitored 24hrs a day over CCTV and the security turnaround time in the past has been minutes, with notifications within seconds of *any* alarm incident. The building cannot be left empty unless all alarms, locks etc are enabled upon threat of gross misconduct - IE you accidentally leave an internal door jammed open and are the last person to leave the building, you could turn up the next day to find the contents of your desk waiting for you in reception. But you'd have to buzz in because your access codes would be dumped...
That computer with the access codes has boot password, encrypted HDD, login password for the (heavily restricted) user account, no internet access, and password for the RFID controller software.
This wasn't some bluechip - it was a small-ish hosting company turning over less than ten million dollars a year.
Now they owned this DC, but they also had floorspace in a 'commercial' DC for geographical segretation, which had similar restrictions, and also had 24hr security personnel.
On top of this, all the servers were tightly monitored - a core storage server going down would raise half a dozen people within seconds, most of whom live within five minutes drive of the DC itself.
When you start to get to *needing* that level of storage, you tend to start protecting that data very, very seriously. I'm pretty sure Kristian (above) knows the sort of thing that I mean.
And if you know an org that has that level of storage, and doesn't have the sort of security listed above, do NOT use them - because they don't have a fucking clue what they're doing.