What kind of merit Kingston love data centers? Says 3data
The reasons why commercial data centers are switching to SSDs are well known - any data center with an emphasis on high bandwidth and low transaction latency will eventually give up on hard drives. But there are a lot of SSD manufacturers, corporate-class drive models are even more, purchasing costs money, and a mistake costs astronomical money. Today we will explain why 3data premium data centers preferred Kingston among all iron manufacturers, and do not regret their decision.
3data is a walking distance data center network with a premium level of service. Today, it includes more than 10 of its own distributed data centers in Moscow, in which 5 distributed cloud nodes (virtualization clusters) are located. Each year, this network increases on average at 3 new sites. The goal for the future is to increase the number of sites to 40 by 2025 so that medium and small businesses in the capital can receive quality data center services within walking distance.
On the basis of these data centers, the company sells, of course, a collocation and its own distributed cloud. The 3data basic service is IaaS, a virtual infrastructure, i.e. separate virtual machines or a dedicated pool of computing resources with the ability to create various configurations of IT infrastructure and access via the Internet or physically or logically separated network infrastructure. Other services - archival and backup storage of large amounts of data (ArcTape), secure storage of extremely large amounts of data based on hybrid (disk-tape) solutions, dedicated servers, rental of servers and data storage systems (DSS), and ready-made solutions ( SaaS).
')
Data center 3data
In the last two virtualization clusters commissioned, 3data switched to using hyperconverged architecture, i.e., peer-to-peer hosts connected by special software. And for this, as you understand, we need disks. 3data uses disks of all types - SSD, SAS, NL SAS and even SATA. If to simplify a lot, the division is as follows: SSD for clients and cases when fast computations are needed, and cheap slow disks (NL SAS, for example) for large amounts of stored data.
The background and shadow for this distributed virtualization cluster is another - a backup cluster. This is a system of individual cloud nodes deployed in each data center backup servers, which are also connected into a single distributed cluster, where backup copies are made from these main virtual machine clusters. For this cluster, mainly capacious cheap SATA or NL SAS disks are used. Thus, information is reserved between data centers. A tape library is also attached to this configuration, to which petabytes of data are “poured” into 3data.
After several years of debugging, the first one, the main cluster, is actively developing and increasing its technical potential. And for such tasks, 3data began to look for high-speed equipment - as you understand from the tablet, SSD became the most suitable option.
Solid state drives in the data center are structurally similar to their counterparts in "civilian" computers, but their purpose is different. In data centers, SSDs either supplement or replace hard drives. Form factors vary from models in the form of a PCI-E expansion card to the usual 2.5 ”models, and the most common protocols / interfaces for transferring data from the server's CPU are SATA and SCSI.
But choosing a drive according to the principle “I’m red and cheaper!” Can’t even be done for a budget home PC, and corporate employees are even more meticulous in choosing SSDs, because “crooked” drives cause problems on all fronts. First, such SSDs “die” ahead of schedule under the weight of the number of write operations in the corporate sector. And if they do not fail, they “degrade”, that is, the write speed decreases, and the delays in the array increase, even when the drives are still far from the “pension”. All of this ends either with losses due to the premature replacement of unsuccessful models, or, if not to take measures, with the departure of customers.
The first thing you should look at when choosing an SSD is the type of controller flash drives, and the type of NAND flash memory on which data is stored. And also IOPS, TBW, DWPD, RTFM, LMAO, NBA, to which we have dedicated a separate article .
One way or another, the level of performance, reliability and service life declared by the manufacturer must be taken into account before purchasing drives. Moreover, the concept of norms in SSD for home PCs and organizations is also different:
JESD218A: Testing Technique for SSD Requirements and Reliability
3data was chosen from a huge number of manufacturers on the eve of purchases of memory and solid-state drives. About the memory of Kingston, we know that it is inexpensive and “accelerates” well. From the “red head” SSD, inexpensive SSDNow for replacing hard drives in computers and laptops, and extremely fast HyperX for overclockers, are widely known. Remarkable feats in themselves, but what about the data center? There is no need, because the corporate iron Kingston is a separate story that representatives of 3data tell us today.
server, inside view
At home, ultra-reliable “hardware” either lives longer than any other component of an older computer, which is already obsolete, or helps to raise money on the secondary market when it comes time to upgrade. In the corporate sector, reliability is the first thing buyers look at.
And Kingston is paranoid in this sense in a good sense of the word - from the very beginning of the company in 1987, when removable RAM began to appear, Kingston's memory was a good alternative to jaded competitors who worked only with mega-corporations and only according to the principle “you will get away”.
John Tu and David Sun, the company's founders, developed stress tests for all modules before they hit the counter. That is, each memory module was tested in combat, and the probability to buy an inoperative iron tends to zero. Therefore, since the era of the dominance of branded computers, Kingston has become a symbol of high-quality non-original components. Hence the market share of over 40% among manufacturers of RAM.
You won't surprise anyone with Kingston's memory in the data center
Today, the number of computers and memory for them, to put it mildly, has increased since 1987, but Kingston is still checking 100% of the released memory at all stages. At least one broken cell among millions of the same = faulty module, no “latok” and prescription of cells before sending to retail. And work at critical temperatures - from +100 to -5 degrees Celsius. On the counters get only the most durable and durable modules.
For everything else, there is a MasterCard 5-year warranty and a full-fledged Russian representative office with techies, not just salespeople and sweet-voiced girls on the hotline. By the way, there is a benefit from representation not only in the case of “nothing works for us, everything is broken!”.
Even in smartphones of the same model, drives with different names and speeds can be installed, to say nothing of server memory, in which NAND chips can vary from Hynix to Micron depending on the batch. Yes, it is still the same memory with identical characteristics, but bugs are inscrutable when upgrading machines for high-load computing.
In order to completely eliminate the potential memory incompatibility, Kingston has Server Premier memory. This is a fixed set of components for cloud computing with high demands for performance and reliability.
3data data centers
For example, 3data clusters are built on Supermicro and Dell servers. When you create a Server Premier Kingston captures a list of materials just under the desired platform, and when replaced, the buyer is guaranteed to receive the same, 100% compatible memory on the same chips, with PCB and capacitors of the same manufacturer.
It’s boring to repeat this phrase, but in industrial-grade drives, the quality of models and service come first, and then thegirls “parrots” in the benchmarks. Storage for data centers - this is not Pokemon, so instead of a rush “oh God, yes this is Kingston! Give ten! ”The company made a path several years long, the business carefully“ tasted ”the drives, made sure that they were reliable, and sales were rushing up.
Not a very Hollywood pace of events, the situation developed something like this:
The first SSD Kingston (SSDNow E and M-series) were published in 2009. Joint development with Intel based on SLC-memory. Without noise or performance records, but their role in turning the SSD from elite components into mass ones, these models played.
And the debut drive of corporate class , SSDNow E100, Kingston introduced in 2012. A good model, although in those years the “corporate Kingston” sounded just like a “BMW combine harvester”. That is, it is very curious, but the "combine" decided to first look at the new product, and only then lay out the hard-earned money for it.
As it turned out later, the "watches" were successful - the next SSD of the company, Kingston E50 , was released in 2014 and became known as the "unkillable", and most importantly, accessible model, with good reading performance. Even giants like Yandex and Mail.ru began to buy it in Russia.
In the modern history of Kingston, the corporate E-series (Enterprise) changed its name to DC (Data Centercomics ), and the Kingston DC400 became a bestseller . These are the drives with a capacity of 980 GB working in the data center 3data.
Why choose DC400? Excellent response time under high load, the ability to flexibly “tune” the drive to the needs of the company - to regulate the reserve area Over-Provision. The larger the area, the greater the performance of the disk, the smaller it is, the greater the capacity of the disk. Protection against power cuts and 5 years of warranty and support by the local representative are very pleasant conditions. But even without them, the drive did not throw problems, and it is worth a lot.
Kingston DC400 drives in data center 3data
Now a few numbers:
DC400 weight is less than 100 g,
form factor - 2.5 inches,
write-read speed is 555/520 mb / s.
The IOPS (Input / Output Operations per Second, or the maximum read / write speed of random blocks of 4KB) for a 960 GB DC400 is 99,000 / 88,000 IOPS.
The interface is SATA 3.0 (6 Gbit / s), there is backward compatibility with SATA 2.0 (3G Gbit / s).
The controller is Phison PS3110-S10. It has been used in real products since the second half of 2015, and basically it falls into models that can be described as "high-performance entry-level." Among the advantages are up to 100,000 IOPS in 4K read mode and up to ~ 90,000 IOPS when writing, as well as linear speeds in the region of 500-550 MB / s.
“Is this Kingston?”, The geeks are already grinning in the comments. And yes, he does.
The 3data data center network prefers to cooperate with the manufacturer. And Kingston, which everyone is accustomed to be considered a supplier, today is just a manufacturer.
The company does not grow crystals on its own and is not tied to any specific factories or chip suppliers. Therefore, Kingston works with Hynix, Micron, and other manufacturers, and in SSD Toshiba chips are most often used.
But! Now Kingston has become almost the only manufacturer that creates chips from finished wafers on its own. And this is already something more than just “sticking” finished components onto textolite.
“Kingston Corporate” is interesting with the HotSwap additional service - this is an iron reserve with a significant discount. Such a reserve may be in the warehouse of the customer or distributor, to choose from. That is, in an unforeseen situation, replace the faulty memory or the SSD will be as fast as possible. There are no restrictions on the amount and type of iron for HotSwap, the number of components and the level of discounts are negotiated individually. 3data reserved themselves SSD, although the need to use them never arose.
More than six months have passed since 3data and Kingston entered into a partnership agreement, and Kingston DC400 with a capacity of 960 GB has settled in one of five clusters of a distributed 3data cloud. Not a single problem during operation in the premium data center class Tier 3, these SSD did not deliver. And there are plenty of positive moments: after the upgrade from the HDD, the speed increased by 2 times, the customers are satisfied. And the efficiency of cloud services has increased with any type of data being processed.
Taking into account that Kingston’s durability and service guarantees do not disappoint either, 3data plans to fully switch to using Kingston’s drives to solve its problems. And the “combat” DC400 continues to serve real customers in the 3data cluster in one of the best clusters in Russia - in the data center B17.
It is not necessary to be the owner of the data center to check the reliability of Kingston hardware. You can simply buy a mechanical metal plate-based keyboard, HyperX Alloy with any switches to choose from (Cherry MX Blue, Brown or Red) with a 15% discount! The promotion is valid until July 15 in the 4Frag, Ulmart and DNS stores - have time to buy a non- exterminating non-killing keyboard while they are still in stock!
Subscribe and stay with us - it will be interesting!
For more information about Kingston and HyperX products, visit the company's official website . In choosing your kit HyperX help page with visual aids .
Who are 3data
3data is a walking distance data center network with a premium level of service. Today, it includes more than 10 of its own distributed data centers in Moscow, in which 5 distributed cloud nodes (virtualization clusters) are located. Each year, this network increases on average at 3 new sites. The goal for the future is to increase the number of sites to 40 by 2025 so that medium and small businesses in the capital can receive quality data center services within walking distance.
On the basis of these data centers, the company sells, of course, a collocation and its own distributed cloud. The 3data basic service is IaaS, a virtual infrastructure, i.e. separate virtual machines or a dedicated pool of computing resources with the ability to create various configurations of IT infrastructure and access via the Internet or physically or logically separated network infrastructure. Other services - archival and backup storage of large amounts of data (ArcTape), secure storage of extremely large amounts of data based on hybrid (disk-tape) solutions, dedicated servers, rental of servers and data storage systems (DSS), and ready-made solutions ( SaaS).
')
Data center 3data
In the last two virtualization clusters commissioned, 3data switched to using hyperconverged architecture, i.e., peer-to-peer hosts connected by special software. And for this, as you understand, we need disks. 3data uses disks of all types - SSD, SAS, NL SAS and even SATA. If to simplify a lot, the division is as follows: SSD for clients and cases when fast computations are needed, and cheap slow disks (NL SAS, for example) for large amounts of stored data.
The background and shadow for this distributed virtualization cluster is another - a backup cluster. This is a system of individual cloud nodes deployed in each data center backup servers, which are also connected into a single distributed cluster, where backup copies are made from these main virtual machine clusters. For this cluster, mainly capacious cheap SATA or NL SAS disks are used. Thus, information is reserved between data centers. A tape library is also attached to this configuration, to which petabytes of data are “poured” into 3data.
After several years of debugging, the first one, the main cluster, is actively developing and increasing its technical potential. And for such tasks, 3data began to look for high-speed equipment - as you understand from the tablet, SSD became the most suitable option.
What you need to know about drives in the data center
Solid state drives in the data center are structurally similar to their counterparts in "civilian" computers, but their purpose is different. In data centers, SSDs either supplement or replace hard drives. Form factors vary from models in the form of a PCI-E expansion card to the usual 2.5 ”models, and the most common protocols / interfaces for transferring data from the server's CPU are SATA and SCSI.
But choosing a drive according to the principle “I’m red and cheaper!” Can’t even be done for a budget home PC, and corporate employees are even more meticulous in choosing SSDs, because “crooked” drives cause problems on all fronts. First, such SSDs “die” ahead of schedule under the weight of the number of write operations in the corporate sector. And if they do not fail, they “degrade”, that is, the write speed decreases, and the delays in the array increase, even when the drives are still far from the “pension”. All of this ends either with losses due to the premature replacement of unsuccessful models, or, if not to take measures, with the departure of customers.
The first thing you should look at when choosing an SSD is the type of controller flash drives, and the type of NAND flash memory on which data is stored. And also IOPS, TBW, DWPD, RTFM, LMAO, NBA, to which we have dedicated a separate article .
One way or another, the level of performance, reliability and service life declared by the manufacturer must be taken into account before purchasing drives. Moreover, the concept of norms in SSD for home PCs and organizations is also different:
JESD218A: Testing Technique for SSD Requirements and Reliability
3data was chosen from a huge number of manufacturers on the eve of purchases of memory and solid-state drives. About the memory of Kingston, we know that it is inexpensive and “accelerates” well. From the “red head” SSD, inexpensive SSDNow for replacing hard drives in computers and laptops, and extremely fast HyperX for overclockers, are widely known. Remarkable feats in themselves, but what about the data center? There is no need, because the corporate iron Kingston is a separate story that representatives of 3data tell us today.
server, inside view
Kingston Memory: First, It's Reliable
At home, ultra-reliable “hardware” either lives longer than any other component of an older computer, which is already obsolete, or helps to raise money on the secondary market when it comes time to upgrade. In the corporate sector, reliability is the first thing buyers look at.
And Kingston is paranoid in this sense in a good sense of the word - from the very beginning of the company in 1987, when removable RAM began to appear, Kingston's memory was a good alternative to jaded competitors who worked only with mega-corporations and only according to the principle “you will get away”.
John Tu and David Sun, the company's founders, developed stress tests for all modules before they hit the counter. That is, each memory module was tested in combat, and the probability to buy an inoperative iron tends to zero. Therefore, since the era of the dominance of branded computers, Kingston has become a symbol of high-quality non-original components. Hence the market share of over 40% among manufacturers of RAM.
You won't surprise anyone with Kingston's memory in the data center
Today, the number of computers and memory for them, to put it mildly, has increased since 1987, but Kingston is still checking 100% of the released memory at all stages. At least one broken cell among millions of the same = faulty module, no “latok” and prescription of cells before sending to retail. And work at critical temperatures - from +100 to -5 degrees Celsius. On the counters get only the most durable and durable modules.
For everything else, there is a MasterCard 5-year warranty and a full-fledged Russian representative office with techies, not just salespeople and sweet-voiced girls on the hotline. By the way, there is a benefit from representation not only in the case of “nothing works for us, everything is broken!”.
Secondly, always not just compatible, but identical components
Even in smartphones of the same model, drives with different names and speeds can be installed, to say nothing of server memory, in which NAND chips can vary from Hynix to Micron depending on the batch. Yes, it is still the same memory with identical characteristics, but bugs are inscrutable when upgrading machines for high-load computing.
In order to completely eliminate the potential memory incompatibility, Kingston has Server Premier memory. This is a fixed set of components for cloud computing with high demands for performance and reliability.
3data data centers
For example, 3data clusters are built on Supermicro and Dell servers. When you create a Server Premier Kingston captures a list of materials just under the desired platform, and when replaced, the buyer is guaranteed to receive the same, 100% compatible memory on the same chips, with PCB and capacitors of the same manufacturer.
Kingston Corporate SSD: Customization and Durability Are Important
It’s boring to repeat this phrase, but in industrial-grade drives, the quality of models and service come first, and then the
Not a very Hollywood pace of events, the situation developed something like this:
The first SSD Kingston (SSDNow E and M-series) were published in 2009. Joint development with Intel based on SLC-memory. Without noise or performance records, but their role in turning the SSD from elite components into mass ones, these models played.
And the debut drive of corporate class , SSDNow E100, Kingston introduced in 2012. A good model, although in those years the “corporate Kingston” sounded just like a “BMW combine harvester”. That is, it is very curious, but the "combine" decided to first look at the new product, and only then lay out the hard-earned money for it.
As it turned out later, the "watches" were successful - the next SSD of the company, Kingston E50 , was released in 2014 and became known as the "unkillable", and most importantly, accessible model, with good reading performance. Even giants like Yandex and Mail.ru began to buy it in Russia.
In the modern history of Kingston, the corporate E-series (Enterprise) changed its name to DC (Data Center
Why choose DC400? Excellent response time under high load, the ability to flexibly “tune” the drive to the needs of the company - to regulate the reserve area Over-Provision. The larger the area, the greater the performance of the disk, the smaller it is, the greater the capacity of the disk. Protection against power cuts and 5 years of warranty and support by the local representative are very pleasant conditions. But even without them, the drive did not throw problems, and it is worth a lot.
Kingston DC400 drives in data center 3data
Now a few numbers:
DC400 weight is less than 100 g,
form factor - 2.5 inches,
write-read speed is 555/520 mb / s.
The IOPS (Input / Output Operations per Second, or the maximum read / write speed of random blocks of 4KB) for a 960 GB DC400 is 99,000 / 88,000 IOPS.
The interface is SATA 3.0 (6 Gbit / s), there is backward compatibility with SATA 2.0 (3G Gbit / s).
The controller is Phison PS3110-S10. It has been used in real products since the second half of 2015, and basically it falls into models that can be described as "high-performance entry-level." Among the advantages are up to 100,000 IOPS in 4K read mode and up to ~ 90,000 IOPS when writing, as well as linear speeds in the region of 500-550 MB / s.
And number 1: own production
“Is this Kingston?”, The geeks are already grinning in the comments. And yes, he does.
The 3data data center network prefers to cooperate with the manufacturer. And Kingston, which everyone is accustomed to be considered a supplier, today is just a manufacturer.
The company does not grow crystals on its own and is not tied to any specific factories or chip suppliers. Therefore, Kingston works with Hynix, Micron, and other manufacturers, and in SSD Toshiba chips are most often used.
But! Now Kingston has become almost the only manufacturer that creates chips from finished wafers on its own. And this is already something more than just “sticking” finished components onto textolite.
And another number 2: reserve iron at a discount just in case of fire
“Kingston Corporate” is interesting with the HotSwap additional service - this is an iron reserve with a significant discount. Such a reserve may be in the warehouse of the customer or distributor, to choose from. That is, in an unforeseen situation, replace the faulty memory or the SSD will be as fast as possible. There are no restrictions on the amount and type of iron for HotSwap, the number of components and the level of discounts are negotiated individually. 3data reserved themselves SSD, although the need to use them never arose.
Kingston in premium data centers: - interim results
More than six months have passed since 3data and Kingston entered into a partnership agreement, and Kingston DC400 with a capacity of 960 GB has settled in one of five clusters of a distributed 3data cloud. Not a single problem during operation in the premium data center class Tier 3, these SSD did not deliver. And there are plenty of positive moments: after the upgrade from the HDD, the speed increased by 2 times, the customers are satisfied. And the efficiency of cloud services has increased with any type of data being processed.
Taking into account that Kingston’s durability and service guarantees do not disappoint either, 3data plans to fully switch to using Kingston’s drives to solve its problems. And the “combat” DC400 continues to serve real customers in the 3data cluster in one of the best clusters in Russia - in the data center B17.
It is not necessary to be the owner of the data center to check the reliability of Kingston hardware. You can simply buy a mechanical metal plate-based keyboard, HyperX Alloy with any switches to choose from (Cherry MX Blue, Brown or Red) with a 15% discount! The promotion is valid until July 15 in the 4Frag, Ulmart and DNS stores - have time to buy a non- exterminating non-killing keyboard while they are still in stock!
Subscribe and stay with us - it will be interesting!
For more information about Kingston and HyperX products, visit the company's official website . In choosing your kit HyperX help page with visual aids .
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/370607/
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