Expensive M.2 SSD Add-In Card from Utran Holds 28 Drives, Offering 109 GB/s Data Transfer Rate and Up to 224TB Storage Capacity, While Drawing 400 Watts of Power.
Take a peek at Utran Technology's jaw-dropping PCIe 5.0 x16 add-in card, gracing this year's Computex. Featuring a whopping 28 M.2 NVMe SSDs, it offers a staggering read and write throughput of 109 GB/s and a storage capacity of a stunning 224 TB.
The heart of this beast is the Broadcom PEX89144, a 144-lane PCIe 5.0 switch that masters connectivity and bandwidth distribution across the drives. This badass switch lets you slide the card into a PCIe x16 slot and two x8 cables, giving you simultaneous access to all the 28 SSDs, while bypassing typical lane and slot limitations and remaining compatible with FHFL-supporting systems.
In terms of performance, this monster delivers an impressive aggregate sequential read throughput of over 109.6 GB/s and more than 418,000 IOPS, as proven in Iometer benchmarks. Its average I/O response time clocks in at an impressive 0.48 milliseconds, thanks to the PEX89144 switch. And when it comes to CPU usage, it hovers around 30%, hinting at room for parallel compute tasks or additional I/O operations. These levels of performance and low latency make this device an appealing choice for data center apps demanding both capacity and performance.
However, be warned, energy vampire! Utran claims the card draws around 400W. One may ponder the source of these power demands, considering its singular eight-pin auxiliary PCIe power connector.
To tackle cooling, Utran has employed a deliciously compact and dense cooling system, featuring a radiator and a high-pressure fan. This cooling setup keeps this storage powerhouse suitable for rack-scale storage deployments. With eight of these bad boys, you'll be hoarding 1.792PB of data!
Now, before you start drooling, remember this storage titan ain't hot-swappable. Also, it's unclear if there’s power loss protection on the card level, so you'll need SSDs with drive-level protection. But fear not, as the card sports management functions such as USB terminal control, allowing for external monitoring or updates. Lastly, it's cooled via a single high-pressure fan, like your powerful pals in the datacenter world.
Utran aims to bring this 28-way M.2 adapter to the market by summer for a pricey $3,000. Then again, the Broadcom PEX89144 ain't exactly a bargain, either! 💸💸💸
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[1] StorageReview: Utran 28-way M.2 adapter boosts NVMe performance with Broadcom PCIe switch[2] AnandTech: Utran Technology PCIe Gen5 Add-in-Card with Dynamic Striping and Phison E28
Bonus: PCIe lane saturation is a lurking possibility when all drives are maxing out IO concurrently, potentially limiting performance gains from having so many drives on a single card. But hey, who needs performance when you've got 28 BIG and FAST drives, right? 🤪🤣😅🤪
When it comes to extreme storage, we're getting a taste of the future with Utran Technology's high-capacity, high-performance solutions. 🤯🚀💥🔥💥🚀
Data-and-cloud-computing enthusiasts will find the innovative Utran Technology PCIe 5.0 x16 add-in card particularly intriguing, as it pushes the bounds of storage capacity with its 28 M.2 NVME SSDs and leverages technology like the Broadcom PEX89144 switch for efficient bandwidth distribution.
In the realm of extreme storage solutions, technology plays a crucial role in enabling high capacity and performance, as exemplified by the 28-way M.2 adapter from Utran Technology.
