- E2 SSDs purpose to stability storage efficiency capability and effectivity
- New type issue suits rising demand for heat tier information storage
- Excessive density flash might cut back reliance on exhausting drives long run
As workloads shift and chilly information heats up underneath AI and analytics calls for, the standard break up between high-speed SSDs and cost-effective exhausting drives is now not serving each use case.
A brand new SSD type issue often called E2 is being developed to deal with the rising hole in enterprise information storage. Doubtlessly delivering as much as 1PB of QLC flash per drive, they might grow to be the middle-ground choice the trade wants.
StorageReview claims the E2 type issue is being designed with assist from key gamers together with Micron, Meta, and Pure Storage by means of the Storage Networking Business Affiliation and Open Compute Venture.
Strong speeds, however not cutting-edge
E2 SSDs targets “heat” information – info that’s accessed typically sufficient to burden exhausting drives however which doesn’t justify the price of efficiency flash.
Bodily, E2 SSDs measure 200mm x 76mm x 9.5mm. They use the identical EDSFF connector present in E1 and E3 drives, however are optimized for high-capacity, dense deployments.
A normal 2U server might host as much as 40 E2 drives, translating into 40PB of flash in a single chassis. StorageReview says these drives will join over PCIe 6.0 utilizing 4 lanes and should devour as much as 80W per unit, though most are anticipated to attract far much less.
Efficiency will attain 8-10MB/s per terabyte, or as much as 10,000MB/s for a 1PB mannequin. That’s sooner than exhausting drives however not in the identical class as top-end enterprise SSDs. E2’s priorities will as an alternative be capability, effectivity, and value management.
Pure Storage confirmed off a 300TB E2 prototype in Could 2025 that includes DRAM caches, capacitors for energy loss safety, and a flash controller fitted to this scale. Whereas present servers aren’t but prepared for this way issue, new programs are anticipated to observe.
It’s honest to say E2 will not exchange exhausting drives in a single day, but it surely does sign a shift. Because the spec strikes towards finalization this summer time, distributors are already rethinking how large-scale flash can match into trendy infrastructure.
