Fusion-io and Princeton University Team Up to Extend Memory from DRAM to NAND Flash
New Extended Memory Feature for ioMemory SDK Breaks Through DRAM Capacity Limitations for In-Memory Performance with Less Complexity for Application Developers and Lower Cost to Customers
12 July 2012 Source: http://www.fusionio.com
SALT LAKE CITY - July 10, 2012 - Fusion-io (NYSE: FIO) today announced that it has collaborated with Princeton University computer scientists to design a new subsystem called Extended Memory, available exclusively for Fusion ioMemory as part of the Fusion-io Software Development Kit (SDK). The Extended Memory subsystem transparently extends system memory from DRAM onto flash, providing much more high-performance memory capacity than currently possible with DRAM alone. Extended Memory simplifies complexity for application developers and extends cost savings to customers who can significantly boost performance with applications customized to leverage ioMemory.
"DRAM is not only a costly resource in modern computing, but the capacity DRAM offers is also extremely limited. Extended Memory offers a cost-effective alternative to large DRAM installments by allowing applications to extend their in-memory data from DRAM onto ioMemory," said Vivek Pai, Associate Professor of Computer Science at Princeton. "Princeton's academic research and design is focused on developing significant advancements in computer architecture, and it's exciting to collaborate with leaders like Fusion-io to bring these innovations to market to help power better performance and efficiency for companies around the world."
Many enterprises are attracted to the benefits of storing all data in-memory, especially to meet the needs of webscale, cloud and big data computing, but DRAM is cost-prohibitive, not persistent, and limited in capacity. The Extended Memory feature intelligently tiers data between available DRAM in the system and the persistent NAND flash tier, making it much more affordable for organizations to greatly expand the size of their in-memory data sets with a powerful software-driven solution.
"The Fusion ioMemory architecture is uniquely suited to innovation like the Extended Memory subsystem," said Chris Mason, Fusion-io director of kernel engineering and principal author of the Btrfs file system for Linux. "Since Fusion ioMemory has moved beyond legacy disk-era protocols, we can integrate new features like the Extended Memory subsystem to truly advance application performance for enterprise computing in ways that are simply not possible with traditional SSDs."
The Extended Memory subsystem dynamically moves frequently accessed data pages into memory on-demand while transparently migrating rarely accessed data pages from DRAM into ioMemory. This allows developers to simplify application design by assuming that entire datasets are in-memory, without the costs associated with DRAM purchase and operation. Application developers are able to further tune performance through software development kit tools that lock selected pages into DRAM, giving access to NAND flash as memory, instead of treating it as an extension of disk storage. This allows legacy applications to scale up with flash memory, instead of scaling out, boosting performance and reducing total cost of ownership.
"Fusion-io is proud to collaborate with the world's leading academic institutions and computer scientists to deliver breakthroughs that help our customers and technology partners advance their businesses," said Brent Compton, Senior Director of Product Management, Fusion-io. "The ability to optimize key operating system subsystems for flash with tools such as Extended Memory simplifies performance for developers in ways that were out of reach just a couple of years ago. We look forward to working with Princeton and other engineering leaders to continue simplifing complexity in application acceleration."
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