How Samsung Is Scaling Up Data Centers for the Hyperscale Era
New technologies based on the next-gen CXL interface are transforming the way data centers manage memory, storage and more.?
Between AI, machine learning, cloud computing, video transcoding and other high-power computing applications, the pressure put on data centers has never been greater. To help address the unprecedented crunch that data servers and IT systems now need to process, Samsung has embraced the CXL (Compute Express Link) standard. Products like CXL Samsung Memory Expander offer data centers the ability to hyperscale while improving performance, cost and efficiency.??
How? Here’s your primer on one of the most innovative new technologies in memory, and how Samsung Semiconductor is pioneering it.??
What is CXL??
CXL, the advanced next-gen interface behind some of Samsung's most innovative new memory technologies, is an interconnect based on an open, industry-backed standard that allows different types of network devices to work more efficiently when processing high-performance computational workloads. How does it do that? By letting network devices bypass the bottleneck of a host processor and communicate with each other quickly and directly.?
Imagine trying to juggle a dozen balls while also mentally calculating your taxes. You'd probably drop the balls, right? Or at least make a math mistake. But now imagine that your eyes could pass data about what they were seeing directly to your hand without having to be processed by your brain first. In such a scenario, you might easily be able to juggle balls and a tax break at the same time.?
In a nutshell, that's what CXL does for data servers. By leveraging the unique strengths of the CXL standard, Samsung Semiconductor has improved the performance and efficiency of hyperscale applications, reducing the software stack and overhead needed to manage them and enabling greater capacity and memory bandwidth than can be achieved normally.?
CXL Memory Expander?
Last year, Samsung unveiled the first 512GB CXL DRAM module. Called CXL Memory Expander, the module uses CXL technology to enable extremely high memory capacity in existing IT systems.?
In standard computer architecture, a central processing unit (CPU) or host processor can access only DRAM slotted into a dual in-line memory module (DIMM). In other words, the upper limits of how much memory a CPU can access are defined by the maximum capacity of DIMM.??
领英推荐
For massive data centers like the ones running #ChatGPT , that upper limit is much higher, of course. Hyperscale applications require an extraordinary amount of memory. But there’s still a limit, and once servers reach it, they have traditionally had only one option: to build a new system with a higher upper-memory limit.?
What makes CXL Memory Expander so innovative is it enables extremely high memory capacity in existing IT systems. Instead of being bottlenecked by the memory capacity in DIMM, CXL Memory Expander allows networks to expand to potentially tens of terabytes of memory, all while greatly reducing latency.??
CXL Memory Expander also helps businesses improve their server operating costs and memory efficiency. The secret sauce is memory pooling, which enables host processors to sip only the amount of memory they need from the memory pool. But that’s not all. Advanced security features limit which hosts can have access to memory pooling, and hot plug functionality enables admins to swap out CXL DRAM on “hot” servers without shutting them down first.??
The Future of CXL?
CXL Memory Expander is just the first product in Samsung Semiconductor’s roadmap of CXL innovation, which also includes the Scalable Memory Development Kit (SMDK). With these products, data centers will be able to take advantage of unprecedented versatility and cost efficiency in terms of how they choose to manage and expand their memory.??
But the best is yet to come. Over the next few years, we expect that the server requirements of AI, ML, VMs and other HPC applications will continue to explode. We can’t wait to show you the CXL memory innovations we have planned to help your business manage the challenges of the hyperscale era.?
The Heart of Tech is a monthly newsletter about how technologies from Samsung Semiconductor are transforming the world. Subscribe and never miss an update.?