Server Hardware Super-Cycle 2022

Re:Server Hardware Super-Cycle 2022 by dragontamer on Tuesday January 18, 2022 @09:27AM (#29979587)

I don't think Intel really knew what they were going for with Optane / persistent memory. They had an invention, it had a bunch of interesting stats, and they were hoping someone out there would figure out a use.

Databases seem like the obvious answer. Persistent memory / Optane is much faster than NAND Flash... but less dense than NAND Flash. Its also slower than DRAM, but more dense, so it sits in between.

Whether or not that's useful remains to be seen.

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Re:Server Hardware Super-Cycle 2022 by haimez on Tuesday January 18, 2022 @09:58AM (#29980104)

You might use such a thing in database systems for, eg: 1. The write ahead log, for faster I/O than a direct flush to SSD 2. Staging disk cache entries to persistent memory before a planned host/process restart for faster subsequent DRAM cache warming

The problem with 1 is that you still need to periodically flush to disk (at least once persistent storage is full) which means it’s only an improvement in burst activity and not peak throughput.

The problem with both is complexity of implementation to deliver functionality that can only be used on a (currently) relatively uncommon subset of servers. Probably not something that Postgres would rush to implement, but potentially something that MSSQL or Oracle might consider as a premium feature.

Disclaimer: I haven’t looked into the details of optane and how you interface with that storage in software.

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