Feed: AnandTech
Feed Link: https://www.anandtech.com
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Title: DapuStor and Memblaze Target Global Expansion with State-of-the-Art
Enterprise SSDs

Date: Thu, 15 Aug 2024 14:00:00 EDT
Link: https://www.anandtech.com/show/21530/dapustor...

The growth in the enterprise SSD (eSSD) market has outpaced that of the
client SSD market over the last few years. The requirements of AI servers for
both training and inference has been the major impetus in this front. In
addition to the usual vendors like Samsung, Solidigm, Micron, Kioxia, and
Western Digital serving the cloud service providers (CSPs) and the likes of
Facebook, a number of companies have been at work inside China to service the
burgeoning eSSD market within.

In our coverage of the Microchip Flashtec 5016, we had noted Longsys's use of
Microchip's SSD controllers to prepare and market enterprise SSDs under the
FORESEE brand. Long before that, two companies - DapuStor and Memblaze -
started releasing eSSDs specifically focusing on the Chinese market.

There are two drivers for the current growth spurt in the eSSD market. On the
performance side, usage of eTLC behind a Gen 5 controller is allowing vendors
to advertise significant benefits over the Gen 4 drives in the previous
generation. At the same time, a capacity play is happening where there is a
race to cram as much NAND as possible into a single U.2 / EDSFF enclosure.
QLC is being used for this purpose, and we saw a number of such 128 TB-class
eSSDs on display at FMS 2024.

DapuStor and Memblaze have both been relying on SSD controllers from Marvell
for their flagship drives. Their latest product iterations for the Gen 5 era
use the Marvell Bravera SC5 controller. Similar to the Flashtec controllers,
these are not meant to be turnkey solutions. Rather, the SSD vendor has
considerable flexibility in implementing specific features for their desired
target market.

At FMS 2024, both DapuStor and Memblaze were displaying their latest
solutions for the Gen 5 market. Memblaze was celebrating the sale of 150K+
units of their flagship Gen 5 solution - the PBlaze7 7940 incorporating
Micron's 232L 3D eTLC with Marvell's Bravera SC5 controller. This SSD
(available in capacities up to 30.72 TB) boasts of 14 GBps reads / 10 GBps
writes along with random read / write performance of 2.8 M / 720K - all with
a typical power consumption south of 16 W. Additionally, the support for some
of NVMe features such as software-enabled flash (SEF) and zoned name space
(ZNS) had helped Memblaze and Marvell to receive a 'Best of Show' award under
the 'Most Innovative Customer Implementation' category.

DapuStor had their current lineup on display (including the Haishen H5000
series with the same Bravera SC5 controller). The company incorporates YMTC
NAND into the drives sold in the Chinese market. However, for other regions,
BiCS flash is being used. Additionally, the company had an unannounced proof-
of-concept 61.44 TB QLC SSD on display. Despite the label carrying the
Haishen5 series tag (its current members all use eTLC NAND), this sample
comes with QLC flash.

DapuStor has already invested resources into implementing the flexible data
placement (FDP) NVMe feature into the firmware of this QLC SSD. The company
also had an interesting presentation session dealing with usage of CXL memory
expansion to store the FTL for high-capacity enterprise SSDs - though this is
something for the future and not related to any current product in the
market.

Having established themselves within the Chinese market, both DapuStor and
Memblaze are looking to expand in other markets. Having products with leading
performance numbers and features in the eSSD growth segment will stand them
in good stead in this endeavor.

Gallery: DapuStor and Memblaze Target Global Expansion with State-of-the-Art
Enterprise SSDs

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