Intel VROCSTANMOD User Manual
Product brief
Intel® Virtual RAID on CPU (Intel® VROC)
Industry: Data Center
Scalable RAID
for CPU-Attached SSDs
Intel® Virtual RAID on CPU (Intel® VROC) – an enterprise RAID solution for NVMe*
SSDs directly attached to Intel® Xeon™ Scalable processors.
Intel® Xeon®
Scalable Processor
Intel® VMD
Intel® VROC
software utilizes
Intel® VMD hardware
on new CPUs
NVMe*
SSDs
Enterprise data storage solutions are migrating to higher bandwidth and lower
latency NVMe*-based SSDs to address the performance bottlenecks of legacy
SATA/SAS interfaces. With this transition, enterprises also require RAID data
protection for NVMe SSDs.
Intel® Virtual RAID on CPU (Intel® VROC), a new enterprise RAID solution
specically designed for NVMe SSDs, provides expected reliability while
unleashing the performance of NVMe SSDs. This is enabled by a new feature
in next-generation Intel® Xeon™ Scalable processors called Intel® Volume
Management Device (Intel® VMD), an integrated controller inside the CPU
PCIe* root complex. Because the NVMe SSDs are directly connected to
the CPU, the full performance potential of reduced latency and increased
bandwidth can be realized. Intel VROC enables this benet without the
complexity, cost and power consumption of traditional hardware RAID host
bus adapter (HBA) cards placed between the drives and the CPU.
Scalable RAID for Growth on Demand
A single Intel Xeon Scalable processor using Intel VROC is capable of supporting up
to 12 NVMe SSDs directly attached to the CPU, and up to 6 RAID arrays.2 By adding
PCIe switches or dual-socket system congurations, that amount doubles. In addition,
Intel VROC supports both boot volumes and data volumes, enabling the exibility to
use one array for both system and data volumes, or separating the arrays respectively.
Although a boot RAID array needs to be within a VMD controller, data R AID arrays can
span across multiple Intel VMD controllers, or even span across dierent processors
on the same system. With a multitude of supported congurations, Intel VROC allows
NVMe RAID solutions to start small, then scale simply and cost eectively.
Over 2M Mixed
Read and Write IOPS
in 4 disk RAID 0 with
Intel® Optane™ SSDs
1
Rich Management Tools for Easy Maintenance
Intel VROC management tools support today’s modernized data center infrastructure.
Intel VROC allows data center administrators to create and delete R AID volumes in
both pre-OS and OS environments. RAID settings can be congured with either a
user interface or command line, plus the arrays can be managed locally or remotely
through a web-based RESTful agent.
NVMe-based SSD management has never been easier. With support for surprise
hot-plug, there is no need to reboot the server to replace a failed drive. Using the
status indicator LED, administrators can visually identify the RAID status (normal,
initialization, degraded, or fail), as well as locate a particular drive in hundreds of
SSDs. Automatic email notications are triggered to alert administrators of events
requiring attention.
Product Brief | Intel® Virtual Raid on CPU (Intel® VROC)
Reliable RAID for Data Protection
For enterprises, it’s critical to protect data when power loss
occurs unexpectedly. Intel VROC takes that a step further.
Data remains safe when RAID 5 is in a degraded state and
power loss occurs at the same time. Most RAID solutions avoid
this problem by requiring a backup power unit, which adds
additional cost. Intel VROC solves this double fault challenge
Unleash the Power of NVMe SSDs Today
Quicker access to data means a more ecient business, and
upgrading to NVMe SSDs is the rst step to a faster storage
solution. Unleash the full power of these NVMe SSDs with Intel
Virtual RAID on CPU, a complete RAID solution that enables
the unprecedented speed of NVMe SSDs while protecting data
required by enterprise applications.
with journaling, and without the need of a backup power unit.
Note: Intel VROC RAID 5 double fault protection feature
depends on state-of-the-art data center NVMe SSDs with
power loss protection.
FEATURES AT A GLANCE
Supported Platform Platforms with Intel® Xeon® Scalable processor family
Supported Operating Systems Windows* 2016, Windows* 2012 R2, Windows* 10, Windows* 7 SP2
Supported NVMe-based SSDs All Intel® SSDs for Data Center and Professional, with NVMe (Non-Volatile Memor y Express)
Supported Conguration • Up to 24 SSDs per Intel® VMD controller, per R AID array, per system
SKUs Available Pass-Through: No RAID (except RAID 0 for Intel® SSD DC P3608 Series)
Key Features • Surprise Hot-plug
Red Hat Enterprise Linux* 7.3
SUSE Linux Enterprise* 12 SP3
3rd party SSDs:
• Samsung* SM951, SM961, PM953, PM961
• Toshiba* XG3
• Micron* 9100
• Lenovo* Atsani
• Huawei* ES3600P3
• Up to 12 arrays per system
• Up to 2 RAID volumes per array
• Up to 2 levels of switches
• Data volume can span across Intel VMD controllers, boot volume cannot span
Standard: RAID 0/1/10
Premium: RAID 0/1/5/10
• Status LED Indication
• Hot Spare and Auto-rebuild
• Email Notications for RAID events
• RAID 5 Power Loss Protection for Degraded Volume (Double Fault Protec tion)
• Bad Block Management
• Various Strip Sizes (4k, 8k, 16k, 32k, 64k, 128k)
Learn more at intel.com/VROC
Register and download the VROC software at: intel.com/downloadVROC
Find the Intel® Solid State Drive that’s right for you: intel.com/ssd
1 System cong uration: I ntel® Serve r System S260 0WF Family, Inte l® Xeon® 8170 Series Pr ocessors , 2.1GHz , 26 cores. 32GB D RAM. BIO S Release SE5 C620.86B .0X.01.0 007.060920171037, MDADM
3.4. 4x Intel® SS D DC P4800X Se ries 375GB, RA ID 0, 128KB Strip size, OS: RHEL* 7.3, Intel® VROC: RSTe_ 5.1_W W13.3, Workload Gener ator: FIO 2.21, 70:30 mixed read/wr ite 4K ran dom IOs: 16
Worker s, IOd epth 16, No Fi lesystem, CPU Anit ized, Hyper-t hreading On.
2 The availabi lity of th e number of NV Me conne ctions will va ry with the OEM system designs
3 Hua wei* ES360 0P will be ful ly support ed in a 5.2 hot x release
Intel technologies ’ featur es and benet s depen d on system cong uration and may re quire enable d hardw are, soft ware or se rvice acti vation. Per formance va ries de pending on sys tem congura tion .
No comp uter syste m can be absolutely secure . Check with yo ur system ma nufactu rer or retai ler or learn mo re at intel.c om.
Tests document pe rformance of compon ents on a pa rticular te st, in sp ecic syste ms. Diere nces in har dware, sof twa re, or congur ation will aec t actual per formance. Consult oth er sources of information to evalua te performance as you conside r your purchase.
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The product s de scribed may contain design defect s or er rors known as er rata which may cause the pr oduc t to deviate from published specicati ons. Cu rrent chara cter ized errata ar e availab le on
request.
Cost red uction scena rios described are intende d as examples of how a given Intel- based produ ct, in the specied circums tances and con gura tions , may aect future costs an d provide cost sav ings .
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