FMS 2024: MaxLinear to Demo Panther III Storage Accelerator Solutions

MaxLinear, Inc. will demonstrate the advanced compression, encryption, and security performance of its storage acceleration solution, Panther III, at the Future of Memory and Storage (FMS) 2024 trade show from August 6-8, 2024.

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The demos will show that Panther III can achieve up to 40x more throughput, up to 190x better latency, and up to 1,000 times less CPU utilization than a software-only solution, leading to significant cost savings in terms of flash drives and needed CPU cores.

The Panther III creates a bold new product category for maximizing the performance of data storage systems – an all-in-one ‘storage accelerator.’ Unlike encryption and/or compression solutions, it consolidates a suite of storage acceleration functions, including compression, de-dupe, encryption, data protection, and real-time validation, in a single hardware-based solution. It is engineered to offload and expedite specific data processing tasks, thus providing a significant performance boost, storage cost savings, and energy savings compared to traditional software-only, FPGA, and other competitive solutions.

“Panther III meets the needs of both data center administrators, who are desperate for power efficiency and cost-saving storage solutions with the rise of AI, and also dataset owners – who want to store and access their data quickly, securely, and accurately,” said Vikas Choudhary, VP, Ethernet and storage accelerators, MaxLinear. “Panther III represents a significant advancement in data storage systems technology, offering an unmatched solution for how the world of data management and storage is rapidly evolving.”

The data storage market is showing enormous growth, driven largely by the rise of AI. According to a report published in 2024 by Fortune Business Insights, the global cloud storage market size was valued at $108.69 billion in 2023 and is projected to grow to $665 billion by 2032, with a CAGR of 22.4% during the forecast period. This growth is driving an adjacent surge in power usage. A report from the International Energy Agency (IEA) found that the 460 terawatt-hours (TWh) consumed by data centers in 2022 represented 2% of all global electricity usage. Much of that was driven by computing and cooling functions within data centers. Further, the Uptime Institute predicts AI will account for 10% of the data center industry’s global power use by 2025.

Panther III lowers TCO of storage systems
The Panther III introduces a paradigm shift in cost efficiency in 2 ways: reducing the number of CPU cores needed for common storage operation like encryption and compression; and, through a 12:1 data reduction ratio, reducing the cost/GB of flash drives needed for storage.

Software-only solutions for data compression and encryption, while flexible, come with significant hidden costs, primarily due to their reliance on CPU cores. In scenarios where high data throughput is required, the number of CPU cores needed can be staggering. For instance, achieving a data throughput rate of 200Gb/s using traditional software based Deflate compression and SHA256 hash requires approximately 3,100 CPU cores. Given that the cost of a CPU core is estimated at $50, the total cost for the CPU cores alone would amount to $157,000. Panther III achieves the same 200Gb data throughput rate using just 3 CPU cores.

With regards to flash drives, Panther III provides significant cost savings. With a 1U AFA storage server equipped with 8x1TB NVMe drives, each drive costs approximately $240. This setup provides a raw storage capacity of 8TB. However, when factoring in typical storage overheads and the lack of compression, the effective capacity remains limited. In this scenario, the system storage cost is 25cents/GB, which can escalate as data storage needs grow. With a 12:1 data reduction ratio, Panther III increases the effective storage capacity of NVMe drives. In the example of an 8-drive 1U AFA storage server, it transforms the effective capacity from 8TB to 96TB. This enhancement means that organizations can store substantially more data on fewer drives, leading to significant cost savings.

Demos at FMS 2024
MaxLinear will showcase demonstrations of the Panther III storage accelerator. The 1st will highlight the power of offloading with a single Panther III card delivering 200Gb/s throughput, showcasing increased memory bandwidth and enhanced power savings. Attendees will witness how Panther III’s hardware acceleration outperforms traditional software solutions, efficiently handling intensive workloads with superior performance and reduced energy consumption.

The 2nd demo will display the scalability of Panther III with multiple cards working in unison within a single server. This demo will emphasize the scalability and performance benefits that data center customers can achieve, showing firsthand how Panther III maintains high performance, low latency and efficiency as it scales with minimal power usage.