Dr John R. Busch
CTO and Founder
Schooner Information Technology, Inc
21st century data centers based on servers with large DRAM caches and hard drive storage typically waste most of their power. Flash memory offers the potential for order of magnitude improvements not only in power consumption but also in performance and space. However, realizing this potential requires balanced system architecture, not just assembling locally optimized pieces. In particular, maximizing flash IOPS in a server is often an exercise in diminishing returns. Effectively balanced systems require software to be optimized for flash memory and for processor core scaling, with high levels of parallelism, granular concurrency control and intelligent memory hierarchy management. Tightly coupled software, processor cores, DRAM and parallel flash memory can be designed into balanced system building blocks matching workload characteristics which dramatically cut datacenter power and improve performance while also reducing cost and improving service availability.