'LightStore' flash-storage system demonstrating better power efficiency developed by MIT researchers

LightStore demonstrated about eight times more efficiency than traditional servers for "random writing" data operation

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) have developed a new flash-storage system, dubbed LightStore, that they claim is more energy and space efficient, and could improve the performance of traditional servers in data centres.

The LightStore system developed by MIT researchers works by making some changes in solid state devices (SSDs). With those changes SSDs become able to connect directly to a data centre ' s network, without requiring any other component to intermediate.

With those changes, SSDs also become able to support data-storage operations, which are more efficient and computationally simpler.

With little fine-tuning in hardware and software, it should be possible to integrate the system into the existing infrastructure of the data centre.

In experiments performed by the team at MIT, storage nodes (cluster of four LightStore units) demonstrated twice the efficiency of traditional storage servers in terms of power consumption requirements for data requests.

Storages nodes also required less than half of the physical space compared to existing servers.

The team also measured LightStore ' s energy efficiency in terms of individual data storage operations and found that LightStore demonstrated about eight times more efficiency than traditional servers for "random writing" data operation.

The researchers suggest that LightStore nodes could lead to a change in architecture of traditional servers in data centres, saving organisations a huge amount in terms of operational and capital expenditures.

Details of the research will be presented at the ACM International Conference on Architectural Support for Programming Languages and Operating Systems in Providence, Rhode Island later this month.

Flash storage uses high-speed, electrically programmable, flash memory to store data for an extended period of time. Flash memory is non-volatile in nature and doesn ' t require electrical power to maintain the integrity of stored data.

In other words, this memory doesn ' t "forget" the stored data when the disk is turned off.

Today, flash memory is used in a variety of computing devices including portable USB drives, cameras, smartphones, and large business storage systems, such as enterprise-class all-flash arrays.

Flash storage is commonly referred to as solid state storage as it contains no moving parts.

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