Google Cloud introduces Intel Optane memory to servers, offering lower price & high performance virtual machines

We announced that Google Cloud will offer low-cost virtual machine service, replacing DRAM on Google Cloud Platform (GCP) server with Intel's " Optane DC Persistent Memory ".

Available first on Google Cloud: Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory | Google Cloud Blog
https://cloud.google.com/blog/topics/partners/ available-first-on-google-cloud-intel-optane-dc-persistent-memory

"Optane DC Persistent Memory" of nonvolatile memory that introduced "3D XPoint DIMM" technology developed by Intel is overwhelmingly cheap by the unit cost of capacity although it is not as fast as DRAM, furthermore it is a nonvolatile memory and faster than SSD It is a memory located between the DRAM and the SSD, which has the characteristic feature. A major advantage of Optane DC Persistent Memory is that it can be used as it is inserted in the DIMM slot of the conventional DRAM. As a memory to replace DRAM, the advantage is very simple to introduce.

Intel officially announces DIMM type high speed, large capacity, low cost nonvolatile memory "Optane DC Persistent Memory" - GIGAZINE

In July 2018 Google Cloud announced a partnership between Intel and SAP SE . The SAP workload already supported Optane DC Persistent Memory, but on October 31, 2018, Google Cloud introduced Intel's Optane DC Persistent Memory to the cloud server and equipped with a capacity of 7 TB Optane DC Persistent Memory We announced to provide services. This means that low-cost, high-performance services will be offered to cloud users who utilize in-memory databases such as SAP HANA.

With virtual machines with capacity of 7 TB Optane DC Persistent Memory, Google retains the advantages of GCP's scalability and flexibility, including on-demand provisioning, live migration, flexible scaling according to the system, We will be able to scale up the load.

Specifically, using the Optane DC Persistent Memory, SAP HANA startup speed has become 12 times faster. Since total cost can be reduced compared to existing DRAM based virtual machines, Google says it no longer needs to balance operational efficiency and cost.

Google has started to offer virtual machines using Optane DC Persistent Memory as an alpha program and you can join the alpha program from the following page.

Google Compute Engine - Intel Optane DC Persistent Memory - Alpha testing program signup

Google Cloud will receive feedback on the alpha program and in 2019 we plan to offer a larger scale Intel Optane based virtual machine in 2019.