Achieve Optimal Performance with NVMe Drives on Dedicated Servers
As a lot of our customers are using dedicated servers, we decided to up the game by enabling them to use NVMe (Non-Volatile Memory Express) drives as primary storage devices for better I/O (input/output) throughput. NVMe SSDs will speed up the data transfer between the disk drive and the motherboard. Therefore, as compared to SATA SSD drives, the use of NVMe SSD drives will help organizations reduce latency significantly.
We are glad to announce that NVMe drives are available in our data centers for our dedicated servers and our 10 GBPS Unmetered servers in all regions including the EU (London, Amsterdam), Americas (Montreal, New York, Dallas, Buffalo, Los Angeles), and Oceania (Auckland).
NVMe Technology
NVMe stands for Non-Volatile Memory Express. What is NVME? It is the new standard protocol for accessing disk drives. NVMe is the successor of SATA (Serial Advanced Technology Attachment), created specifically for rotating disks but was adopted by early solid-state drives. NVMe comes with many benefits apart from just an increased data transfer speed (up to 6 times than the fastest SATA version). NVMe SSDs consume a lot less power than SATA. NVMe. SSDs (Solid State Drives) also come in more compact form factors like M.2, which help save space in the rack.
Motherboard Requirements
While NVMe provides a significant performance improvement, it does require a native M.2 or U.2 connector on the motherboard. They also need to support the correct firmware upgrade (BIOS, UEFI) for using NVMe drives as boot drives so that you can install your OS on the primary NVMe drives. As motherboards are also continuously redesigned as per the latest processors, many legacy motherboards cannot support NVMe SSD drives as it requires additional PCIe (Peripheral Component Interconnect Express) slots. For this reason, NVMe drives are not available on our legacy servers.
Using NVMe Drives as Secondary Drives
Using NVMe drives as primary drives for the OS (operating system) and other low-level applications is very beneficial. NVMe drives can also be used as secondary drives depending upon the number of PCIe slots that are available on the motherboard.
NVMe Dedicated Server Offering
Currently we offer NVMe SSDs in five different sizes to be used both as NVMe dedicated primary and secondary drives – 500 GB NVMe SSD, 1 TB NVMe SSD, 2 TB NVMe SSD, 3 TB NVMe SSD, 4 TB NVMe SSD.
| CPU | CORES | MAX RAM |
|---|---|---|
Intel Xeon E3-1230 V6 | 4 | 64 GB |
Intel Xeon E3-1270 V6 | 4 | 64 GB |
Intel Xeon E3-1280 V6 | 4 | 64 GB |
Intel Xeon E5-1650 V4 | 6 | 1.5 TB |
Intel Xeon E-2236 | 6 | 128 GB |
Intel Xeon E-2146G | 6 | 128 GB |
Intel Xeon E-2246G | 6 | 128 GB |
Intel Xeon Silver 4210 | 10 | 1 TB |
Intel Xeon W-2125 | 4 | 512 GB |
Intel Xeon W-2145 | 4 | 512 GB |
Intel Xeon W-2245 | 8 | 1 TB |
| AMD Ryzen 9 3950X | 16 | 64 GB |
Intel Xeon E3 & E5
We support the most popular processors from Intel’s range of CPUs to deliver optimal and essential performance for smaller businesses. With the Xeon E3-1270 V6 as the latest addition to our offerings from the Xeon E3 family of processors, we currently offer the Intel Xeon E3-1230 V6, Intel Xeon E3-1280 V6. All of the above processors are quad-core processors. We also offer a 6-core processor from the Xeon E5 family, the Intel Xeon E5-1650 V4.
Intel Xeon E Series
The Intel Xeon E Series offers processors with 4,6, and 8 cores. You’ll find only six-core processors from the Xeon E Series in our catalog like Intel Xeon E-2236, Intel Xeon E-2146G, Intel Xeon E-2246G. These processors provide great value for money. To check the price of the aforementioned servers, please visit our page on dedicated servers.
Intel Xeon W Series
The Xeon W family of processors is specifically designed for creative professionals in the fields of music, cinema, television, animation, graphics, complex 3D modeling, AR/VR (Augmented Reality/Virtual Reality), and so on. With the most powerful processors having up to 28 cores and 56 threads along with up to 48 processor PCIe slots, the specifications of the Xeon W series scream performance. We currently offer Intel Xeon W-2125, Intel Xeon W-2145 and Intel Xeon W-2245 with more addition coming soon.
Intel Xeon Silver
Similar to the Xeon E, the Silver family is also custom made for essential performance, however, for a most substantial workload. Although the Xeon Silvers are a bit higher than the E3s price-wise, they are much more fit to handle mid to large sized business workloads. We currently offer the following two processors from the Xeon Silver family – Xeon Silver 4114, Xeon Silver 4210.
AMD Ryzen
We currently offer the power-packed monster of a processor from AMD, the Ryzen 9 3950X. It is a 16-core, 32-thread processor which has the turbo boost capacity of 4.7 GHz. With 64 MB of L3 cache and 16 PCIe v4.0 lanes, it makes a superb processor for any kind of application which requires a good amount of compute power. While AMD Ryzen 9 3950X makes a great processor for a high performing desktop-like dedicated server, we are working on adding more exciting and powerful products from AMD.
Quick Note on RAID with NVMe Drives
Although all the processors mentioned above work well with all major operating systems, you need to be aware while working with NVMe drives in RAID configurations like RAID 1, Raid 10, etc. NVMe SSDs have such fast speeds that traditional RAID cards cannot keep up. Instead of hardware RAID, we strongly recommend only using software RAID. For Linux, our server experts can help you (with email support) deploy this for customers but Windows servers like Windows Server 2016 Essentials and Windows Server 2019 Essentials have their own software RAID controllers which can be configured by your customers.
At ServerMania, we provide you complete transparency into your infrastructure and the ability to choose from an ever-increasing number of options so that you can use the best technologies that suit your needs.
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