Just in time for NVIDIA’s GPU Technology Conference (GTC), Kioxia has unveiled a 122.88 terabyte capacity NVMe SSD designed for high-speed memory and storage demands of today’s artificial intelligence (AI) workloads. Increasingly, its kind of high capacity, flexible QLC SSD is rapidly becoming a core player in data centers supporting today’s hybrid cloud and multi-cloud infrastructure.
The new Kioxia LC9 Series is the first SSD designed with the company’s BiCS FLASH generation 8 3D flash memory technology QLC 2 Tb die. To increase density on the memory die which supports the storage needs of large language models (LLMs) – the unit is built using CMOS directly Bonded to Array (CBA). It offers a sizzling-fast 128 gigatransfers per second. The SSD has a PCIe 5.0 interface and dual-port capability, which enables a higher level of fault tolerance as well as connectivity to a diverse array of data center hardware.
Kioxia’s ultra-fast, high-capacity SSD arrives on the scene as data centers are handling a complex array of AI workloads. SSD drives like this one are designed to crunch remarkably large and complex volumes of data. This includes relatively new data-intensive tasks like AI inferencing and training, the development (and constant revision) of large language models and the demands of RAG (retrieval augmented generation). The unit is well suited for the rapidly evolving requirements of generative AI applications.
The unit is designed with the flexibility and speed needed by today’s heterogeneous enterprise infrastructure with its mix of in-house, hybrid cloud and multi-cloud platforms.
One of the many reasons SSDs are replacing HDDs is faster SSDs like these are equipped to quickly route massive amounts of AI inference and training data to IT systems hosted in the cloud.
“As AI adoption accelerates and larger LLMs and vector databases become more prevalent, the need for high-capacity SSD storage is surging,” said Gregory Wong, founder and principal analyst at Forward Insights. “Advanced storage solutions such as Kioxia’s LC9 Series 122.88 TB SSD will be critical in supporting the growing computational needs of AI models, enabling greater efficiency and innovation.”
LC9 Series is part of a larger product line from Kioxia focused on the increasing compute specifications of AI. The newly unveiled SSD can be deployed in conjunction with the Kioxia AiSAQ system, which boosts performance of RAG by supporting vector databases on SSDs, and is a more cost-efficient alternative than deploying DRAM.
In response to greater enterprise investment in AI, many of the leading SSD vendors have debuted their brands of high-capacity QLC SSDs, which enable faster data transfer required by generative AI. These newer units have taken the place of older HDD storage systems as data centers now require even second tier units to operate at the pace previously required only of first-rank storage devices. By debuting an SSD product whose specs are up with the leading edge, Kioxia is positioning itself as a vendor for AI-focused enterprise companies.
