Optimized server storage architecture - Amazon EBS io2 Block Express is officially launched!

At the 2020 Amazon Cloud Re: Invent conference, we previewed the Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volume , the first SAN built for the cloud for next-generation server storage architectures. Amazon EBS io2 Block Express is designed to meet the requirements of the largest, most I/O intensive, mission-critical deployments of Microsoft SQL Server, Oracle, SAP HANA, and SAS Analytics on Amazon. Previewed Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volume https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/now-in-preview-larger-faster-io2-ebs-volumes-with-higher-throughput/

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2021 Amazon Cloud Technology China Summit! Click on the picture to sign up~ Recently, Amazon Cloud Technology is very pleased to announce the official launch of Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volumes, of which Amazon EC2 R5b instance powered by Amazon Nitro system has the best additional support on the Amazon EC storage performance. Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volumes now also support io2 features such as multi-mount volumes and elastic volumes .

R5b instance
https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/new-amazon-ec2-r5b-instances-providing-3x-higher-ebs-performance/

Amazon Nitro System
https://aws.amazon.com/jp/ec2/nitro/

Multiple mount volumes
https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/new-multi-attach-for-provisioned-iops-io1-amazon-ebs-volumes/
elastic roll
https://aws.amazon.com/blogs/aws/amazon-ebs-update-new-elastic-volumes-change-everything/

In the past, customers had to combine multiple volumes as stripes to surpass single volume performance. Now, Amazon EBS io2 volumes can meet the needs of mission-critical, performance-intensive applications without striping, saving management overhead. With Amazon EBS io2 Block Express, customers can get the highest performance block storage in the cloud for free with four times the throughput, IOPS, and capacity of Amazon EBS io2 volumes with sub-millisecond latency.

The following is a summary of the use cases and characteristics of key solid-state drive (SSD)-backed Amazon EBS volumes:

*Throughput limit is between 128MiB/s and 250MiB/s, depending on volume size.
**Maximum IOPS and throughput are only guaranteed for instances built on Amazon Nitro Systems with more than 32,000 IOPS provisioned.

• built on Amazon Nitro system https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/instance-types.html#ec2-nitro-instances

The new Amazon EBS io2 Block Express architecture delivers the highest levels of performance and sub-millisecond latency by using the Scalable Reliable Datagrams (SRD) protocol to communicate with Amazon Nitro System-based instances. The Scalable Reliable Datagrams (SRD) protocol is implemented in the Nitro Card dedicated to Amazon EBS I/O functionality on the instance host hardware. Amazon EBS io2 Block Express also provides modular software and hardware building blocks that can be assembled in a variety of ways, giving you the flexibility to design and improve performance and deliver new functionality faster.

Getting Started with Amazon EBS io2 Block Express Volumes

You can now Amazon Command Line Interface (Amazon CLI), Amazon Command Line Interface (Amazon CLI) , or combine the SDK with the Amazon EC2 API when creating an Amazon EC2 R5b instance use.

• Amazon Command Line Interface (Amazon CLI)
  https://console.aws.amazon.com/ec2
• Amazon Command Line Interface (Amazon CLI)
  https://aws.amazon.com/cli/

After selecting the Amazon EC2 R5b instance type, on the Add Storage page, under Volume Type , select Provisioned IOPS SSD (io2) . Your new volume will be created in Block Express format.

Notes

Please note the following:

1. You cannot modify the size or provisioned IOPS of an Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volume.
2. If the encrypted Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volume is larger than 16TiB or IOPS higher than 64000, you will not be able to launch an Amazon EC2 R5b instance from an unencrypted Amazon AMI or a shared encrypted Amazon AMI. In this case, you must first create an encrypted Amazon AMI in your account, and then use that Amazon AMI to launch instances.
3. Snapshot recovery is not supported for Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volumes larger than 16TiB or IOPS higher than 64000. We recommend that you initialize these volumes to ensure that they provide full performance. Initializing an Amazon EBS Volume in the Amazon EC2 User Guide.

• Initialize Amazon EBS volume https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/ebs-initialize.html

now available

Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volumes are available in all Amazon Cloud Tech regions where Amazon EC2 R5b instances are available: US East (Ohio), US East (N. Virginia), US West (Oregon), Asia Pacific (Singapore), Asia Pacific (Tokyo) ), Europe (Frankfurt), and more Amazon Cloud Tech regions coming soon. We plan to allow all types of Amazon EC2 instances to connect to Amazon EBS io2 Block volumes and will update this later this year.

For pricing and billing, Amazon EBS io2 volumes and Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volumes have the same rates. Usage reports do not differentiate between Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volumes and Amazon EBSio2 volumes. We recommend that you use labels to help you identify costs associated with Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volumes. For more information, see the Amazon EBS pricing page.

• Amazon EBS pricing page
  http://aws.amazon.com/ebs/pricing/

To learn more, visit the Amazon EBS Provisioned IOPS Volumes pages and Amazon EBS io2 Block Express Volumes in the Amazon EC2 User Guide.

• Amazon EBS Provisioned IOPS Volumes
  22https://aws.amazon.com/ebs/provisioned-iops/ 
• Amazon EBS io2 Block Express volume https://docs.aws.amazon.com/AWSEC2/latest/UserGuide/ebs-volume-types.html#io2-block-express

The author of this article

Channy Yun

Amazon Cloud Technology Chief Developer Evangelist