SOLUTION BRIEF™

Supermicro Multi-Node Infrastructure Solutions

Executive Summary

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1
Demand for Massive In-Memory Applications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
Options for Effective Memory Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2
What We Need is a Better Software-Defined Memory . . . . . . . . . . 2

Data is the new oil, and datasets are constantly expanding. AI/ML
HPC, Database, and Virtualization applications can all benefit
from in-memory processing, driving memory requirements
beyond what a single server can provide. Further, the need toover-allocate memory for headroom in many applications leads
to stranded and underutilized memory assets.

Why Supermicro. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

Supermicro, Kove, and Red Hat, have benchmarked a large inmemory application using Kove:SDM, spanning a multi-nodecluster running Red Hat OpenShift on Supermicro BigTwin

Why Kove . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4

servers.

Welcome to Kove:SDM . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3

Why Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Massive Memory Technical Implementation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
Proof of Concept Testing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
Benchmark Results . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8© 2023 Copyright Super Micro Computer, Inc. All rights reserved

This turnkey solution enables a new class of applications andgreatly improves productivity by negating the need to chunkdatasets and associated programs to fit into constrained
memory. Capex and Opex are further improved by making
underutilized server memory in HPC data centers available toany application on demand.

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The Increasing Demand for Massive In-Memory Applications
AI and Enterprise data sets are exploding in size. Processing that data is most efficient when all the data is fully resident in DRAM,
avoiding the need to process the data in blocks or constantly page data to disk storage. However, while processor core counts
are increasing, memory capacity and bandwidth are not scaling proportionally.
To enable the broadest set of virtualized applications, servers are being built with the maximum possible memory, limited onlyby the physical PCB real estate. However, there is a dichotomy: Increasing memory size addresses memory-intensive
applications and increases costs and the probability of stranding memory. Meanwhile, to protect against possible server
crashes, memory is often under-utilized, so you don’t run out of it.
As a result, while many applications can benefit from more memory than can be provisioned on a single server node, many
servers have underutilized memory, depending on workload.

Options for Effective Memory Use
Effective memory can be increased by accessing memory secondary memory on the server, often by paging to block storage.
The problem: This results in a massive slowdown. It could be up to 125x slower, even using the fastest SSDs. The outcome: A 4hour job running in SWAP could take more than 20 days to complete, rendering certain workloads impractical.
A common workaround is to rewrite the application to process the data in manageable chunks and then assemble the result.
But this approach is fraught with numerous problems as it is error prone, creates developer costs, and may not solve the runtime issues.
What is needed is a way to improve direct access to offboard memory by providing on-demand access to memory across servers.
The industry has recognized this and has been working on a software-defined memory solution for many years in the form of
CXL. However, CXL 3.0, which provides complete caching capability, is still several years away, will require new server
architecture, and will only be available in forthcoming generations of hardware.

What We Need is a Better Software-Defined Memory
Workloads at the heart of everything from HPC to AI have significant memory requirements. But designers struggle to make useof the additional cores available in modern CPUs.
The leap forward in the number of CPU cores is mismatched with a lack of memory bandwidth. And it continues to worsen due
to the limited physical space to incorporate more memory and the limited access to additional memory beyond themotherboard.
Concerns about latency compromises are surfacing, too. Even CXL 3.0 is still piggybacking on the PCI Express (PCIe) physicallayer and relying on physical memory paired with PCIe, so one would ordinarily incur a penalty on a key critical metric—latency.
Generally, the farther the memory is from the CPU, the higher the latency and the poorer the performance.
To embrace scaling, memory must be moved outside of the server. Yet, current options that include block storage and cloudservices aren’t viable solutions.

© 2023 Copyright Super Micro Computer, Inc. All rights reserved

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Meanwhile, software-defined memory helps ease pressure on DRAM while increasing computing efficiency and performance.
This subset of software-defined technologies is unlocking a new age of disaggregated memory, mirroring the revolution thatcame with disaggregated storage.

Welcome to Kove:SDM – The Software-Defined Memory Solution
Your days of memory limitations are over. Kove:SDM is a breakthrough technology that gives enterprises the memory size andperformance they need when and where they need it on any hardware. It empowers individual servers to draw from a sharedmemory pool, including amounts far larger than could be contained within any physical server, so each job receives exactly thememory it needs while reducing your power consumption.
With Kove:SDM, for instance, you can allocate 10x 64 GiB for ten containers on a compute node with only 64 GiB of memory,
create containers with larger memory than the physical hypervisor, or burst to allocate 40 TiB to a single server for an hour.
Control memory in real-time, on-demand, using easy-to-configure provisioning rules. Memory capacity scales up to CPU
addressable limits beyond the limits of local physical DIMM slots.
Kove:SDM solves memory stranding by pooling memory into a global resource, shareable and reusable across the data center.
In other words, it decouples or “disaggregates” memory from standard servers, aggregating memory into a shared memory pool
resource. SDM policies then structure the access to the memory pool. After use, Kove:SDM securely zeros out and returns
memory to the pool for reuse. As a result, Kove:SDM also provides strong security against attacks targeting memory penetration.

Kove:SDM Works with Any Server
Unlike CXL, no special chips or hardware are required to run Kove:SDM. Rather, it decouples memory from servers, poolingmemory into an aggregate, provisionable, and distributable resource across the data center using unmodified Supermicro
hardware.
Like a Storage Area Network (SAN) provisioning storage using policies, Kove:SDM delivers a RAM Area Network (RAN) thatprovisions memory using policies. Both provide a global, on-demand resource exactly where, when, and how it is needed. For
example, an organization might:•••

Use a Kove:SDM policy to allocate up to 2 TiB of need-based memory for any of 200 servers between 5 pm-8:30 pm;
Develop a provisioning rule that would provision a virtual machine with larger memory than the physical hypervisor,such as a 64 GiB RAM physical server (hypervisor) hosting a 512 GiB RAM virtual machine; andProvision a 40 TiB server for a few hours or a 100 TiB RAM disk with RAID backing store for a temporary burst ingest
every morning.

Kove:SDM uses three transparent software components: 1) Management Console (MC) that orchestrates memory pool usage; 2)
Host Software that connects applications to a memory pool; and 3) XPD software that converts servers into memory targets toform a memory pool. Users and applications do not ever need to know that it is present.
As a result, Kove:SDM enables technology leaders and their enterprises to do things they could not have done before – including
finally maximizing the performance of their infrastructure and people.

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Why SupermicroSupermicro, a Total IT Solution Provider for Cloud, AI/ML, Storage, and 5G/Edge, offers the industry’s most extensive portfolioof workload-optimized servers to support the highest computing density across the broadest range of applications. Supermicro
servers are used for demanding workloads across the entire IT industry, including 5G workloads, a range of AI, HPC,
visualization, Big-Data Analysis, virtualization, and enterprise workloads.
Supermicro continues to innovate and design application-optimized solutions across the entire IT industry. By implementing
Kove:SDM, Supermicro enables the class of very large dataset workloads to be efficiently and effectively processed in the
shortest time possible. Even in some cases, enabling applications that would otherwise be impractical using standard methods.
The Supermicro Twin family of products has been designed for the most demanding applications while reducing OPEX throughinnovative design that reduces electricity usage and E-waste. Supermicro Twin Family Multi-node systems are designed so thatall servers (nodes) are located within a single chassis with shared power supplies and fans. Supermicro has developed a productfamily that takes advantage of the Twin product family's latest computing, storage, and networking technologies. The Twin
Family is ideally suited to workloads enabled by Kove:SDM as it provides a dense cluster of computing, memory, and storage
while supporting a full range of networking. Kove:SDM enables the cluster to operate as a single, very large memory machine.
The Supermicro BigTwin® infrastructure is perfect for this setup which can save 3-9x on infrastructure costs with OpenShift baremetal. Additionally, each node can hold 6x NVMe to provide low-latency persistence storage for any workload.

Why Kove
After years of testing and validation, Kove premiered the world’s first patented and mature software-defined memory solution(Kove:SDM). With Kove:SDM, your days of memory limitations are over. Users of Kove:SDM can now right-size memory to need,
providing faster time to solution, better models, and the ability to do things they could not do before. Never again worry aboutfine-tuning datasets to fit hardware when you can dynamically size hardware to fit the datasets. With Kove:SDM, you can quickly
scale up your memory for improved utilization, simplicity, efficiency, and performance and avoid the need to over-provision
memory, risking underutilization and wasted resources. As a result, you can analyze any data size or computational need, nomatter how large. With Kove:SDM, you can scale up your size and density on demand beyond server limits.
Kove:SDM on Supermicro Big Twin is applicable across a wide range of demanding computing, bringing the benefits of larger
effective memory to:•

AI/ML - Provision resources to the model rather than forcing models to fit fixed resources. Enjoy deeper and faster lookups,
analytics, and iterations. Improve your time on the solution and your return on your data scientists.

•

In-Memory Databases - Analyse databases 100s of times larger than physical servers.

•

Containers - Improve CPU utilization. Run more jobs in parallel on a single server, increasing workload capability by 20x.
Gain the ability to run 7.5x more C3.ai containers.

•

High-Performance Computing - Run big data analytics, genomics, and Monte Carlo computations entirely in memory.
Build trading systems in Java with <11 μs risk exposure. Use standard servers to create any size memory server on demand(e.g., 32-256 TiB in a few seconds).

•

Enterprise, Cloud, and Edge - Enables unlimited memory sizing. Any size computation can run entirely in memory. Achieve
your green goals through 52% CO2 reduction and 33% floor space reductions. Create a hybrid cloud to keep sensitive dataon-premises without cost and scaling concerns. Reduce your power consumption needs by 50%. Greater utilization makesedge computing financially viable.

© 2023 Copyright Super Micro Computer, Inc. All rights reserved

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Why Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform
Red Hat OpenShift is a powerful container platform that offers several benefits when deployed along with Kove:SDM operator
in bare metal environments such as the Supermicro systems. OpenShift’s inherent scalability and flexibility for containerized
applications make it ideal for managing applications in a software-defined memory environment. OpenShift’s container
orchestration capabilities enable seamless deployment and management of applications across the distributed memory
infrastructure provided by Kove, ensuring optimal resource utilization, large amounts of memory available, and efficient
workload distribution. This combination allows organizations to leverage the benefits of software-defined memory while
maintaining the ease of managing containerized applications in a low-cost bare-metal environment.
The combination of Red Hat OpenShift with Supermicro BigTwin systems provides additional performance, reliability, andresource utilization advantages. The Supermicro BigTwin 2U 4-Node form factor offers the most reliable 3-node cluster with an
extra node as a bastion node in one chassis. Supermicro’s BigTwin system with high-density and high-storage options
compliments OpenShift’s capabilities by providing a robust and scalable foundation to run containerized workloads.

Massive Memory Technical Implementation
The Logical Diagram for our collaborative proof of concept is shown below. It shows two host computers running theapplications and 3 Kove memory targets. However, Kove:SDM scales linearly and is limited only by the network interconnect
infrastructure that customers provide. Kove:SDM software allocates memory on demand and as needed to the Application
Hosts.

Figure 1 Kove:SDM Logical Diagram© 2023 Copyright Super Micro Computer, Inc. All rights reserved

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The actual physical system for our collaborative proof of concept was implemented using two Supermicro 2U 4-Node BigTwin
systems.
• The first Host was running Red Hat OpenShift bare-metal with three nodes as control plane/compute nodes for theapplication host and a single node as a bastion node to access the control plane/compute nodes and provision themwith the DNS server for the rest of the nodes and run the Kove:SDM management Console.
• The second 2U 4-Node Supermicro BigTwin system ran the Kove® software. Each node was equipped with 1TB ofmemory per node, enabling Kove:SDM to leverage the combined memory pool across the four nodes. This system will
provide additional memory resources to any control plane/compute nodes as needed.
• In the PoC, we used one 2U 4-Node Supermicro BigTwin for the targets. Additional targets can easily be added, as
represented in the diagram.

Figure 2 Proof of Concept Physical Diagram

Most reliable OpenShift cluster in a single chassis:▪
▪
▪
▪

The optimal number of nodes to create a small viable OpenShift cluster.
Run once, run anywhere with Red Hat OpenShift.
1x bastion node to access the rest of the nodes and 3x control plane/compute nodes in a single chassis.
Fully optimized containerized environment to build and deploy cloud-native applications.

High density for a larger pool of memory with the Kove® software:▪
▪
▪
▪

Four nodes are fully loaded with memory to provision more memory to client nodes.
Kove® software running to monitor memory resources.
Kove target memory will automatically provision memory to any workload if necessary.
Workloads that need large amounts of memory will take full advantage of Kove's software-defined memory
technology.

Proof of Concept Testing
During the testing phase, we subjected various scenarios to stress this environment using stress-ng. This tool facilitated targeted
stress on the CPU and memory, enabling us to gather essential data for evaluating the compatibility and performance ofKove:SDM with Red Hat OpenShift.

© 2023 Copyright Super Micro Computer, Inc. All rights reserved

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Each scenario involved adjusting the CPU governor from performance to power save, with memory operated at different
frequencies for each CPU governor setting.
The initial phase involved stressing the system using local memory, while the second phase involved reducing physical memory
to allow dynamic memory allocation by Kove:SDM to the control plane/compute nodes requiring more memory than physicallyavailable. In total, the tests were executed with 16 scenarios, each repeated seven times to ensure accurate data collection
across 2.165 quadrillion results averaged.
This proof of concept validated the seamless compatibility of Kove:SDM and Red Hat OpenShift in handling containerized
workloads. Additionally, the test demonstrated the significant benefits offered by Kove:SDM in scenarios where workloads
require memory capacities exceeding physical limitations while exhibiting minimal to no performance penalty.

Benchmark Results
Combined with Intel CPU governor settings, Kove:SDM provided 12 to 54% power savings, illustrated in Figure 3.
Kove Benefit [Percent %]CPU Governor

Test

MemoryMHz

Performance → Powersave

1→2

3200

Powersave

2→33200 → 2200

Performance → Powersave

1→3

3200 → 2200

Performance

1→43200 → 2200

Workload
Idle
Busy
Idle
Busy
Idle
Busy
Idle
Busy

Compute Node [64 GiB]
A
B
C
Total

Kove
1 TiB

-34
-47
-5
-5
-38
-49
-4
-3

-26
-23
-6
-7
-31
-29
-6
-6

-32
-46
-6
-6
-36
-49
-7
-3

-32
-46
-7
-6
-37
-50
-7
-2

-33
-46
-6
-6
-37
-49
-6
-3

TotalsServer + Target 256 → 64GiB
-31
-42
-6
-6
-35
-45
-6
-3

-40%
-50%
-14%
-14%
-44%
-54%
-14%
-12%

Figure 3 Power Savings with Kove:SDM

Conclusion
Kove:SDM is fully integrated with Red Hat OpenShift. The Supermicro BigTwin multi-node is the ideal and most reliable minimal
Red Hat cluster. The Supermicro BigTwin system is very well adopted across industries, given its density and versatility, and issuited to broad applications. With the Supermicro BigTwin deployments, many nodes are typically concentrated in a single
cloud instance. Many of these nodes will have spare available memory. Kove:SDM allows memory in nearby nodes to be
dynamically allocated to a single Supermicro BigTwin node enabling it to perform very large in-memory workloads well overthe memory capacity of a single node. The testing shows that memory can be dynamically and transparently assigned to aworkload by Kove:SDM. The latency of memory across nodes is negligible compared to traditional memory management
methods enabling applications that would otherwise be impractical given very long run times without Kove:SDM.

© 2023 Copyright Super Micro Computer, Inc. All rights reserved

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References
To learn more about Supermicro Server Infrastructure options, please visit:
•
•
•
•
•
•

Supermicro Data Center Server, Blade, Data Storage, AI System
Twin Servers: High-Density Multi-Node Server Solutions | Supermicro
Networking Devices & Hardware Products For HPC | SupermicroSupermicro Solution for Red Hat® OpenStack | Supermicro
AI Infrastructure Solutions | Supermicro

To learn more about Kove and Red Hat OpenShift, visit••

Enable Shared Memory Pools in Cloud, Edge, and On-Premise | Kove®
Red Hat OpenShift enterprise Kubernetes container platform.

About Super Micro Computer, Inc.
Supermicro (NASDAQ: SMCI) is a global leader in Application-Optimized Total IT Solutions. Founded and operating in San Jose,
California, Supermicro is committed to delivering first-to-market innovation for Enterprise, Cloud, AI, and 5G Telco/Edge IT
Infrastructure. We are transforming into a Total IT Solutions provider with servers, AI, storage, IoT, switch systems, software,and services while delivering advanced high-volume motherboard, power, and chassis products. The products are designed
and manufactured in-house (in the US, Taiwan, and the Netherlands), leveraging global operations for scale and efficiency andoptimized to improve TCO and reduce environmental impact (Green Computing). The award-winning portfolio of Server
Building Block Solutions® allows customers to optimize for their exact workload and application by selecting from a broadfamily of systems built from our flexible and reusable building blocks that support a comprehensive set of form factors,
processors, memory, GPUs, storage, networking, power and cooling solutions (air-conditioned, free air cooling or liquid
cooling).
Supermicro, Server Building Block Solutions, and We Keep IT Green are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Super Micro
Computer, Inc.
Intel, the Intel logo, and other Intel marks are trademarks of Intel Corporation or its subsidiaries.
All other brands, names, and trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

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