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HighPoint, Samsung, and ITG Unite to Showcase a 59GB/s Speed Marvel: One of the World's Fastest PCs Debuts at Inter BEE 2024!
December 12, 2024
Source: Isamu Kubo, Akiba PC Hotline!
Inter BEE 2024 is a large-scale exhibition for video and music producers that took place from November 13th to 15th. Many PC manufacturers also exhibited at the event, and Samsung's booth displayed a workstation equipped with some of the fastest storage in the world.
The storage speed is 58,963MB/s read and 59GB/s maximum, making this a PC with otherworldly performance. It was on display in a state where you could actually touch it, and we were able to check the response with video editing software, and try benchmarks and file transfers. This time, we will introduce what the world's fastest storage PC at the venue was like.
Build the world's fastest storage with 990 PRO 2TB x 8 RAIDA monster machine that can hit 59GB/s in actual measurements
Benchmark speed when run during the interview on the day.
We ran a benchmark on the fastest storage PC on display at the Samsung booth, and it achieved a read speed of 58,963MB/s and a write speed of 53,374MB/s, which was ridiculously fast. It was so fast that it was in a realm of uncertainty.
The demo machine used was a specially customized Lenovo workstation, the ThinkStation P8. This configuration does not exist in Lenovo's official product lineup, but the sales agent Ask handles models that can be ordered and sold by request.
The main configuration of the demo machine is AMD's "Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7975WX (32 cores / 64 threads)" CPU, NVIDIA's "GeForce RTX 5000 Ada generation" video card, 128GB (32GB x 4) memory. The ultra-fast storage section is built with a combination of HighPoint's RAID card "Rocket 7608A" and Samsung's SSD "990 PRO" 2TB x 8.
Demoed on a special custom model of Lenovo ThinkStation P8.
PC configuration table.
With the Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7975WX and GeForce RTX 5000 Ada, this is a very high-performance model for creative use.
The RAID card + SSD is installed on the top side of the case.
We ran a benchmark on the fastest storage PC on display at the Samsung booth, and it achieved a read speed of 58,963MB/s and a write speed of 53,374MB/s, which was ridiculously fast. It was so fast that it was in a realm of uncertainty.
The demo machine used was a specially customized Lenovo workstation, the ThinkStation P8. This configuration does not exist in Lenovo's official product lineup, but the sales agent Ask handles models that can be ordered and sold by request.
The main configuration of the demo machine is AMD's "Ryzen Threadripper PRO 7975WX (32 cores / 64 threads)" CPU, NVIDIA's "GeForce RTX 5000 Ada generation" video card, 128GB (32GB x 4) memory. The ultra-fast storage section is built with a combination of HighPoint's RAID card "Rocket 7608A" and Samsung's SSD "990 PRO" 2TB x 8.
HighPoint Rocket 7608A equipped with 8 SSDs.
The Rocket 7608A is a PCIe 5.0 x 16 lane RAID card with a maximum rated speed of 56GB/s.
The installed SSD is Samsung 990 PRO. This time, eight 2TB models were used.
It seems that by using PCIe 5.0 compatible SSDs, the maximum speed can be achieved even with fewer SSDs, but there are also benefits to installing as many SSDs as possible. One is that the capacity can be simply increased, and the more SSDs installed, the higher the maximum capacity can be. The other is that the more SSDs there are, the greater the cache capacity. The 2TB model of the 990 PRO can use up to 226GB of SLC cache, and with this 8-slot configuration, the cache capacity reaches a total of 1,808GB, so most work can be done within the high-speed cache capacity.
In many cases, cache capacity affects execution performance, so if you want to create an environment where actual work can achieve speeds close to the theoretical value of the SSD, it makes sense to increase the number of SSDs in order to increase cache capacity.
To edit RAW files from 8K videos, you'll need a PC with this configuration! We asked creator Masaki Hani what's so great about the fastest PC
An 8K video work of a city shot from the air by Masaki Hani.
The demo unit demonstrated speeds of approximately 59GB/s, highlighting the fact that this performance is also meaningful from a practical standpoint.
With the cooperation of video creator Masaki Hani, a demonstration was given of editing RAW video shot in 8K resolution. It was shown that 8K video can be edited in real time using DaVinci Resolve Studio without any dropped frames.
Video creator Masaki Hani
Using 8K video footage shot by Hani, the presentation demonstrated just how convenient ultra-high speed storage is.
According to Hani, there are very few environments in which 8K video material shot in Nikon RAW (N-RAW) or REDCODE RAW can be edited without any dropped frames, and even if dropped frames are tolerated, there are few PCs that can run the camera properly, so he says that the demo unit is surprisingly comfortable to use.
8K video places too much of a strain on current PCs, so in most cases editing work is done by creating a lower-resolution proxy file for the job. However, the demo machine in this case is said to be a PC with unprecedented performance, as it can work using the 8K resolution file itself without the need for a proxy file.
When I actually tried doing some simple editing with DaVinci Resolve Studio, there was no pause while waiting for loading, no lag when moving the bar quickly, and it was as light as editing a full HD resolution video. If it weren't for the 8K video material, it was so comfortable that I wouldn't even notice I was editing a heavy file.
The real-time preview always displays 59.94fps with no dropped frames.
The N-RAW format material used this time was 8,256 x 4,644 dots/59.940 fps.
Even if you move the bar quickly during editing, there is no dropped frames or stalls.
Being able to work comfortably in real time using the footage as is is said to lead to significant improvements in efficiency.
In addition to the comfort of operating a PC, not having to generate proxy files is said to be a major benefit for creators. Before actually starting the editing process, there is the time it takes to transfer the shot data to the PC and the wait time to generate proxy files, which means you can't do anything. If you can use a high-performance PC that doesn't require the use of proxy files, you can completely cut out the time it takes to generate proxy files, reducing your work time accordingly.
High-resolution video editing is a battle against waiting time, and there are many situations where work is stopped due to the import of shooting data, data backup, generation of proxy files, export of edited data, and transfer of the finished data. If the time required for generating proxy files could be cut, the work could be progressed faster or the time could be spent on improving the quality, so it is an area worth focusing on.
According to Hani, it is the creator's fate to want to record and preserve in the best possible condition, and to preserve as many conditions as possible. When asked if the performance of this PC was more than sufficient, he replied that if 8K video can be edited in real time, it makes him want to shoot and edit materials from more angles, and he wants to try more complex processing, so he would like to see PC performance improve in the future.
The storage performance of the demo machine this time during video editing is incredible, but I think the finished video will be transferred to another environment or backed up. This time, as an example of the ultra-high speed data transfer from the demo machine, we were shown the transfer time using HighPoint's 8-bay enclosure "RocketStor 6542AW".
When connected to the HighPoint enclosure RocketStor 6542AW, the file transfer time was approximately 20GB.
Benchmark speed of external storage built with RocketStor 6542AW.
It is connected to the PC via an interface card, and the cable connector standard is CDFP, which supports 400Gbps.
It took 1.5 seconds to transfer approximately 20GB of video data using FastCopy.
I checked the data transfer speed using Task Manager and it seemed to be 15.4GB/s.
The RocketStor 6542AW is equipped with Samsung's data center SSD PM9A3, and an environment was created where the actual benchmark reading speed was 27,012MB/s and writing speed was 23,771MB/s. Using the data transfer app FastCopy, it took only 1.5 seconds to move a video file of about 20GB from the demo machine to the RocketStor 6542AW. It seems that it takes a little longer to transfer data using the standard Windows Explorer, but it still takes a few seconds. The actual speed measured from the OS was about 15.4GB/s, so it's quite fast. If you transfer a movie video file, it can really be transferred in a few seconds.
In addition, up to USB4 (40 Gbps), even if there is some loss in transfer speed when using Windows Explorer, it is unlikely to become a bottleneck and cause practical problems, but in an environment where an enclosure with CDFP connection (400 Gbps) is used this time, the loss due to the application used becomes a level that cannot be ignored. If there is a loss of about 10 to 20% due to the data transfer application used, the speed will decrease by several GB/s, which may become a bottleneck. In this demo machine, FastCopy was used to maximize performance, but the higher the speed of the environment, the more you should be aware of the application you use for data transfer, and it will also be important to optimize the application for high-speed storage.
Incidentally, Hani also commented that if he had this in his workspace, it would significantly reduce backup times, so it seems that creators are waiting for ultra-fast external storage as well as internal storage.
Samsung's storage is great for videos. Check out he demonstration of SSD and SD cards with mirrorless cameras and action cameras.
Samsung booth at Inter BEE 2024.
At the Samsung booth at Inter BEE 2024, in addition to the PC equipped with ultra-fast storage of over 58GB/s, a number of other products will be on display.
There were a variety of products on display, including a RAID card that looks like a video card but can accommodate 16 M.2 SSDs, examples of combining external SSDs with cameras, examples of how Samsung microSD cards work with action cameras and drones, and video editing solutions. We would like to introduce these products to you.