KTNF has partnered with MaxLinear to deliver cutting-edge storage server solutions, leveraging the MaxLinear Panther Storage Accelerator.
This collaboration aims to enhance storage, security, and data processing performance for HPC, cloud, and big data users.
By utilizing Panther, KTNF will strengthen the security of storage servers and improve data processing capabilities, offering more options to AI,
cloud, and big data users. This solution real-time compresses data generated by servers, which accelerates data transfer speeds and optimizes storage device operations. Its embedded security technology blocks threats throughout the data movement process,
significantly bolstering the security of existing infrastructure.
These technological innovations minimize data processing and transfer bottlenecks while maximizing storage space utilization,
ultimately reducing IT infrastructure costs for businesses. This solution meets the core requirements of real-time processing, security, and infrastructure optimization, making it a strategic asset for strengthening competitiveness in today's rapidly changing digital landscape.
Furthermore, to highlight the solution's effectiveness and encourage adoption,
KTNF has established an experience zone within its data center, allowing customers to directly test the solution.
Panther III Introduction
MaxLinear Panther III is PCIe based storage accelerator ASIC that provides breakthrough data reduction, encryption, deduplication, and data protection and sets a new standard in storage acceleration with a high throughput of 200Gbps and ultra-low single-pass transformation latency.
Panther III silicon is available in PCIe HHHL, OCP 3.0 NIC, EDSFF form factor boards from MaxLinear.
Panther III offers powerful data reduction technology that intelligently offloads the CPU to open all tiers of storage to their full bandwidth potential with no CPU or software limitations. These capabilities enable intelligent and faster dataset delivery, high-performance analytics, and improved workload accuracy in fast-growing Edge to disaggregated computing of the public cloud.
The MaxLinear’s Panther III storage accelerator (Panther III) has been developed to optimize the performance and efficiency of storage appliances by offloading complex tasks that require long CPU cycles to execute. The key features of Panther III are as follows:
Panther III silicon is available in PCIe HHHL, OCP 3.0 NIC, EDSFF form factor boards from MaxLinear.
Panther III offers powerful data reduction technology that intelligently offloads the CPU to open all tiers of storage to their full bandwidth potential with no CPU or software limitations. These capabilities enable intelligent and faster dataset delivery, high-performance analytics, and improved workload accuracy in fast-growing Edge to disaggregated computing of the public cloud.
The MaxLinear’s Panther III storage accelerator (Panther III) has been developed to optimize the performance and efficiency of storage appliances by offloading complex tasks that require long CPU cycles to execute. The key features of Panther III are as follows:
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Data reduction High-quality compression algorithms to minimize the size of data before storage. Accelerated deduplication Hash generation using MaxLinear patented MaxHash™ technology to drive deduplication to further reduce the size of data before storage. -
Data security Panther III supports NIST-certified Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) security standards used for SSL and IPsec transforms. They are optimal for securing data at rest (on the storage device), being transferred to/from the remote client or to/from a backup/replication storage appliance -
Data integrity Panther III provides the most robust protection against data corruption available. Real-time verification (RTV)—All encode operations are automatically followed by a decode operation and verification that the fully decoded data matches the original data. Panther III provides full support for the T10-DIF, T10-DIX, and NVMe Protection Information (PI) data protection functions.
Leading class of data transform algorithms supported in Panther III
Compression Operation
Deduplication Operation
Data Reduction Using Deduplication and Compression
Real-Time Verification (RTV)
Panther III
Architecture
Architecture
The Panther-III architecture is built on PCIe Gen 4x16, providing high-speed connectivity for efficient data transfer.
It features two banks of deep pipelines equipped with data transformation engines, each configured on a per-command basis. These pipelines enable the chaining of multiple data transformation operations in a single command, supporting both encoding and decoding processes. The five supported transformation types include NVMe Protection Information (PI) processing, compression/decompression, padding/depadding, encryption/decryption, and deduplication/crypto hash generation and authentication (hash or MAC).
Panther-III offers eight classes of service for commands submitted to the device, ensuring preferential treatment for high-priority transformation operations while efficiently sharing device bandwidth across multiple concurrent sessions.
With support for up to 64 virtual functions, Panther-III delivers robust virtualization capabilities, leveraging Single Root I/O Virtualization (SR-IOV). Additionally, the on-chip memory facilitates efficient caching of commands and metadata, as well as peer-to-peer DMA operations, significantly reducing memory bandwidth consumption.
Panther III ASIC and boards are supported by an Enterprise grade Software Development Kit. The SDK is optimized for both Linux and FreeBSD on AMD and Intel platforms, allowing developers to fully leverage the hardware capabilities of the Panther accelerators.
Panther III Block Diagram
It features two banks of deep pipelines equipped with data transformation engines, each configured on a per-command basis. These pipelines enable the chaining of multiple data transformation operations in a single command, supporting both encoding and decoding processes. The five supported transformation types include NVMe Protection Information (PI) processing, compression/decompression, padding/depadding, encryption/decryption, and deduplication/crypto hash generation and authentication (hash or MAC).
Panther-III offers eight classes of service for commands submitted to the device, ensuring preferential treatment for high-priority transformation operations while efficiently sharing device bandwidth across multiple concurrent sessions.
With support for up to 64 virtual functions, Panther-III delivers robust virtualization capabilities, leveraging Single Root I/O Virtualization (SR-IOV). Additionally, the on-chip memory facilitates efficient caching of commands and metadata, as well as peer-to-peer DMA operations, significantly reducing memory bandwidth consumption.
Panther III ASIC and boards are supported by an Enterprise grade Software Development Kit. The SDK is optimized for both Linux and FreeBSD on AMD and Intel platforms, allowing developers to fully leverage the hardware capabilities of the Panther accelerators.
Panther III
Applications Areas
Applications Areas
- Software-defined storage (SDS) acceleration
- Enterprise storage and hyperscale data center
- Converged and Hyperconverged infrastructure
- Security applications – encryption and authentication of data at rest or data on transit (IPSec, OpenSSL etc.)
- Backup appliances and remote replication
- Block / file / object storage
- Structured and Unstructured storage
- Digital library media
- NVMe SSD storage arrays, JBOF and JBOD
- File system and parallel/distributed file system acceleration
System Configuration
- Singel/Dual socket AMD EPYC 3rd (Milan), 4th (Genoa), 5th (Turin) processors
- Single/Dual socket 4th or 5th or 6th generation Intel® Xeon
- 16 or more cores per CPU
- Processor base frequency 1.9 GHz or more
- 1xPCIe Gen 4 x 16 slot or 1xOCP 3.0 NIC slot (Gen 4x16).
- Memory (2 or more) x DDR4/DDR5 DIMMs (each DIMM 16 GB or more)
- Operating Systems – Linux (CentOS 7.x, CentOS 8.x, Ubuntu 18.x, Ubuntu 20.x Ubuntu 22.x, Ubuntu 24.x, RedHat 8.x, RedHat 9.x, Anolis 8.x, Rocky Linux 9.x, SLES) and FreeBSD (12.x, 13.x, 14.x)
Panther III Performance
- Panther delivers breakthrough compression performance that enables 12:1 data reduction when Panther deep compression algorithms (Deflate/GZIP/ZLIB level 9 or XP10 level 6) are coupled with MaxHash™ deduplication technology. This allows storage solutions to not only store 1/12th the data, but also allow users to access, process, and transfer data 12 times faster.
- Panther delivers 200Gbps throughput for any combination of data transform operations in a single pass through the device.
- Panther delivers ultra-low latency for executing transformation operations. For instance, with a 32KB block size, the total latency for executing an encode command (which may include any combination of compression, padding, encryption, and NVMe PI processing) is typically under 40 microseconds. For decode operations, the latency is typically under 25 microseconds.
- Offload CPU cores : Panther III has very little CPU overhead (1-2 CPU core typically) freeing up almost all CPU cores for business logic of the customer software.
- Integrate Faster : Feature-rich software development kit (SDK) contains API, drivers, and source code for easy incorporation with end application software and software-defined storage (SDS).
- Meet Six 9’s Reliability : Built-in, end-to-end data protection, real-time verification (RTV) of all transforms, NVMe protection, and in-line CRCs/parity assure data integrity
Panther III Performance against software implementation
Panther III Unleashes the True Power of Data Storage
Panther delivers ultra-low latency, 200Gbps throughput, data reduction, and security acceleration for enterprise and hyperscale data centers and results in unprecedented excellent performance, scalability, high availability, resiliency, and capacity optimization.
Panther III addresses these challenges and more by delivering simultaneous breakthrough data reduction, encryption, data protection, and enhanced deduplication enablement with MaxHash. With Panther, storage solutions offer 12:1 data reduction, a full suite of security, and CAPEX cost reduction while providing ultra-reliable data protection.
Panther Accelerator powerful data reduction technology intelligently offloads the CPU by providing multiple independent parallel data processing unit transform engines. Panther opens all tiers of storage, including All-Flash-Array and NVMe, to their full bandwidth potential with no CPU or software limitations
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Accelerate the Speed of Storage Panther delivers simultaneous breakthrough compression performance and security capability that enables 12:1 data compression allowing storage solutions to not only store 1/12th the data, but also allow users to access, process, and transfer data 12 times faster. -
Enable Intelligent Storage Panther’s 200Gbps throughput and ultra-low latency enable quicker access to big data, allowing higher performance data analysis to deliver better workload accuracy. -
Lower Capital Storage Expenses (CAPEX) The exclusive MaxHash provides independent hash block size and programmable offset to enhance deduplication hit rates resulting in improved effective storage capacity and $/GB savings. -
Integrate Faster Feature-rich software development kit (SDK) contains API, drivers, and source code for easy incorporation with end application software and software-defined storage (SDS). -
Meet Six 9’s Reliability Built-in, end-to-end data protection, real-time verification (RTV) of all transforms, NVMe protection, and in-line CRCs/parity assure data integrity and eliminate data loss.
Panther III addresses these challenges and more by delivering simultaneous breakthrough data reduction, encryption, data protection, and enhanced deduplication enablement with MaxHash. With Panther, storage solutions offer 12:1 data reduction, a full suite of security, and CAPEX cost reduction while providing ultra-reliable data protection.
Panther Accelerator powerful data reduction technology intelligently offloads the CPU by providing multiple independent parallel data processing unit transform engines. Panther opens all tiers of storage, including All-Flash-Array and NVMe, to their full bandwidth potential with no CPU or software limitations