In a significant development in the realm of edge computing, Amazon Web Services (AWS) has announced the general availability of its second-generation AWS Outposts racks. This marks a noteworthy advancement in AWS’s efforts to enhance edge computing capabilities. The newly launched generation offers a host of improvements, including support for the latest x86-based Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2) instances, simplified network scaling and configuration, along with specialized accelerated networking instances tailored for ultra-low latency and high-throughput workloads. These enhancements promise to boost performance for a wide range of on-premises workloads, such as core trading systems in financial services and telecom 5G Core workloads.
Prominent companies like athenahealth, FanDuel, First Abu Dhabi Bank, Mercado Libre, Liberty Latin America, Riot Games, Vector Limited, and Wiwynn are already leveraging Outposts racks for workloads that need to remain on-premises. The second-generation Outposts racks cater to low latency, local data processing, or data residency requirements. They are particularly suitable for applications such as game servers for multiplayer online games, customer transaction data, medical records, industrial and manufacturing control systems, telecom Business Support Systems (BSS), and edge inference of various machine learning models. With the latest processor technology and advanced configurations, these racks offer faster processing, higher memory capacity, and increased network bandwidth.
Latest Generation EC2 Instances
AWS has introduced local support for the latest 7th generation x86-powered Amazon EC2 instances on AWS Outposts racks, starting with C7i compute-optimized instances, M7i general-purpose instances, and R7i memory-optimized instances. These new instances boast twice the vCPU, memory, and network bandwidth while offering up to 40% better performance compared to the previous generation C5, M5, and R5 instances on Outposts racks. Powered by 4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors, these instances are ideal for a diverse range of on-premises workloads requiring enhanced performance, such as larger databases, memory-intensive applications, advanced real-time big data analytics, high-performance video encoding and streaming, and CPU-based edge inference with more sophisticated machine learning models. AWS plans to introduce more latest generation EC2 instances, including GPU-enabled instances, shortly.
Simplified Network Scaling and Configuration
In a move to simplify and enhance scalability, AWS has completely reimagined networking in its latest Outposts generation. At the core of this upgrade is the new Outposts network rack, which serves as a central hub for all compute and storage traffic. This new design offers three significant benefits. First, users can now scale compute resources independently from the networking infrastructure, providing more flexibility and cost efficiency as workloads grow. Second, the network rack is built with resilience in mind, automatically handling device failures to ensure smooth system operation. Third, connecting to on-premises environments and AWS Regions is now more straightforward. Users can configure everything from IP addresses to VLAN and BGP settings through easy-to-use APIs or the updated console interface.
Specialized Amazon EC2 Instances with Accelerated Networking
AWS is introducing a new category of specialized Amazon EC2 instances on Outposts racks with accelerated networking. These instances are purpose-built for the most latency-sensitive, compute-intensive, and throughput-intensive mission-critical workloads on-premises. To achieve optimal performance, these instances feature a secondary physical network with network accelerator cards connected to top-of-rack (TOR) switches.
The first in this category are the bmn-sf2e instances, designed for ultra-low latency with deterministic performance. These new instances leverage Intel’s latest Sapphire Rapids processors (4th Gen Xeon Scalable), delivering 3.9 GHz sustained performance across all cores with generous memory allocation – 8GB of RAM for every CPU core. Equipped with AMD Solarflare X2522 network cards, these instances connect directly to top-of-rack switches.
For financial services customers, particularly capital market firms, these instances offer deterministic networking through native Layer 2 (L2) multicast, precision time protocol (PTP), and equal cable lengths. This enables customers to meet regulatory requirements around fair trading and equal access while seamlessly integrating with their existing trading infrastructure.
Instance specifications for bmn-sf2e include:
- bmn-sf2e.metal-16xl: 64 vCPUs, 512 GiB Memory (DDR5), 25 Gbps Network Bandwidth, 2 x 8 TB (16 TB) NVMe SSD Storage, 2 Accelerated Network Cards, 100 Gbps Accelerated Bandwidth.
- bmn-sf2e.metal-32xl: 128 vCPUs, 1024 GiB Memory (DDR5), 50 Gbps Network Bandwidth, 4 x 8 TB (32 TB) NVMe SSD Storage, 4 Accelerated Network Cards, 200 Gbps Accelerated Bandwidth.
The second instance type, bmn-cx2, is optimized for high throughput and low latency. This instance features NVIDIA ConnectX-7 400G NICs physically connected to high-speed top-of-rack switches, providing up to 800 Gbps bare metal network bandwidth operating at near line rate. With native Layer 2 (L2) multicast and hardware PTP support, this instance is ideal for high-throughput workloads like real-time market data distribution, risk analytics, and telecom 5G core network applications.
Instance specifications for bmn-cx2 include:
- bmn-cx2.metal-48xl: 192 vCPUs, 1536 GiB Memory (DDR5), 50 Gbps Network Bandwidth, 4 x 4 TB (16 TB) NVMe SSD Storage, 2 Accelerated Network Cards, 800 Gbps Accelerated Bandwidth.
Conclusion
The new generation of Outposts racks delivers enhanced performance, scalability, and resiliency for a broad range of on-premises workloads, even those with the most stringent latency and throughput requirements. Users can select and initiate orders from the AWS Management Console. The new instances maintain consistency with regional deployments by supporting the same APIs, AWS Management Console, automation, governance policies, and security controls in the cloud and on-premises, thereby improving developer productivity and IT efficiency.
Things to Know
At launch, second-generation Outposts racks can be shipped to the US and Canada and be parented back to six AWS Regions, including US East (N. Virginia and Ohio), US West (Oregon), EU West (London and France), and Asia Pacific (Singapore). Support for more countries, territories, and AWS Regions is forthcoming. Initially, second-generation Outposts racks will locally support a subset of AWS services found in previous generation Outposts racks. Support for more EC2 instance types and AWS services is expected soon.
For more information, you can visit the AWS Outposts racks product page and refer to the user guide. If you are ready to discuss your on-premises needs, you can consult with an Outposts expert.
This announcement underlines AWS’s commitment to providing cutting-edge solutions for businesses seeking robust, scalable, and efficient on-premises computing capabilities. As AWS continues to expand its offerings, businesses can look forward to more innovative solutions tailored to meet ever-evolving technological demands.
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