Kaby Lake and Optane Memory

"PUB @ Keystreams.net" <[email protected]> Thu, 12 Jan 2017 21:28:17 -0700

Newsgroups	gmane.org.user-groups.linux.calgary.general
Organization	Keystreams
Message-ID	<[email protected]>

Hi Neil et al,

I have some questions I am hoping you or anyone else on the list can
help me with. I am researching the new Intel Kaby Lake processor, the
i7-7700K. My information so far is specifically from the first page of
the Anandtech article about it:

http://www.anandtech.com/show/10968/the-intel-core-i7-7700k-91w-review-the-new-stock-performance-champion.

The article says that Kaby Lake will have support for a new version of
RST for PCIe-based storage but doesn't explicitly state anything about
Optane Memory capabilities. I can't tell if it is something that will be
arriving in q3 _AND_ be usable by the i7-7700K Kaby Lake processor or if
there's more to it than that. Does its mentioning in the article imply
the i7-7700K has support built in? I am trying to wrap my head around
what I will need to put in the new system to have all the features
available to me as I move forward with the purchase.

Hmmm... Or should I wait a bit? Focus on Skylake instead? These are the
questions that spin in my head!

I also saw a /. post that panned the new Kaby Lake...

Anyway, one of the reasons I come to you with this inquiry, is that I
think PCIe-based RST and Optane Memory technologies further enhance what
you were describing at the last meeting and so you probably have more
familiarity with the concepts involved than I do.

What you described at the meeting was using bcache (in the kernel) to
speed up document retrieval, with an SSD as the storage device for the
cache. I understood that the purpose of the setup was to limit the
necessity of going to the mechanical drive for data, but also to reduce
the hits that an SSD would experience if it were to be the only drive in
the system, thus also prolonging the lifetime of the SSD.

Putting together bcache and Optane Memory I imagine they would look
something like this (simplified). I hope my ASCII works!:

/---> mechanical drive
request -> bcache /---> Optane Memory
\---> SATA or PCIe RST --->
\---> SSD

Any thoughts?

At the end of the day I will be most interested in the status of support
for all these technologies in the Linux kernel... but that is the next
step - to take more detailed questions to the kernel people!

Of course, if anyone here knows anything about any of this jump on in!

I also like that the i7-7700K is unlocked :-)

Thanks!
Jacob

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