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标题: 11天内的360°大回转，英特尔重新支持VROC (Virtual Raid on CPU) [打印本页]

作者: 埃律西昂 时间: 2023-1-21 09:51
标题: 11天内的360°大回转，英特尔重新支持VROC (Virtual Raid on CPU)
本帖最后由埃律西昂于 2023-1-22 09:50 编辑

简介：
英特尔在Sapphire Rapids发布会前突然取消了其放弃VROC的决定。

来源： ServeTheHome Tom's Hardware
原英文标题： 《Intel Does a 360 on Discontinuing VROC Around Sapphire Rapids Server Launch》《Intel Kills VROC Prematurely, Then Changes Course》

Just before the Sapphire Rapids launch, I had the team working on some relatively quick pieces one of them was the Intel VROC Hardware Key Quick Reference Guide. It turns out just before that piece went live, Intel had discontinued VROC almost immediately via a Product Change Notification or PCN. Now, Intel says it is pulling that PCN and will continue supporting VROC. If that sounds like a 360 degree flip in 11 days with a massive 4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable Sapphire Rapids launch in the middle, it should.
就在 Sapphire Rapids 发布之前，我让团队制作了一些相对快速的作品，其中之一是英特尔 VROC 硬件密钥快速参考指南。事实证明，就在这篇文章上线之前，英特尔几乎立即通过产品变更通知或PCN停止了VROC。现在，英特尔表示正在拉动PCN，并将继续支持VROC。如果这听起来像是 11 天内穿插有大规模的第 4 代英特尔至强可扩展蓝宝石急流发布的 360 度翻转，那么它就是这样。

Intel Does a 360 on Discontinuing VROC
Intel在停产VROC上转了个360度弯
Before we get to the latest from Intel, let us first get to what VROC is in the first place. VROC stands for Intel Virtual RAID on Chip. This is effectively software RAID for NVMe devices. Instead of requiring adding a Broadcom Tri-Mode HBA to create NVMe RAID 1 or 10 for Windows or other OS boot devices, one can skip that and just use Intel VROC.
在我们了解英特尔的最新消息之前，让我们首先了解 VROC 是什么。VROC 代表英特尔虚拟芯片。这实际上是用于NVMe设备的软件RAID。无需添加 Broadcom 三模 HBA 即可为 Windows 或其他操作系统启动设备创建 NVMe RAID 1 或 10，而是可以跳过它，只使用英特尔 VROC。

The advantage is severalfold. For legacy OSes without OS-based software RAID boot support, one can mirror boot devices or other devices. That is an important capability alone. Beyond that, by removing a Broadcom (or other brands, but this is a market Broadcom largely dominates) HBA or RAID controller, a PCIe slot is freed, also lowering power consumption and removing a source of airflow restriction from a server. It also costs less to not have to buy a PCIe controller in the first place.
优点是多样的：对于不支持基于操作系统的软件 RAID 引导的传统操作系统，可以镜像引导设备或其他设备，这本身就是一项重要能力；除此之外，通过移除Broadcom（或其他品牌，但这是Broadcom主要主导的市场）HBA或RAID控制器，可以释放PCIe插槽；同时降低功耗并消除服务器的气流限制源；当然，不必购买PCIe控制器肯定也能让成本更低。

Then came Intel PCN 119406-00 on January 6, 2023.
然后 2023 年 1 月 6 日的英特尔 PCN 119406-00 来了。

The SKUs are the hardware keys, such as the ones pictured in the cover image of this article. In the VROC guide linked above, we go into the features of each. The key is:
“All support for VROC (Virtual Raid on CPU) software will be discontinued.”
SKU 是硬件密钥，如本文封面图片中所示的密钥。在上面链接的 VROC 指南中，我们将介绍每种功能。关键是：
“对VROC软件的所有支持都将停止。

That line gave a January 23, 2023, last order date, so there were only 17 days from the End-of-Life notification being issued to the last order date.
该行给出了 2023 年 1 月 23 日，即最后订单日期，因此从发出生命周期结束通知到最后一个订单日期只有 17 天。

Why that matters is that a few days after the PCN, we had a big launch. The 4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable Sapphire Rapids launch. For those who have not seen this, I recorded a few videos at Supermicro about its X13 generation of servers. Something that we said but was edited out is that many of the company’s servers support VROC.
为什么这很重要，因为在PCN之后的几天，我们举行了一次大型发布会。第四代英特尔至强可扩展蓝宝石急流发布。对于那些没有看过的人，我在Supermicro录制了一些关于其X13代服务器的视频。我们说过但被编辑掉的是，该公司的许多服务器都支持VROC。

This is one of the example platforms from the SuperBlade platform that we showed, stating VROC support:
这是我们展示的SuperBlade平台的示例平台之一，声明支持VROC：

Aside from Supermicro, companies like HPE also stated support for VROC in its launch slides. We posted this one, for example, on the HPE ProLiant Gen11 launch piece:
除了Supermicro，像HPE这样的公司也在其发布幻灯片中表示支持VROC。例如，我们在HPE ProLiant Gen11发布会上发现了以下内容：

We can clearly see that this was highlighted as a “New features from the prior generation” update.
我们可以清楚地看到，这被突出显示为“上一代的新功能”更新。

At this point, we had a strange one. Intel said on January 6, 2023 that it would discontinue VROC in a few days. Then four days later, it had OEMs launching servers with VROC support being advertised.
在这一点上，我们有一个奇怪的。英特尔于 2023 年 1 月 6 日表示，将在几天内停止 VROC。然后四天后，它让OEM厂商推出了支持VROC的服务器。

Of course, we asked Intel about this last week, and just got the official response from the company:
当然，我们上周向英特尔询问了此事，并刚刚得到了该公司的官方回应：

“The PCN was prematurely posted while the decision was under evaluation. After discussing with the ecosystem and customers we realize there is significant demand for this product and intend to continue to support it.” (Source: Intel Spokesperson to STH)
“PCN在评估决定时过早发布。在与生态系统和客户讨论后，我们意识到对该产品的需求很大，并打算继续支持它。（来源：英特尔发言人对STH）

For now, it appears as though the January 6, 2023 PCN 119406-00 is going to be pulled, reinstating a future for VROC.
目前，似乎 2023 年 1 月 6 日的 PCN 119406-00 将被取消，VROC 的未来恢复。

Final Words
结语
It is great to see that VROC is going to continue. It is certainly not perfect. We had been working on a piece prior to VROC being discontinued where we could show the power consumption savings from using VROC and the performance of the solution. Then, that piece was sidelined while we thought it would be discontinued. Also, for a portion of Intel’s enterprise customer base, this is actually a nice feature that is less expensive and more available than getting a Broadcom HBA lately. Our last Broadcom 9500-16i’s took almost two months to arrive. The VROC keys we bought above for that piece took less than 48 hours between ordering and deploying.
很高兴看到VROC将继续下去。这当然不完美。在VROC停产之前，我们一直在研究一件作品，我们可以展示使用VROC节省的功耗和解决方案的性能。然后，那件作品被搁置了，而我们认为它会停产。此外，对于英特尔的一部分企业客户群来说，这实际上是一个不错的功能，比最近获得Broadcom HBA更便宜，更容易获得。我们最后一台Broadcom 9500-16i花了将近两个月的时间才到达。我们在上面为该器件购买的 VROC 密钥从订购到部署不到 48 小时。

Hopefully, our STH readers enjoyed this 360 on VROC support that played out over the past 11 days. It is an interesting technology that is useful without great alternatives for some segments of the market. It would be great if Intel continues to support it for some time to come. Or perhaps just make it a standard Intel feature instead of this hardware key system.
希望我们的STH读者喜欢过去11天在VROC上播放的360度支持。这是一项有趣的技术，对于某些细分市场来说，如果没有很好的替代品，它很有用。如果英特尔在未来一段时间内继续支持它，那就太好了。或者也许只是让它成为标准的英特尔功能，而不是这个硬件密钥系统。

Intel surprisingly posted a product change notice on January 6 that it had decided to discontinue its important Virtual Raid on CPU (VROC) technology that is popular with its data center Xeon chips, including the fourth-gen Xeon models that launched last week. The feature is also present on some of Intel's consumer-focused Core models. Last week we reached out to Intel for details about the unexpected change, and today we're told the notice was posted prematurely.
英特尔出人意料地在1月6日发布了产品变更通知，称它已决定停止其重要的虚拟Raid on CPU（VROC）技术，该技术在其数据中心至强芯片中很受欢迎，包括上周推出的第四代至强机型。该功能也出现在英特尔的一些以消费者为中心的酷睿型号上。上周，我们联系了英特尔以获取有关意外更改的详细信息，今天我们被告知通知过早发布。

“The PCN was prematurely posted while the decision was under evaluation. After discussing with the ecosystem and customers we realize there is significant demand for this product and intend to continue to support it.” — Intel Spokesperson to Tom's Hardware.
“PCN在评估决定时过早发布。在与生态系统和客户讨论后，我们意识到对该产品的需求很大，并打算继续支持它。

The VROC functionality is activated via different types of physical RAID keys that plug into the motherboard, each enabling a different level of RAID support. The keys cost between $100 for basic functionality(opens in new tab) to $250 for the full-featured model(opens in new tab). Intel also offered these keys for consumer systems for some time, but they didn't gain much traction.
VROC 功能通过插入主板的不同类型的物理 RAID 密钥激活，每个密钥都支持不同级别的 RAID 支持。基本功能密钥的成本在 100 美元之间（在新选项卡中打开）全功能型号至 250 美元。英特尔也为消费者系统提供了这些密钥一段时间，但它们并没有获得太大的牵引力。

Surprisingly, Intel originally posted January 23, 2023, as the last order date for the products. That's a mere 17 days after the initial posting that announced that "all support for VROC (Virtual Raid on CPU) software will be discontinued." Now we've learned that won't be the case.
令人惊讶的是，英特尔最初将 2023 年 1 月 23 日发布为产品的最后订购日期。这距离最初宣布“将停止对VROC软件的所有支持”的最初发布仅17天。现在我们已经知道情况并非如此。

This isn't the first time the company has issued a product notice in error — with a product stack as broad as Intel's, mistakes are bound to happen. Much like when the company put out a notice that its consumer chips were dying from a bus degradation issue, but later moonwalked the statement back to say the notice was in error.
这不是该公司第一次错误地发布产品通知 - 对于像英特尔这样广泛的产品堆栈，错误肯定会发生。就像该公司发布通知说其消费芯片因总线退化问题而死亡一样，但后来又将声明退回，说该通知是错误的。

The VROC feature debuted in 2017 to simplify and reduce the cost of high-performance storage arrays, and it has enjoyed broad uptake in enterprise applications. The feature brings NVMe RAID functionality on-die to the CPU for SSD storage devices, thus providing many of the performance, redundancy, bootability, manageability, and serviceability benefits that were previously only accessible with an additional device, like a RAID card or HBA. Thus, VROC gives users a host of high-performance storage features without the added cost, power consumption, heat, and complexity of another component, like a RAID card or HBA, in the chassis — not to mention extra cabling.
VROC功能于2017年首次亮相，旨在简化和降低高性能存储阵列的成本，并在企业应用程序中得到广泛采用。该功能将 NVMe RAID 功能引入 SSD 存储设备的 CPU 芯片，从而提供了许多性能、冗余、可启动性、可管理性和可维护性优势，这些优势以前只能通过附加设备（如 RAID 卡或 HBA）访问。因此，VROC为用户提供了许多高性能存储功能，而不会增加机箱中其他组件（如RAID卡或HBA）的成本，功耗，热量和复杂性 - 更不用说额外的布线了。

Pat Gelsinger's shift to focusing on the company's core competency — logic chips — has seen the company stepping away from several of its 'adjacencies,' like its storage business. It's unclear if the uncertainty that formed around the VROC tech stems from Intel's sale of its storage business to SK hynix, which also contributed to the company ceasing further development of its Optane-based products as it sells off its remaining inventory. Intel designed its VROC software to also work in tandem with its own storage products, so it's possible that the groups responsible for this software were within the storage organization that is headed to SK hynix as part of the sale.
帕特·格尔辛格（Pat Gelsinger）转向专注于公司的核心竞争力——逻辑芯片——已经看到该公司摆脱了几个“邻接”，比如它的存储业务。目前还不清楚围绕VROC技术形成的不确定性是否源于英特尔将其存储业务出售给SK海力士，这也导致该公司在出售剩余库存时停止进一步开发其基于Optane的产品。英特尔将其VROC软件设计为也与自己的存储产品协同工作，因此负责该软件的团队可能位于存储组织内，作为销售的一部分前往SK海力士。

In either case, users and OEMs alike have nothing to worry about, as Intel has decided to continue supporting the VROC feature. As such, the company has removed the original cancellation notice.
无论哪种情况，用户和OEM都没有什么可担心的，因为英特尔已决定继续支持VROC功能。因此，公司已删除原始取消通知。

作者: rico19375 时间: 2023-1-21 10:27
牙膏那个VROC在z690上也能用，效果不错，甚至可以南桥的盘和CPU通道的盘一起raid。。。

作者: kevinho86 时间: 2023-1-21 10:39

难道没有人发觉180度才是翻转，而360度只是原地转吗？

作者: 埃律西昂 时间: 2023-1-21 10:39

kevinho86 发表于 2023-1-21 10:39
难道没有人发觉180度才是翻转，而360度只是原地转吗？

支持->不支持->支持
而且360°也是STH的用法。

作者: COFFFEEEE 时间: 2023-1-21 11:24
真的拉接触几次都很麻烦。

作者: Will 时间: 2023-1-21 14:32
这吃相太恶心了，raid 还好另外买。人家 amd 都是直接支持

作者: rico19375 时间: 2023-1-22 07:41

Will 发表于 2023-1-21 14:32
这吃相太恶心了，raid 还好另外买。人家 amd 都是直接支持

牙膏在桌面平台就是直接支持（8,9代只能用Intel的SSD，10代以后支持全品牌SSD），跟AMD一样的。epyc不支持raid，需要自行购买阵列卡，更坑。xeon收费是坑大客户的钱，跟消费者又没关系。。。

作者: skanlife 时间: 2023-1-22 17:18

rico19375 发表于 2023-1-21 10:27
牙膏那个VROC在z690上也能用，效果不错，甚至可以南桥的盘和CPU通道的盘一起raid。。。 ...

那个貌似只是RST而已

作者: rico19375 时间: 2023-1-22 19:46

skanlife 发表于 2023-1-22 17:18
那个貌似只是RST而已

可以在CPU通道使用，不再局限于南桥通道，vroc全称就是Virtual Raid on CPU

作者: skanlife 时间: 2023-1-22 20:36

rico19375 发表于 2023-1-22 19:46
可以在CPU通道使用，不再局限于南桥通道，vroc全称就是Virtual Raid on CPU

不过，VROC不是需要CPU里有VMD支持才可以吗？

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