What does Alibaba Cloud I/O optimization and non I/O optimization mean? Difference and how to choose?

Alibaba Cloud I/O optimization And non I/O optimization? Difference and how to choose? I/O optimization is often seen in Alibaba Cloud server descriptions. According to the description, instances with I/O optimization can better play the disk performance of efficient cloud disks and SSD cloud disks. However, many people still don't know much about this term. In the spirit of sharing, Lao Wei summarized the information from many sources.

1、 I/O optimization

IOPS refers to the number of I/Os that can be processed per second, indicating the ability of block storage to process read/write (output/input), and the unit is times. I/O optimization is to improve the read/write speed and performance of hard disk through the performance of hardware and software. Click me directly Alibaba Cloud official documents can be found by searching [Block Storage Performance]. However, there is no definition of I/O optimization in the official document, which is Lao Wei's own understanding after synthesizing various materials.

2、 Difference between I/O optimization and non I/O optimization

1. In addition to the 100% cloud disk performance mentioned above, I/O optimization instances can also provide 10G shared bandwidth between servers' intranets. Non I/O optimized instances do not have such high performance.

2. When an I/O optimization instance mounts an SSD cloud disk or an efficient cloud disk, it can obtain all the storage performance of the cloud disk, because I/O optimization provides a better network capability between the instance and the cloud disk, which can ensure the performance of cloud disk storage.

3. When a non I/O optimized instance is attached to an SSD cloud disk, the maximum IOPS performance can be about 1000; When you mount an efficient cloud disk, you can usually obtain up to hundreds of IOPS performance. For example, if the same 40G SSD cloud disk is used, the non I/O optimization instance can achieve a maximum of about 1000 IOPS read/write performance, while the I/O optimization instance can achieve a maximum of 25000 IOPS performance.

Let's talk about whether your server and database instances are I/O optimization instances, The difference between read and write performance can be up to 250 times ！！！ For example, if you buy a cheap AliCloud server and a non I/O optimized instance model, the speed of opening web pages is much slower than that of I/O optimized instances.

You can see the maximum IOPS of SSD cloud disks and efficient cloud disks in the following table, which means this. At the same time, the following maximum throughput and random write access delay also differ by several times. These factors add up, The speed of opening the web page or calling the database will be slow for several seconds 。

3、 How to select

After searching, Lao Wei found that the common Alibaba Cloud servers, such as computational c5, computational c6, general g5, general g6, computing network enhanced sn1ne, and general network enhanced sn2ne, belong to I/O optimization instances.

The burst performance instances t5, t6, shared xn4, n4, and mn4 depend on whether the I/O optimization instance is specified when purchasing, Click me directly On the AliCloud server purchase page, click "Buy Now" to enter the configuration page, and then click "Custom Purchase" at the top to see the following basic configuration options, as shown in the following figure.

Remember first Click me to get it AliCloud 1000 yuan voucher can partially offset the cost when making payment, saving the cost of going to the cloud.

The benefits of I/O optimization instances have been mentioned above, and the price increases will follow. As we all know, the choice of ECS is always the result of multiple factors. You can't just look at one or several items. Friends who choose burst performance instances or shared instances should remember that these two instances have certain limitations. They cannot always obtain 100% of the system's resources. Either there is a CPU performance peak limit or there is a resource race. Computational, general-purpose and network enhanced instances are all equipped with I/O optimization. In addition, they are exclusive models, which can use all resources of the system 100% for a long time, and their performance is naturally many times better than the previous two models.

4、 I/O optimization server recommendation

Alibaba Cloud enterprise servers, starting from Alibaba Cloud computing servers, are enterprise servers with I/O optimization for 2-core 4G memory configurations and exclusive models. Enterprise class servers can not only be purchased by enterprises, but also by individuals. They have strong performance and help businesses grow rapidly.

Performance: CPU can operate under 100% long-term full load. Because you can enjoy 100% of the system resources exclusively, there is no such situation as stuck.

Price: Compared with the sudden performance instance, it has a certain improvement and is definitely worth it.

Scope of application: small and medium-sized individuals, industry websites, small and medium-sized enterprise websites, etc.