Skip to main content

The new information super-highway: Amazon hauls 100 petabytes of data on a truck

Need to move lots and lots of data into the cloud but don’t have the time and money to pump all that information across the internet? Look no further than Amazon’s new Snowmobile for its Amazon Web Services platform. Despite the bitter cold, free-riding name, this data migration solution is a secure data “truck” that can store up to 100 petabytes of data for moving exabytes of data across the nation’s real highways to Amazon’s cloud in a matter of weeks.

Ten-four, good buddy.

Recommended Videos

Amazon describes its new Snowmobile as a “ruggedized, tamper-resistant shipping container” measuring 45-feet long, 9.6-feet high, and 8-feet wide. The container is both climate-controlled and waterproof and consumes around 350KW of power just for the cooling system alone. It can be parked in a covered or uncovered area at the customer’s datacenter, and Amazon will even supply a generator if customers can’t provide enough power to juice the container.

“Each Snowmobile includes a network cable connected to a high-speed switch capable of supporting one terabit per second of data transfer spread across multiple 40 gigabits per second connections,” Amazon’s Jeff Barr wrote in a blog post on Wednesday. “Assuming that your existing network can transfer data at that rate, you can fill a Snowmobile in about 10 days.”

Barr indicated that the Snowmobile is aimed at customers in the scientific industry, media and entertainment companies, financial services firms, and so on. It attaches directly to the company’s network and appears as a local, network file system (NFS) storage device. Customers can use their own backup/archiving tools to transfer all their data to be stored using Amazon Glacier or Amazon Simple Storage Service (S3).

Using a Lego-inspired example, Barr suggested Snowmobiles are ideal for aging data centers that still rely on racks full of disk and tape drives storing “precious, mission-critical” data. Thus, by moving all that data onto current storage technologies via the cloud, enterprises are spending less time and money trying to squeeze additional performance out of aging hardware.

AWS customers can call to set up a meeting to discuss how the data can be moved to Amazon’s cloud using a Snowmobile. Once the 18-wheeler shows up with the container, AWS Professional Services does all the work in connecting the container to the customer’s network. The customer then initiates the data transfer and when the process is finally complete, the 18-wheeler hauls the container back to Amazon to import the data as specified by the customer.

For now, Snowmobiles will only be used to migrate data into Amazon’s cloud. However, the company is quite aware that many customers may want to export their data from the cloud in disaster recovery cases. Barr didn’t say when the latter service will become available, nor did he have any info to share regarding the overall cost of using one or more Snowmobiles. However, this new truck-based storage transfer service is available in all AWS Regions.

To see Amazon’s new Snowmobile container, head over to Twitter and have a peek at the company’s coverage stemming from its annual Re:Invent conference that is currently under way in Las Vegas.

Kevin Parrish
Kevin started taking PCs apart in the 90s when Quake was on the way and his PC lacked the required components. Since then…
This Lenovo all-in-one computer is 30% off even though Prime Day has ended
The Lenovo V100 All-in-One Desktop Computer on a white background.

Even though Prime Day is already finished, there are still some excellent desktop computer deals on Amazon. If you don't have much space, or you just want to avoid clutter, you should take a look at the Lenovo V100 All-in-One PC. From its original price of $800, it's all the way down to just $560 following a 30% discount. The offer for this machine will only be available for a limited time though, so you need to act fast and proceed with the transaction immediately to secure the savings of $240.

Buy Now

Read more
The new Reachy Mini robot can let kids turn play into innovation
The Reachy Mini robot.

The Reachy Mini is an exciting new desktop robot aimed primarily at developers, educators, students, and enthusiasts, or basically anyone interested in creative coding.

There are actually two of them -- Reachy Mini Lite ($299) and Reachy Mini Wireless ($449) -- and both were developed by the prominent AI platform Hugging Face following its recent acquisition of Pollen Robotics. 

Read more
If you’re itching for an HP OMEN MAX gaming laptop, this deal will save you $500
The HP Omen Max gaming laptop with Valorant on the screen.

We've recently published a stunningly positive review of the HP OMEN Max 16. It's got a list of "Pros" a mile long. The single, obligatory con is "Thick and heavy." Considering that it's a gaming laptop, that's practically the equivalent of saying a flashlight is too bright to look at. Thick, and a bit heavy, just comes with the territory. All of this is to say that the review was great and we're fans of the HP OMEN Max 16. As a deal hunter it made me want to go and see if I could find a deal on the HP OMEN Max 16 and I did, sort of. Right now you can get a customizable HP OMEN Max 16t — a laptop that, if it didn't have a separate store page, I would think is identical to the one we reviewed — with a $500 discount, no matter what settings you choose. With the base settings of the laptop, that discount brings it from $2,100 to just $1,600, but you're free to upgrade to your heart's content. Tap the button below to start customizing to your whimsy or keep reading for some advice on how to do so and what to expect from the 16t.

Buy Now

Read more