Introduction to CPFS

This topic introduces the editions of Cloud Parallel File Storage (CPFS), compares them, and helps you get started.

CPFS is a fully managed and scalable parallel file system from Alibaba Cloud. It is designed for high-performance computing (HPC) workloads. CPFS provides a unified namespace that allows hundreds or even thousands of compute nodes to access data concurrently. It delivers tens of GB/s in throughput and millions of IOPS, all with sub-millisecond latency.

CPFS editions

CPFS is available in the following editions:

CPFS General-purpose Edition: Ideal for HPC workloads such as AI training, autonomous driving, genomics, film and television rendering, EDA simulation, oil and gas exploration, and meteorological analysis. This edition is optimized for high throughput, high IOPS, and handling massive numbers of files.
CPFS for Lingjun: Designed for intelligent computing scenarios such as AIGC and autonomous driving.
This edition can only be used with Lingjun resources, general computing resources of PAI, Lingjun resources of the single-tenant version, and Container Compute Service (ACS). It does not support access from ECS instances.

Differences between CPFS for Lingjun and CPFS General-purpose Edition

The following table details the differences between CPFS for Lingjun and the CPFS General-purpose Edition.

Category	Comparison criteria	CPFS for Lingjun (invitational preview)	CPFS General-purpose Edition
Positioning	Target customers	Intelligent computing workloads	HPC workloads
	Product features	Ultra-high throughput and IOPS with an end-to-end RDMA network	High throughput and IOPS
	Purchase method	Requires whitelisting for purchase on the Alibaba Cloud console.	Available for purchase on the Alibaba Cloud console.
Purchase	Available specifications	400 MB/s/TiB Baseline	100 MB/s/TiB Baseline 200 MB/s/TiB Baseline
Usage	Protocol	POSIX	Interoperability between POSIX and NFS v3 protocols
	Client	Linux	Linux
	Region	China (Hangzhou) China (Shanghai) China (Shenzhen) China (Guangzhou) China (Beijing) China (Ulanqab) China (Hong Kong) Singapore Germany (Frankfurt) Thailand (Bangkok) Malaysia (Kuala Lumpur) Dubai	China (Hangzhou) China (Shanghai) China (Beijing)
	Capacity specifications	Starting capacity: 10 TiB Maximum capacity: 1 PiB To create a file system up to 20 PiB, submit a ticket.	Starting capacity: 3,600 GiB Maximum capacity: 1 PiB
Performance	Throughput	Read throughput: min{400 * Capacity (TiB), 400,000} MB/s Write throughput: min{200 * Capacity (TiB), 200,000} MB/s To increase throughput to 2 TB/s, submit a ticket.	100 MB/s/TiB Baseline: min{0.1 * Capacity (GiB), 30,000} MB/s 200 MB/s/TiB Baseline: min{0.2 * Capacity (GiB), 45,000} MB/s To increase throughput to 100,000 MB/s, submit a ticket.
	IOPS	Read IOPS: min{6,800 * Capacity (TiB), 6,800,000} Write IOPS: min{2,300 * Capacity (TiB), 2,300,000} To increase IOPS to 30,000,000, submit a ticket.	100 MB/s/TiB Baseline: min{15 * Capacity (GiB), 3,600,000} 200 MB/s/TiB Baseline: min{30 * Capacity (GiB), 7,200,000} To increase IOPS to 10,000,000, submit a ticket.
	Average latency for a single 4 KB read	0.25 ms	100 MB/s/TiB Baseline: 0.6 ms 200 MB/s/TiB Baseline: 0.4 ms
	Average latency for a single 4 KB write	0.6 ms	100 MB/s/TiB Baseline: 0.8 ms 200 MB/s/TiB Baseline: 0.6 ms
Elasticity	Elastic scale-out	Supported	Supported
	Elastic scale-in	Not supported	Not supported
	Scaling method	Manual	Manual
	Scaling step size	10 TiB	1,200 GiB
Security	ACL-based access control	Not supported	Supported
	Server-side encryption	Not supported	Supported
	Encryption in transit	Not supported	Supported
Stability	Subdirectory mounting	Not supported	Supported
	Dataflow	Supported	Supported
	Backup	Supported	Supported
	Locally redundant storage	Supported	Supported
	Zone-redundant storage	Not supported	Supported only for the 100 MB/s/TiB Baseline
Cost	Billing method	Pay-as-you-go	Pay-as-you-go

Get started with CPFS

Action		CPFS for Lingjun (invitational preview)	CPFS General-purpose Edition
Learn about CPFS		What is CPFS for Lingjun (invitational preview)? Specifications Limits Billing	What is CPFS General-purpose Edition? Specifications Limits CPFS billing
Activate CPFS		Create a file system	Create a file system
Mount a CPFS file system		Mount a CPFS for Lingjun file system in PAI Mount a CPFS for Lingjun file system in ACS	Mount a CPFS file system on an ECS instance Mount a CPFS file system by using a container
Use CPFS	Query file system details	Query file system details	Query file system details
	Scale out a file system	Scale out a file system	Scale out a file system
	Protocol service	Not supported	Protocol service
	Dataflow	CPFS for Lingjun dataflow (invitational preview)	Dataflow overview
	Monitoring and alerts	Data monitoring	Overview
	Access control	Not supported	Access control
	Log management	Log management	Not supported
	Data backup	Data backup	Data backup
	Zone-redundant storage	Not supported	Storage redundancy
Call the API		List of operations by function	List of operations by function