Amazon Web Services Snowmobile – when a one gigabit per-second connection just doesn’t cut it

Amazon Web Services Snowmobile – 100 petabyte on board
Credit: Amazon

Amazon Web Services (AWS) is in the business of providing cloud storage. If you have made use of such a service, you will be aware of how long transferring even a few gigabytes to the cloud can take (depending on the speed of your connection).

For organisations with storage requirements in the 100 petabyte range (that’s 100,000 terabytes¹), AWS has a different kind of Internet connection – an 18 wheeler containing a 100 petabyte hard drive array. To upload the customer’s data to its cloud:
● Amazon delivers a Snowmobile (or a several) to the customer
● customer copies data to Snowmobile
● Amazon delivers Snowmobile(s) to its server facility
● Amazon copies customer data to its servers

For multi-petabyte data uploads, Snowmobile is faster than even a one gigabit per-second connection.

And Snowmobile? The name is derived from a similar service called Snowball – a device which can hold 80 terabytes – Amazon ships one to a customer – customer ships it back to Amazon Web Services (AWS) for upload to its cloud.

Wired – “Amazon’s Snowmobile Is Actually a Truck Hauling A Huge Hard Drive”
https://www.wired.com/2016/12/amazons-snowmobile-actually-truck-hauling-huge-hard-drive/?mbid=nl_12216_p3&CNDID=

Engadget – “Amazon's new Snowmobile collects data instead of blasting through powder”
https://www.engadget.com/2016/12/02/amazons-new-snowmobile-collects-data-instead-of-blasting-throug/

Mashable – “Amazon just unveiled its most impressive tech yet, and it's an actual truck”
http://mashable.com/2016/12/02/amazon-unveils-a-truck-to-carry-all-that-data/#2pTt5NPMH8qn

Amazon – “Amazon Web Services Snowmobile”
https://aws.amazon.com/snowmobile/
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¹ High Scalability: “How Big Is A Petabyte, Exabyte, Zettabyte, Or A Yottabyte?”, http://highscalability.com/blog/2012/9/11/how-big-is-a-petabyte-exabyte-zettabyte-or-a-yottabyte.html / Amazon new Snowmobile collects data instead of blasting through powder Amazon’s Snowmobile Is Actually a Truck Hauling A Huge Hard Drive new service that makes Google Fiber seem slow rides on 18 wheels today’s speediest internet connections faster to download movies downloading uploading large amounts of data take days months years film studio’s entire video archives satellite imagery collections government agencies lag problem Amazon companies store their information lucrative cloud logistics company solve strangest ideas yet tractor trailer transport your data to Amazon’s own data centers information superhighway joke Amazon new service named Snowmobile Re:Invent conference Las Vegas designed shuttle 100 petabytes around 100,000 terabytes per truck storage five copies of the Internet Archive comprehensive backup web present and past 18.5 petabytesof unique data Amazon businesses ship hard disks full of data Amazon uploading retail giant’s cloud copying 100 petabytes to individual hard drives isn’t practical Snowmobile acts like a giant hard drive comes to you using multiple semis shuttle data around massive amounts of data hitting open road most efficient way to go one gigabit per-second connection Google Fiber uploading 100 petabytes over Internet take more than 28 years average speed 65 mph drive Snowmobile San Francisco to New York City about 45 hours about 4,970 gigabits per second time it takes to actually transfer data onto Snowmobile Amazon take less than 10 days Snowmobile Amazon’s servers truck much much faster Amazon has data centers throughout the country data won’t need to travel cross-country security Snowmobile multiple layers logical physical protection chain-of-custody tracking video surveillance Amazon cloud /