AI Workloads Have a New Self-Cooling SSD on the Market — Here’s How It Works

At Nvidia’s annual GPU Technology Conference (GTC) in March, data storage provider Solidigm announced its brand-new liquid-cooled SSD designed for AI and HPC workloads.

The Solidigm D7-PS1010 E1.S is a PCIe 5.0 NVMe SSD that works as a compact, fan-less design, which could help reduce power consumption and cooling costs in data centers.

It’s cooled using a spring-loaded cold plate mechanism, which allows for hot-swappable liquid cooling. So, unlike traditional cooling solutions that only cool one side, this cools both.

The SSD also offers capacities of up to 15.36TB and delivers class-leading performance with up to 90% IOPS consistency across its lifespan.

At the conference, Kevin Noh, co-CEO of Solidigm, demonstrated the 9.5mm cold-plate-cooled SSDs in real time.

“The combination of an innovative Solidigm E1.S SSD and liquid cold-plate kit – both first-to-market innovations – deliver significant benefits in thermal efficiency while maintaining data center grade serviceability,” said Noh.

Soon, 15mm SSDs will also be available.

James Zhao, senior principal SSD and HDD storage analyst at Omdia, said that while liquid cooling isn’t uncommon in data centers, it’s typically reserved for high-powered chips.

The difference here is that this liquid-cooled deployment is in the form of an SSD.

“GenAI and accelerated computing call for memory and storage that can provide the best performance,” Zhao told Data Center Knowledge.

“However, higher performance comes along with the problem of more heat and keeps creating challenges for the system integrators. A better cooling solution for major heat contributors is a must for compact-designed systems.”

The SSD will be available for AI servers “in the second half of this year.“

One of the main reasons data center leaders are searching for alternative energy solutions is a direct result of the AI infrastructure boom.

There’s a growing demand to build data centers that don’t drain nearby resources — a sentiment that Boris Siegenthaler, Founder of Infomaniak, has shared before:

“Large players worldwide have the power and resources to adopt similar eco-friendly innovations by prioritizing energy reuse, cooling servers without water or additional air conditioning, and integrating into local ecosystems rather than disrupting them.”

Hyperscale data centers require an incredible amount of energy — usually exceeding 100 megawatts, which can support the peak energy demands of 80,000 households at once.

Aside from energy, these hyperscale data centers need a lot of cooling.

Some data centers opt for fans; others rely on liquid cooling. The average data center consumes 3 to 5 million gallons of water per day, which is equivalent to the usage of a small city.

It’s why Solidigm’s new self-cooling SSD seems promising. While traditional data centers use fans to cool, the Solidigm D7-PS1010 uses liquid cold plates to manage heat.

Now the question is who will be among the first to implement it.