Microsoft began offering previous of Azure Boost, which offloads virtualization processes traditionally performed by the hypervisor and host OS onto purpose-built hardware and software, such as networking, storage, and host management.
The idea is to separate hypervisor and host OS functions from the host infrastructure. Microsoft said Azure Boost will deliver greater network and storage performance at scale, improves security by adding another layer of logical isolation, and reduces the maintenance impact for future Azure software and hardware upgrades.
The preview of Azure Boost achieves 200 Gbps networking throughput and remote storage throughput up to 10 GBps and 400K IOPS.
The performance is enabled by a Microsoft Azure Network Adapter (MANA) that is powered by a custom system-on-chip (SoC). The MANA runs a set of stable forward-compatible device drivers for Linux and Windows operating systems. MANA also supports Data Plane Development Kit (DPDK). In addition, the Azure Boost’s chip features hardware-based secure boot and attestation, while implementing a FIPS 140 certified kernel for its cryptography, providing federal government levels of security.
While the preview is new, Azure Boost has been providing benefits to millions of existing Azure VMs in production today, such as enabling the exceptional remote storage performance of the Ebsv5 VM series and networking throughput and latency improvements for the entire Ev5 and Dv5 VM series.
