Based on our conversations with customers, we know that customers prefer InfiniBand or Ethernet. For this reason, the HPC Ready Architecture for AI and Data Analytics offers these options:

• Dell EMC PowerSwitch S5232F-ON switch, which is a high-performance Ethernet building block:

• Well suited for HPC simulation workloads, deep learning training, machine learning training, and inferencing
• Supports up to 6.4 Tbps of switching I/O bandwidth for high performance and low latency

• Mellanox SB7800 switch, which is a high-performance InfiniBand building block:

• Well suited for large-scale HPC simulation workloads and deep learning training
• Supports up to 7.2 Tbps of nonblocking bandwidth with 90 ns port-to-port latency for performance and low latency

The following figure shows the Ethernet switch architecture:

Figure 1.              HPC Ready Architecture for AI and Data Analytics with Ethernet switches

The following figure shows the InfiniBand switch architecture:

Figure 2.         HPC Ready Architecture for AI and Data Analytics with InfiniBand switches

The performance of both types of switches is comparable in most use cases. Customers must choose a networking switch that enables them to run multiple workloads at high bandwidth and low latency for best performance. The networking switch must have a fast connection to compute and storage resources for best performance.