Gcore Launches AI Cloud Based on Graphcore IPU in Manassas, US
- October 27, 2023
- 2 min read
We are pleased to announce the expansion of the Gcore AI Cloud powered by Graphcore Bow IPU to our data center in Manassas, Virginia. Strategically located near Washington DC, Manassas is at the heart of the US’s Eastern Seaboard region, a hub of tech innovation. The AI Cloud provides virtual vPODs with multiple configurations, suitable for running all types of AI/ML workloads—including those that are particularly demanding.
What Is the Basis of the Infrastructure?
The AI cluster is built on the Graphcore Bow Pod64, an IPU system that supports multiple users and various AI workloads across virtual vPODs. The Bow Pod64 contains 94,208 IPU cores and delivers 22.4 petaFLOPS of total compute power. These capabilities allow us to deliver powerful AI computing for training and inference, enabling our customers to develop and deploy their AI/ML models in the cloud and at the edge.
Bow Pod is compatible with all popular ML frameworks, including TensorFlow, PyTorch, and Paddle Paddle, and with cloud-native applications such as Kubernetes, Prometheus, and Grafana.
Manassas Virtual vPOD Configurations
Here are the virtual vPOD configurations we offer at the new Manassas location:
| Product | Instance configuration | Number of IPUs | Price per hour |
| BOW-vPOD4 | 60 vCPU / 116GB RAM / 1100GB NVMe (ephemeral) / 100Gbit/s Interconnect | 1 | $3.68 |
| BOW-vPOD16 | 120 vCPU / 232GB RAM / 2200GB NVMe (ephemeral) / 100Gbit/s Interconnect | 16 | $13.70 |
| BOW-vPOD16 | 240 vCPU / 464GB RAM / 4400GB NVMe (ephemeral) / 100Gbit/s Interconnect | 16 | $15.80 |
| BOW-vPOD64 | 240 vCPU / 464GB RAM / 4400GB NVMe (ephemeral) / 100Gbit/s Interconnect | 64 | $64.30 |
All configurations are available now via our Cloud platform.
You can also try out vPOD4 for free for 24 hours. To get the trial, contact our sales team.
What Is a Virtual vPOD?
A virtual vPOD is a flavor in which a Poplar® server—a server that manages Bow IPU servers in a cluster—is deployed on a virtual machine. This is in contrast to a dedicated vPOD, which deploys a Poplar® server on a dedicated bare metal server.
A virtual vPOD provides direct access to a host server and fast connectivity to physical IPU accelerators, offering a cost-effective solution to those who need fast and dynamic access to IPU computing power. You can provision virtual vPODs in just five minutes, compared to fifteen minutes for dedicated physical vPODs.
Benefits of Virtual vPODs
Virtual vPODs let you:
- Deploy your development environment seamlessly.
- Install and run code at lightning speed.
- Enhance your experience with popular ML frameworks like TensorFlow, PyTorch, and Keras.
- Leverage ephemeral storage for stateless workloads.
- Use external volumes to connect to external block storage and add new data volumes.
- Use suspension mode to pause your cluster, useful for unpredictable workloads, resource management, and cost optimization; you can resume the cluster in minutes.
Learn More
Visit our AI IPU product page to explore all the features and benefits of our AI Cloud.
Watch our webinar to learn how IPUs enable you to train AI models for various applications.
Check out our blog to find out how the Gcore AI IPU Cloud can help you with your AI/ML development, training, and inference needs.
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