Posted On: Aug 29, 2023

Amazon FSx for Windows File Server, a service that provides fully managed file storage built on Windows Server, now enables you to select and update the level of I/O operations per second (IOPS) separately from storage capacity on your file system. This new capability enables you to improve price-performance for IOPS-intensive workloads like SQL Server databases and optimize costs for workloads with IOPS requirements that vary over time like periodic reporting jobs.

Before today, the IOPS performance level for accessing data on your file system’s SSD storage disks was fixed at a ratio of 3 IOPS per GiB of storage capacity. With this launch, you can now configure SSD IOPS independently from storage capacity during file system creation and scale SSD IOPS at any time later – up to a ratio of 50 IOPS per GiB. Scaling IOPS independently from storage capacity enables you to reduce storage costs for IOPS-intensive workloads like SQL Server databases or virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) that require high levels of IOPS relative to storage size. You can also update your file system’s SSD IOPS level in just a few minutes without impacting file system availability, enabling you to optimize costs and accelerate time-to-results for cyclical or intermittent workloads like periodic data analytics jobs.

You can now configure and scale SSD IOPS for both new and existing file systems in all Amazon Web Services Regions where Amazon FSx for Windows File Server is available.

To learn more about Amazon FSx for Windows File Server, visit our product page. For more information about configuring and scaling IOPS, see Managing SSD IOPS.