Helios: a hybrid electrical/optical switch architecture for modular data centers
The basic building block of ever larger data centers has shifted from a rack to a modular container with hundreds or even thousands of servers. Delivering scalable bandwidth among such containers is a challenge. A number of recent efforts promise full bisection bandwidth between all servers, though with significant cost, complexity, and power con-sumption. We present Helios, a hybrid electrical/optical switch architecture that can deliver significant reductions in the number of switching elements, cabling, cost, and power consumption relative to recently proposed data center net-work architectures. We explore architectural trade offs and challenges associated with realizing these benefits through the evaluation of a fully functional Helios prototype.