❄️ AWS Snow Family – Edge & Offline Storage Services
The AWS Snow Family is a collection of physical devices designed for offline data migration, edge computing, and secure transport of large datasets between your on-premises environment and AWS.
📦 Snow Family Members
| Service | Capacity | Use Case |
|---|---|---|
| Snowcone | 8 TB usable storage | Portable edge device for small jobs |
| Snowball Edge Storage Optimized | 80 TB usable | Data transfer + local compute |
| Snowball Edge Compute Optimized | 42 TB usable + GPU | Edge compute-heavy tasks |
| Snowmobile | Up to 100 PB | Massive-scale data center migration |
🔹 1. AWS Snowcone
- Smallest & lightest device (4.5 lbs)
- 8 TB usable storage
- Rugged, portable; supports battery or vehicle power
- Has compute capability (2 vCPUs, 4 GB RAM)
- Ideal for edge data collection, remote sites, IoT
✅ Supports:
- Data sync to S3
- AWS OpsHub for management
- NFS-compatible file interface
🔹 2. AWS Snowball Edge (Storage & Compute Optimized)
📦 Storage Optimized:
- 80 TB usable HDD
- Designed for large-scale data transfer
- Local compute with vCPUs and EC2 instances
⚙️ Compute Optimized:
- 42 TB usable SSD
- Powerful with 52 vCPUs, 208 GB RAM
- Optional NVIDIA Tesla V100 GPU
- Great for ML inference, video analytics, edge AI
Both support:
- S3 compatible storage
- EBS-like volumes
- Lambda + EC2 for offline compute
- AWS OpsHub GUI for device management
🚛 3. AWS Snowmobile
- Semi-truck-sized data transfer device
- Up to 100 Petabytes
- Used for data center evacuations, large backups
- Comes with climate control, tamper-proof casing, GPS tracking, chain-of-custody services
🔐 Security Features (All Devices)
- Data encryption (256-bit AES)
- Tamper-resistant enclosures
- Uses Trusted Platform Module (TPM)
- Data automatically erased after job completion
- AWS IAM and OpsHub integration
🧠 Use Cases
| Scenario | Recommended Snow Device |
|---|---|
| Backup remote oil field data | ✅ Snowcone |
| Ship TBs of video footage | ✅ Snowball Edge |
| Run AI at construction sites | ✅ Snowball Edge Compute |
| Data center shutdown | ✅ Snowmobile |
🔁 Workflow
- Order device from AWS Console
- AWS preloads job configuration
- Device shipped to your location
- Transfer data locally or run compute workloads
- Ship device back to AWS
- Data is imported into Amazon S3 or other services
💰 Pricing Overview
| Item | Description |
|---|---|
| Per-day charge | Varies by device type |
| Data transfer into AWS | ✅ Free |
| Data transfer out of AWS | Billed like S3 egress |
| Shipping charges | Passed through at cost |
👉 Pricing varies by region and usage; check the AWS Snow Pricing page
✅ Summary Table
| Device | Capacity | Compute | Ideal Use Case |
|---|---|---|---|
| Snowcone | 8 TB | Basic | Remote edge data collection |
| Snowball Edge Storage | 80 TB | Moderate | Bulk data transfer |
| Snowball Edge Compute | 42 TB | High + GPU | ML/AI at edge |
| Snowmobile | 100 PB | ❌ | Full data center migration |