Storage Types

GaussDB(for MySQL) provides two storage types: Cloud Database Engine Level 6 (DL6) and Cloud Database Engine Level 5 (DL5). Standard Edition instances use DL5 by default, while Enterprise Edition instances support both DL6 and DL5.

This section describes the differences between the two storage types, helping you choose the one that best suits your needs.

Storage Type Description

**Table 1** Storage type description
Storage Type	Description	Applicable Scenario
DL6	The shared storage is the default storage type for GaussDB(for MySQL) instances created before July 2024. DL6-based instances achieve zero RPO with a 3 AZ deployment and deliver better performance and higher peak throughput.	Core application systems that are sensitive to performance and have demanding requirements on storage I/O during peak hours, such as those in finance, e-commerce, government, and gaming
DL5	The new storage type uses Huawei Cloud's hardware and network infrastructure technologies, ensuring that DL5-based instances maintain the same high availability as DL6-based instances with 3 AZs and zero RPO. Although the peak performance may decrease, the cost per unit capacity is significantly reduced.	CPU-intensive sub-core business systems or cost-effective application modules

As the two storage types rely on different physical media, you cannot change the storage type for an existing instance. If you want to change the storage type, you are advised to purchase a new GaussDB(for MySQL) instance, select the desired storage type, and migrate data from the original instance to the new instance using DRS.

Billing

For details, see Price Calculator.

Performance Comparison

When DL6- and DL5-based instances with the same compute specifications and I/O-intensive workloads are compared using sysbench, there is only an about 3% difference in read performance and less than 10% difference in write performance.

Figure 1 Performance comparison results