Qwen3.5 35B-A3B on DCU K100-AI 64GB (海光深算) (64GB) — VRAM, KV Cache & Throughput

Qwen3.5 35B-A3B (35.95B total, 3B active, Hybrid Linear/Mamba + MoE) uses 20.5 GiB of 4-bit weights (Q4_K_M), requiring 21.28 GiB total at 8K context and 21.75 GiB at 32K on DCU K100-AI 64GB (海光深算) (~225.8 tok/s decode).

Interactive Sizing Workbench

Full Compatibility Report →
64 GB · 1638 GB/s
Fits with Safe Headroom
Config-derived formula HF config.json ↗
Memory Allocation Breakdown (GiB) 21.28 GiB (22.85 GB) / 64 GiB (33%)
Model Weights: 20.5 GiB KV Cache & State: 0.22 GiB Runtime & Activation Buffers: 0.56 GiB System RAM Offload: 0 GiB
Required GPU Memory
21.28 GiB
22.85 GB (decimal)
Usable Hardware Memory
60.8 GiB
64 GB (physical)
Safe Headroom
+39.52 GiB
33% utilization
Est. Decode Throughput
~225.8 tok/s
3B active params
Est. Prefill Throughput
~21233 tok/s
4K Prompt TTFT: ~193 ms
Est. Cost / 1M Tokens
$0.23
Hybrid Linear/Mamba + MoE · Apache-2.0

Recommended Hardware for Current Configuration

Best Single GPU
Arc Pro B60 24GB (24GB)
~$599
Best Value / Used GPU
RTX 3090 (24GB)
~$750
Apple Unified Memory
Ryzen AI Max+ 395 128GB
~$1,999
Cloud From
Vast.ai · $0.19 / hr
1x RTX 3090

Production Launch Commands

llama.cpp (GGUF)
llama-server -hf unsloth/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B-GGUF:Q4_K_M \
  --ctx-size 8192 -ngl 999 --flash-attn
vLLM
vllm serve Qwen/Qwen3.5-35B-A3B \
  --max-model-len 8192 --gpu-memory-utilization 0.92
Live Token Speed Simulator (TTFT ~193ms · ~225.8 tok/s)
[Qwen3.5 35B-A3B · 21.28 GiB] allocated on target GPU. Prefill completed in TTFT window; streaming autoregressive tokens at memory-bandwidth-bound rate...

Cloud GPU Comparison & Rent-vs-Buy TCO

Verified public rates across RunPod, Vast.ai, Vultr, and DigitalOcean.

Verified: 2026-11-04
Purchase break-even
~26.6 months
Est. local power: $4.26 / mo
Provider Recommended Instance Total VRAM Hourly Rate Monthly at Selected Hours Billing Mode Deploy
RunPod 1x RTX 3090 (Community Cloud) 24 GB $0.22 / hr $26.75 / mo Per-second Deploy GPU ↗
Vast.ai 1x RTX 3090 (Verified Host) 24 GB $0.19 / hr $22.98 / mo Spot / On-demand Deploy GPU ↗
Vultr ($300 Free Credit*) 1x L40S 48GB (Dedicated Instance · $300 Credit*) 48 GB $1.67 / hr $203.19 / mo Hourly Deploy GPU ↗
Vultr Cloud GPU 1x L40S 48GB (Dedicated Instance) 48 GB $1.67 / hr $203.19 / mo Hourly Deploy GPU ↗
DigitalOcean 1x RTX 6000 Ada (Dedicated Instance) 48 GB $1.57 / hr $190.91 / mo Per-second Deploy GPU ↗

Rates reflect public listings on the verification date and fluctuate with regional inventory.

Fine-Tuning VRAM Requirements (QLoRA / LoRA / Full) — Qwen3.5 35B-A3B

QLoRA (4b) Fits with Safe Headroom
22.71 GiB
Model Weights: 20.5 GiB · Gradients + Optimizer: 1.2 GiB · Act: 1.01 GiB
Recommended GPU: Radeon AI PRO R9700 32GB (32GB)
LoRA (16b) Exceeds Available GPU Memory
70.1 GiB
Model Weights: 66.96 GiB · Gradients + Optimizer: 1.8 GiB · Act: 1.34 GiB
Recommended GPU: RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell (96GB)
Full BF16 Exceeds Available GPU Memory
276.9 GiB
Model Weights: 66.96 GiB · Gradients + Optimizer: 207.58 GiB · Act: 2.36 GiB
Recommended GPU: 2x B200 180GB (360GB)

Engineering Sizing Notes & Optimization Playbook

Quick Hardware Verdict

DCU K100-AI 64GB (海光深算) (64GB physical, 60.8 GiB usable) runs 4-bit (Q4_K_M) Qwen3.5 35B-A3B at 8K context using 21.28 GiB with 39.52 GiB of safe headroom (~225.8 tok/s single-stream decode).

KV Cache & Runtime Tuning

Qwen3.5 35B-A3B uses Hybrid Linear/Mamba + MoE (35.95B total, 3B active per token). Moving from 8K to 32K context expands FP16 KV cache from 0.22 GiB to 0.69 GiB; enabling 8-bit KV cache (llama.cpp -ctk q8_0 -ctv q8_0 or vLLM --kv-cache-dtype fp8) saves 0.32 GiB at 32K (reducing total VRAM to 21.43 GiB).

VRAM Scaling Across Context Windows (4K to 128K, 4-bit Weights)

Qwen3.5 35B-A3B VRAM scaling from 4K to 128K context (4K: 21.19 GiB, 8K: 21.28 GiB, 32K: 21.75 GiB, 128K: 23.62 GiB) 4K 21.19 GiB (KV 0.14 GiB) 8K 21.28 GiB (KV 0.22 GiB) 32K 21.75 GiB (KV 0.69 GiB) 128K 23.62 GiB (KV 2.56 GiB) DCU K100-AI 64GB (海光深算) (64GB)
Model weights remain constant while attention KV cache grows with context length and batch size.

Quantization Precision & Memory Matrix — Qwen3.5 35B-A3B @ 8K

Quantization Format Weights (GiB) KV Cache Total VRAM (GiB) Decode Speed Compatibility (DCU K100-AI 64GB (海光深算)) Recommended GPU Data Source
Native Weights (BF16 / FP8 / MXFP4 — Lossless) (BF16) 66.96 GiB 0.22 GiB 67.74 GiB (72.74 GB) ~64.2 tok/s Exceeds Available GPU Memory RTX PRO 6000 Blackwell (96GB) Official checkpoint size
FP8 / GGUF Q8_0 (8-bit — Near-Lossless) (Q8_0) 35.57 GiB 0.22 GiB 36.35 GiB (39.03 GB) ~166.2 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom A40 48GB (48GB) Config-derived formula
GGUF Q6_K (6-bit — High Precision) (Q6_K) 27.45 GiB 0.22 GiB 28.23 GiB (30.31 GB) ~193.8 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom Radeon AI PRO R9700 32GB (32GB) Config-derived formula
GGUF Q5_K_M (5-bit — Balanced) (Q5_K_M) 23.92 GiB 0.22 GiB 24.7 GiB (26.52 GB) ~208.8 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom Radeon AI PRO R9700 32GB (32GB) Config-derived formula
Q4_K_M / UD-Q4_K_XL / AWQ (4-bit — Recommended) (Q4_K_M) 20.5 GiB 0.22 GiB 21.28 GiB (22.85 GB) ~225.8 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom Arc Pro B60 24GB (24GB) Config-derived formula
GGUF IQ4_XS (4.25-bit — Compact) (IQ4_XS) 17.93 GiB 0.22 GiB 18.71 GiB (20.09 GB) ~240.5 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom Arc Pro B60 24GB (24GB) Config-derived formula
GGUF Q3_K_M (3-bit — Low VRAM) (Q3_K_M) 16.49 GiB 0.22 GiB 17.27 GiB (18.54 GB) ~249.6 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom Arc Pro B60 24GB (24GB) Config-derived formula
GGUF UD-Q2_K_XL (2-bit — Extreme MoE) (UD-Q2_K_XL) 11.72 GiB 0.22 GiB 12.5 GiB (13.42 GB) ~285.4 tok/s Fits with Safe Headroom RTX 4060 Ti 16GB (16GB) Config-derived formula

Technical Specifications & FAQ

Does Qwen3.5 35B-A3B fit on DCU K100-AI 64GB (海光深算) (64GB)?

In 4-bit (Q4_K_M) at 8,192 context, Qwen3.5 35B-A3B requires 21.28 GiB total GPU memory (20.5 GiB weights + 0.22 GiB KV cache + 0.56 GiB runtime buffers) against 60.8 GiB usable on DCU K100-AI 64GB (海光深算), delivering ~225.8 tok/s decode.

How much VRAM does Qwen3.5 35B-A3B need at 32K context?

At 32,768 context tokens, Qwen3.5 35B-A3B (Hybrid Linear/Mamba + MoE) allocates 0.69 GiB for KV cache and state, bringing total 4-bit VRAM to 21.75 GiB (23.35 GB decimal).

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