If you’re looking for the big news in IT, this should catch your attention: The biggest Intel server in the world just got bigger.
The HP Integrity Superdome X sets a new standard for server power, featuring 16 sockets and 12 terabytes of memory. But big is only half the story. The new Superdome X is also designed to help IT departments get lean by reducing software license costs and expanding beyond its traditional UNIX base to embrace Linux, Microsoft, and VMware.
Here’s the skinny on HP’s new IT titan:
- It brings the Superdome’s legendary reliability to Linux shops, as in 20X more reliable, with 60% less downtime and 95% fewer memory outages than other x86 server platforms
- It consolidates more power in a smaller footprint and consumes 32% less energy than comparable large-scale systems
- It’s 4X faster than the leading x86 platforms
- It’s certified on Microsoft Windows 2012 and VMware vSphere 5.5 environments as well
The Superdome X arrives in time to help enterprises with one of their biggest challenges, big data. The Superdome’s massive memory allows enterprises to move an entire database into memory storage, which is ideal for SAP HANA environments. HP even offers a version of the Superdome configured specifically for HANA, the ConvergedSystem 900.
The Superdome X also does a super job of consolidating costs in the data center. Database software licenses take a big bite out of most IT budgets. Superdome X helps enterprises reduce those costs through a unique partitioning scheme that allows them to configure the number of sockets and cores in their system—which can save millions of dollars in a market where database software is often priced out per core.
The new Linux support promises to drive down IT costs further and make system management easier, but that’s only the beginning for the Superdome X. HP recently announced that the Superdome X is now certified to run Microsoft Windows Server 2012 and VMware vSphere 5.5. For Microsoft SQL shops and virtualized machine environments, the Superdome X has the potential to be a game-changer in terms of processing power and efficiency.
Bringing the Superdome X into your data center isn’t something to be taken lightly, of course. We recommend that enterprises do an IT assessment first to ensure they have the storage, networking, and backup to support the Superdome. If you’re looking for a partner to plan, design, and manage your Superdome, we’ve got some super-smart people at Rolta AdvizeX who can help you with that. ▪