Power cuts from IBM with Xeon 5500

April 3, 2009:IBM has joined with major system vendors in unveiling systems based on the new Intel Xeon 5500 series processors, promising easier virtualised computing and significantly reduce growing operating costs.

IBM's four new x86 rack servers and blades feature optimised designs that offer lower wattage requirements that are claimed to potentially cut energy costs up to 93 percent.

At the same time, the new System x servers boast double the compute performance in some models, and support more memory, storage and I/O with 96GB to 1TB memory options.

IBM has also announced new management software to complement Systems Director 6.1, which enables automatic management of virtual and physical assets across platforms.

The two-socket IBM BladeCenter HS22 offers three times as much memory as its predecessor, and IBM promises an 11-to-1 consolidation ratio migrating older rack and blade servers onto HS22 blades, while saving over 93 percent in energy costs alone. Two hot-swap internal storage bays offer a choice of SAS, SATA, or solid state options.

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