Bladewatch.com

http://www.dell.co.uk

BRACKNELL, UK, April 14, 2011 – Small and medium businesses today are deluged with data that is overwhelming their existing technology infrastructures.  To help these growing businesses thrive in the “Virtual Era” where multi-media content, multiple access points and devices are the norm, Dell today introduced new server, storage and networking offerings.

First Server —Dell’s PowerEdge T110 II and R210 II

Dell today introduced a guide to servers made easy – a roadmap for entrepreneurs as they contemplate purchasing either their first server or expanding their IT infrastructure with new servers.  In addition to online resources, Dell is introducing refreshed value servers with the right balance of performance, flexible features and business value to meet the needs of small to midsized businesses and branch offices – the entry-level PowerEdge T110 II and mid-level PowerEdge R210 II.

Both have the performance and features to run business applications that facilitate data coordination and sharing, protection, management and scalability to support business growth with features such as choice of processors to meet performance needs with new Intel® Xeon® processor E3-1200 product family, the Intel® Core™ i3-2100 product family and Intel® Pentium® processors, 4 DIMM slots with enough memory to handle common applications and the full Dell OpenManage suite of systems management for ease of maintenance.

Storage Within Reach – The PowerVault NX3500 / MD3600i

According to IDC, the capacity of storage systems shipped in the fourth quarter of 2010 grew more than 55 percent from a year earlier with demand for bytes growing even during the recession.¹ With this data explosion in mind, Dell today unveiled two new storage offerings that help customers reduce complexity and increase the availability of their data to help their businesses run smarter.

The PowerVault NX3500, featuring the Dell Scalable File System, provides affordable scale-up Network Attached Storage (NAS) functionality for smaller scale, high availability deployments. The system works with PowerVault MD32x0i and MD36x0i storage arrays to help provide affordable unified storage with iSCSI, CIFS and NFS access to block and file data. With no architectural limits to file-system size, it is designed to give customers more flexibility than traditional unified storage. Integrating next-generation high performance, highly optimized file system technology from Exanet, Dell Scalable File System, delivers the first unified storage solution in Dell’s PowerVault iSCSI storage array product series. The NX3500 also offers affordable data protection features, including snapshots, replication and NDMP backup support.

The PowerVault MD3600i is an Ethernet-based (10GbE) storage device that is designed to deliver exceptional storage capacity to small and midsize businesses without sacrificing performance or flexibility. With an intuitive multi-generational management interface the MD3600i can be installed in under 30 minutes. Growing businesses with limited technical and financial resources can keep up with data growth, Web and media demands while reducing server sprawl by virtualizing infrastructure applications. The system also provides medium-sized businesses with remote offices a cost-effective way to support virtualized infrastructures leveraging 10GbE Ethernet to improve limited or slow data migration between home and remote office locations. Lastly, the MD3600i continues to maintain the uncompromising value of being able to share common components with our PowerEdge server line (i.e. hard drives) expediting installation and deployments for our SMB customers.

Networking

To help supplement Dell’s new server and storage offerings, the company recently launched new 5500 and 7000 PowerConnect switch families to enable technology infrastructures where scalability, flexibility and value are key requirements. Both families implement innovative technology features to streamline deployment, simplify management and help reduce operating costs with power-saving Energy Efficient Ethernet (IEEE 802.3az) design and Power-over-Ethernet operation.

The PowerConnect 7000 family is designed to deliver scalable performance and enhanced functionality for midsized business deployments, distributed offices and large server farms. Businesses benefit from high availability wire-speed performance and simplified management of multiple switches with a single IP address, enabling them to power business applications while maintaining flexibility and control of the network. The 7000 series delivers the connectivity to support the new PowerEdge R210 servers in addition to seamless, automated provisioning and iSCSI operation with Dell’s EqualLogic storage arrays.

The PowerConnect 5500 series enables a superb solution to basic, non-managed Gigabit Ethernet switches deployed in small-to-medium offices and remote locations, which require rapid wire-speed deployment with flexible features. Efficient energy operation and simplified switch configuration can reduce operating costs while providing customers cost-effective performance they need to scale with their growing business needs.

Anything the vendors can do to improve the accessibility to platforms such as virtualization or the ability to deploy new technologies to empower their business has to be a good thing. Making the technology more accessible not only in terms of finance but in operations, in management and support remains key to on boarding new customers, not only for businesses themselves but the vendor and their eco-systems alike, the service providers and partners. The more we on board the small businesses, the more range of opportunities for revenue generation we create, the more different end user requirements we come across remembering that an issue affecting one small business could equally be of value to the next enterprise we encounter albeit in possibly a different footprint or package. Great news from Dell, I’m off to read up more, particularly about their storage and networking solutions as well as their servers.

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http://www.thegreengrid.org/ or

London, 05 April 2011 – The Green Grid has given its endorsement to the Green Award for Sustainability in Data Centres, to be presented at the annual Data Centres in Europe Awards which takes place on June 2nd in London (www.datacentres.com/awards2011).

Now in its fourth year, the Awards ceremony and dinner provides another exceptional platform for the data centre industry which is expanding exponentially across locations in Europe, eastern and central Europe. In 2011, the European awards will again provide new benchmarks of aspiration for the companies nominated, and world class recognition for winners.

Winners achieve significant marketing differentiation and credibility because of the independence of the panel of Judges, robust scrutiny of awards nominations, and their relevance to today’s changing conditions in a continually evolving market.

Mark Munroe, the Green Grid’s Executive Director will present the Award on 2nd June. In 2011, the European awards ceremony will be held this year in London, and will offer an international event to celebrate the technical and commercial success of the data centre industry in Europe in the following award categories:

• New Data Centre Award 2011
• Enterprise Data Centre Award 2011
• Colocation Award 2011
• Wholesale Data Centre Award 2011
• Facilities Management for Data Centres Award 2011
• Cloud Services Award 2011 Managed Services Award 2011
• The Green Grid Award for Sustainability European Award for Energy Efficiency in Data Centres
• Data Centre Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2011
• The Data Centre Award for Change and Innovation 2011

“Efficiency in data centres is now a critical requirement for all businesses. However, the Green Grid also considers resource efficiency and increasing the sustainability of natural resources in developing enterprise infrastructure as a wider objective. In endorsing the Green Award for Sustainability at this year’s Data Centres in Europe Awards, we hope to encourage companies to aspire to achieve these exemplary goals.”

These award events are interesting in the respect that its great to hear which vendors or service providers are gaining recognition or award and for what, whether its in specific areas, how they are making achievements in efficiency and continuing to keep the lights on so to speak. Keeping that balance of energy efficiency with business empowerment remains a challenge for many either directly for the IT teams managing data center capacity with business needs, the facilities teams managing power distribution and load, or the corporate social responsibilities teams trying to illustrate, document and manage the corporate message within this space. The more we discuss the challenges, the more we discuss opportunities for savings for better work practices or a new way of thinking.

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http://www.hp.com/hpinfo/newsroom/press/2011/110411a.html

HP today announced the HP ePrint service App for iPhone is now available on the App Store.

Now millions of iPhone users can search for and download the app to unlock the power of the HP ePrint Enterprise solution on their device. The HP ePrint Enterprise solution allows users to print within their enterprise network via an HP Managed Print Services engagement, and users can also download the HP ePrint service App to print at thousands of HP ePrint Mobile Print Locations worldwide, including FedEx Office® and Hilton Worldwide.⁽¹⁾

“By 2014, 90 percent of global Fortune 1000 companies will implement cloud printing services for mobile personnel,⁽²⁾ showing what HP has known for years – mobility is not a trend, it’s a way of life,” said Bruce Dahlgren, senior vice president, Managed Enterprise Solutions, Imaging and Printing Group, HP. “We are committed to anticipating our customer needs and delivering innovative solutions like HP ePrint Enterprise for our enterprise customers that need simple, secure mobile access to printing.”

This is very cool, anything we can do to join up the dots, free users to support a range of devices whilst keeping them within the corporate framework for compliance and security has to be good news, I wonder what will be coming up next on the horizon.

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http://content.dell.com/us/en/corp/d/press-releases/2011-04-05-dell-westmere.aspx

• Latest PowerEdge servers are among the company’s highest performing systems, and ideal for customers considering RISC and UNIX migration
• Dell achieves highest 4-socket rack server market share in 10 years this quarter with 22 percent in Q4 2010, according to IDC¹

Dell today introduced refreshed PowerEdge systems with substantially increased performance, integrated security and resiliency to tackle the toughest computing environments while easing the migration from proprietary UNIX deployments.

“Dell’s refresh of the higher-end of its PowerEdge portfolio is a solid strategy considering IDC research shows customers are looking to migrate more of their business critical applications to x86 servers,” said Jed Scaramella, research manager for IDC’s Enterprise Platforms and Datacenter Trends. “The increased capacity and performance of these systems enable users to do more at an economical price. The ability to tackle some of the higher-end workloads in the data center will entice IT managers to consider wider adoption of x86 within their environment.”

In the fourth quarter last year, Dell picked up significant market share in the four socket x86 rack server space, according to IDC. In part, this can be attributed to Dell’s time to market with the latest technology. By providing IT platforms that can help accelerate virtualization, enable greater IT consolidation while supporting mission-critical business and database applications, Dell is driving x86 server customer adoption.

There has been a lot of talk amongst colleagues who are migrating their high end unix platforms in some scenarios to more linux based platforms running on x86 partly due to cost and to ease of support through reducing the range and number of hardware platforms. Anything the vendors can do to help end user choice and create opportunities for new solutions has to be a good thing, I’m off to read up more.

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http://www.zdnet.com/blog/btl/cloud-computing-dominates-data-center-agenda-says-survey/46749

Cloud computing adoption among data center managers has snowballed in the last year with more than 70 percent of respondents who have implemented the technology or seriously considering it, according to a survey by AFCOM, a data center association.

I saw this whilst reading some articles on zdnet and it’s an interesting read, I did wonder though what people were meaning when they responded positively regarding cloud computing, and what solutions or services that they are considering, where the trends are for example in virtualization, grid computing or in email/file and backup solutions. Cloud continues to mean different things to different people despite the efforts made to rationalize it and put it into context, with all the buzz going around we need to both improve end user understanding of the possibilities as well as the what end users need to think about and ask when considering a cloud solution – 99.999% uptime on tier 1 storage with replication, or is it an email system that works all the time but at least has redundancy so when something goes on its holiday my corporate email still stays available and online to the outside world.

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I’ve put together some pictures of the HP Proliant DL385 G1 servers that we have in the lab.  The DL385 G1 was the first generation of servers built on the AMD processor and chip set and was similar in terms of design and form factor to the DL380 G4. Key points to note, it was supplied with ILO and a Smart Array 6i (SCSI drives) on board or the Smart P600 (SAS small form factor drives), it was a dual socket system, memory has to be paired with each processor.

The specifications are here.

The photographs we took are here.

The drivers/software pages are here.

The pictures include a screenshot of the welcome to SmartStart screen as well as the POST messages displayed after having run the System Erase utility which resets the NVRAM and disk configuration, returning the server to factory defaults.

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http://www.theengineer.co.uk/sectors/electronics/news/grid-computing-helps-visualise-motion-of-seismic-events/1008044.article

Researchers in Taiwan are planning to use grid computing to visualise the motion of earthquakes after they occur. They hope this will cut the time of creating ’shake movies’ from a few hours to just minutes, providing valuable information to rescuers once an earthquake has occurred.

As animations that show the ground motion of seismic events, shake movies provide information as to where the strongest shaking has occurred, helping to ensure rescue efforts and resources are directed to where they are most needed.

An interesting article illustrating the possibilities of hpc or grid computing, it’s always great to see how technology is enriching lives or creating new opportunities, do check it out.

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I’ve posted pictures of the HP MicroServer and Fujitsu Primergy MX130 S1, as ever they’re rather raw but then that’s because they’ve been taken with our iPhone in the office so you can see what you actually get when they arrive if you were to order one.

The feed for pictures of Marjorie the HP MicroServer

The feed for pictures of Bernard the Fujitsu Primergy MX130 S1

Before we get to analytical, both servers are geared at either the technical end user looking for their first server to play with for VMware or testing, as well as the small business that might decide it’s time to get their first server for running a few applications, storing files or possibly VMware. With this in mind our testing is going to be aimed more to the end user than benchmarking/possibilities and limitations.

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http://content.dell.com/us/en/corp/d/press-releases/2011-04-07-dell-invests-solutions-services.aspx

• Dell to build multiple next generation cloud data centers that operate and deliver hyperscale efficiency
• New data centers to provide the foundation for next generation services and solutions from Dell Global Solution Centers help customers architect, validate and build the Efficient Enterprise – from the data center to the edge of the network
• New open, capable and affordable solutions for data center virtualization, data management and desktop virtualization

Dell today announced it is increasing its investments in new technology solutions and services that will help customers innovate and drive business results in the Virtual Era. In its current fiscal year, Dell will invest $1 billion (USD) to deliver leading solutions, services and cloud-based delivery options to help customers capture the benefits from new compute and information delivery advancements.

“Technology advances, delivery methods and the move to disruptive IT models like cloud are changing the fundamental way businesses operate,” said Steve Schuckenbrock, President, Dell Services. “With this transformational shift, businesses are gaining benefits in terms of speed to market and organizational and compute flexibility. Dell is mobilizing to help customers capture these benefits and with today’s announcement is making the power of the cloud accessible to more organizations and users. Dell has made and will continue to make significant investments to deliver technology that helps customers thrive in the Virtual Era.”

Anything the vendors can do to continue innovation of the platform, improve the accessibility of IT products and services to the end user community, or to research new ways of doing things, new best practices and standards has to be good news. That they are placing the focus on data center virtualization, management and desktop virtualization illustrate the demands and interest of solving issues and delivering new products and services in the virtualization and Efficient Enterprise space, very exciting, I’m off to read up more.

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The specs for the Fujitsu Primergy MX130 are here, it’s an entry level server and I would best describe it as a server in a desktop chassis making the transition from a desktop where you might keep all your files to a server in a familiar footprint in either tower or desktop format. Features include onboard RAID, features a dual core AMD processor, supports 16GB of RAM, and features their 85% energy efficient power supply.

The server in base configuration retails at £129 + VAT and delivery.

What’s in the box?

The server and a configuration box containing:

• Power cable
• USB Keyboard
• Driver CD and manuals

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