Sun is introducing the third-generation CMT SPARC Enterprise T5140 and T5240 servers based on the UltraSPARC T2 Plus processor, which offers up to eight-cores and 64 threads like previous releases, but is compatible with multi-socket servers such as the two-socket T5140 and T5240 servers. The two UltraSPARC chips means users can access a total of 128 instructional threads and up to 16 processing cores within each machine.

These new SPARC Enterprise servers deliver up to 16 times higher compute density than competitive two-socket x86 systems and up to 32 times higher compute density than competitive four-socket x86 systems, Sun reports.

According to The Register\'s Ashlee Vance who reported on this release last month, the T5140 is available with four-, six- and eight-core versions of the 1.2GHz UltraSPARC T2 Plus chip. Memory support ranges from 8GB up to 64GB, and Sun will ship the systems with a pair of 146GB disks. Prices start at $14,995 for a four-core unit.

The T5240 will be available with six-core chips and eight-core chips, Vance notes. The 2U systems can hold up to eight disks, although Sun will ship two of the 146GB disks as standard. The low-end model with 8GB of memory starts at approximately $17,995.

Taking into account the Solaris Operating System's (Solaris OS) virtualization technologies like Solaris Containers and Logical Domains (LDoms) and the 128 virtual servers per system, customers can deploy 5,120 isolated domains per rack. Additionally, Sun announced new offerings providing virtualization services to run Solaris 8 and Solaris 9 applications to enable the simple transfer of applications to the latest CMT systems running the Solaris 10 OS. With these new products, Solaris 8 and 9 Containers for the Solaris 10 OS, multiple Solaris 8 or Solaris 9 environments, or a combination of the two, can be hosted on a single SPARC-based system. For customers, this means that moving to the latest hardware is now de-coupled from the need to move directly to the Solaris 10 OS.

Performance

Sun also claims these new servers are setting the pace with breakthrough performance and beating the competition in performance, price/performance and power and space utilization on business-critical and compute-intensive workloads.

"The performance and scalability we've designed into these new multi-socket systems with the UltraSPARC T2 Plus and Solaris is jaw dropping," said John Fowler, executive vice president, Systems Group, Sun. "In just two-and-a-half years we've increased CMT performance by over 5x without sacrificing space or power efficiency. Customers can now scale more with less whether they're developing Web 2.0 services or running classic CRM or ERP."

Additional details and a complete list of all CMT benchmarks are available here.

Special Offer

Customers interested in upgrading to the Sun SPARC Enterprise T5140/5240 servers can test drive the new servers in a free 60-day trial through Sun\'s Try and Buy program.

Additionally, customers can take advantage of a Sun special offer and receive a 30 percent trade-in allowance toward the purchase of Sun SPARC Enterprise T5140 and T5240 servers when trading in select IBM, HP or Sun systems.

More Information

Get more information on the SPARC Enterprise T5140 and T5240 servers. Also take a look inside these servers via a virtual tour and get the developer's perspective in a video hosted on the Sun Website. Sun also has posted a web event of the launch, which includes an introduction video presented by Fowler, a replay of a Second Life technical chat on the new SPARC Enterprise servers and CMT technology, plus much more.

Future Releases

Fowler said Sun plans on offering a two-socket blade server later this year, and a four-socket system that will offer up to 256 compute threads. [...read more...]

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