System News for Sun Users

Sun Fire Servers 3D Demos

2011-07-18T16:00:00+01:00

3d demos of the Sun Fire X4800, Sun Fire X4470 M2, Sun Fire X4170 M2 and the Sun Fire X2270 M2 are available.

Sun Blade 6000 Interactive 3D Demo

2011-07-11T16:00:00+01:00

A three dimensional fly-by demo of the Sun Blade 6000 chassis is available. The demo shows Oracle's flexible, eco-efficient Sun Blade 6000 chassis that integrates Oracle's x86 and SPARC server blade modules with high-capacity networking and storage blades to support a wide range of application environments.

Sun Fire X4470 M2 Server: Best Virtualization Server for Business Apps

2011-06-23T16:00:00+01:00

Oracle calls its Sun Fire X4470 M2 Server the "best virtualization server for business applications," especially as a consolidation platform for mixed workloads. The Sun Fire X4470 M2 offers a 35% lower TCO than comparable four-socket HP or IBM systems which, incidentally, it has beaten in standard industry benchmarks. The Sun Fire X4470 M2, that can be consistently and efficiently managed with Oracle Integrated Lights Out Manager, delivers superior performance and lower power consumption with its integrated Sun FlashFire technology and up to 1 TB of low voltage memory. The key specifications of the Sun Fire X4470 M2 Server include:

Two or four Intel Xeon processor E7-4800 processors
Up to 64 DIMMs with a maximum memory of 1 TB
Up to six 2.5" disk drive bays for HDDs or SSDs
Up to four Sun Flash Accelerator F20 PCIe cards
Hot-swappable disks, cooling fans, and power supply units
Optimized to run Oracle Solaris, Oracle Linux, and Oracle VM

This server is also certified to run Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SUSE Linux Enterprise, Windows Server, and VMware.

Oracle Linux 6.1 With Both 32 and 64 Bit Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel

2011-06-08T16:00:00+01:00

With the release of Oracle Linux 6.1 users can enjoy the benefits of improved IRQ balancing; reduced lock contention across the kernel (improves performance on large NUMA systems); improved network I/O via receive packet steering and RDS improvements; and improved virtual memory performance. In addition to these improvements, uses will discover numerous driver updates and both a 32 bit and a 64 bit Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel. As was the case with the previous release, the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel (kernel-uek-2.6.32-100.34.1.el6uek) is installed and enabled by default. If you prefer to maintain full kABI compatibility, the Red Hat compatible Kernel (kernel-2.6.32-131.0.15.el6) is installed as well and can be selected manually at boot up time or by changing the default in the GRUB configuration file.

Oracle Linux 6.1 With Both 32 and 64 Bit Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel

2011-06-03T16:00:00+01:00

IDC Finds Growth in Demand for Unix Servers

2011-05-26T16:00:00+01:00

Demand for high-end non-x86 servers during the first quarter helped HP and IBM to retain their position as first and second in server revenue, respectively, as determined by an IDC survey and reported by Jeffrey Burt writing in eWeek. Burt writes that, for Unix servers, Q1 was the first in the past 11 quarters to show year-on-year revenue growth, which increased 12.5 percent over the same period last year. IBM, HP and Oracle all showed improvement in their Unix server revenue numbers. Worldwide Unix revenues grew to $2.6 billion, which represented 21.8 percent of all quarterly server revenue, Burt reports. He notes also that revenue for IBM's System z servers running z/OS grew for the third consecutive quarter, increasing 41.1 percent over the first quarter in 2010, to $1 billion, which represents 8.8 percent of overall server revenue.

Reducing Costs Through Better Server Utilization

2011-04-25T16:00:00+01:00

"Reducing Costs Through Better Server Utilization," an Oracle white paper, explains how customers can use innovative virtualization and consolidation technologies from Oracle to create substantial savings on their investments in Sun servers from Oracle. As the paper points out, consolidating systems onto the latest server technology and taking advantage of virtualization techniques, enterprises leads to optimized datacenter efficiency, produces gains in flexibility, and reduces operating costs'without sacrificing performance or impacting service levels. Companies seeking lower energy costs and improved ROI need to give serious consideration to Oracle's integrated offerings that comprise Oracle's Sun servers running Oracle Solaris 10.

High Availability for Business-Critical IT Services Using Oracle�s SPARC Enterprise M-Series Servers

2011-04-21T16:00:00+01:00

The Oracle white paper "High Availability for Business-Critical IT Services Using Oracle's SPARC Enterprise M-Series Servers" introduces readers to the benefits of adopting the integrated systems from Oracle that deliver a a comprehensive approach to availability, organizations also gain many business benefits, including increased revenue opportunities, lower costs, greater flexibility to respond to changing business conditions, and better ROI. Delivering the highest level of speedy availability to mission-critical applications is the aim of Oracle's SPARC Enterprise M-Series.

Enhanced M3000 Server with SPARC64 VII+ Processor

2011-04-15T16:00:00+01:00

Already a top performer in the Oracle server line, the enhanced SPARC Enterprise M3000 Server with the SPARC64 VII+ processor, developed on Fujitsu's mission-critical computing technology in partnership with Oracle, now delivers up to 20 percent better performance than the previous generation SPARC64 processor. Equally impressive is that the enhanced SPARC Enterprise M3000 Server delivers this increased rate of performance with up to 37 less power consumption than similarly equipped HP and IBM servers. The M3000's internal Solid State Drives (SSD) enable the server, running Oracle Database 11g, Release 2 to take advantage of the Oracle Database Smart Flash Cache feature to increase I/O throughput and optimize system performance, Oracle's press release reports.

Three New Validated Oracle Linux Configurations

2011-04-05T16:00:00+01:00

Three new Oracle Validated Configurations are now available to enable Oracle Linux customers to quickly deploy a modern, reliable, and optimized corporate IT infrastructure using enterprise hardware and software based on Oracle Linux with Oracle's Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel. The new configurations consist of Oracle Linux 5 with the Unbreakable Enterprise Kernel, Oracle Database 11g, Oracle RAC, Sun ZFS Storage 7420 appliance. One of the following is also part of the configuration:

Sun Fire X4800 server
Sun Fire X4470 server
Sun Fire X4270 M2 server

Validated Configurations enable easier, faster, and lower-cost deployment of Oracle Linux and Oracle VM solutions in the enterprise by offering best practices via pre-tested, validated architectures that help improve the reliability of solutions.

Datacenter Transformation with Oracle�s Blade and x86 Servers: Webcast

2011-03-01T17:00:00+01:00

In an hour long webcast entitled Redefine What's Possible in Your Datacenter (log-in and registration required) Oracle's Director of Sun x86 Servers and Sun Blade Modular Systems Kate Islas explains how users can achieve maximum performance while reducing costs by switching to Oracle's x86 clustered systems, which are based on the new Intel Xeon processor 5600 and 7500 series. Islas points out how these solutions, designed to work together from application to disk, and which hold numerous world record performance benchmarks, can provide powerful visibility and intuitive systems management across an entire stack.

Oracle Exadata Database Machine 3-D Tours

2011-02-25T17:00:00+01:00

The Oracle Exadata Database Machine is the only database machine that provides extreme performance for both data warehousing and online transaction processing (OLTP) applications, making it the ideal platform for consolidating onto grids or private clouds. It is a complete package of servers, storage, networking, and software that is massively scalable, secure, and redundant. With Oracle Exadata Database Machine, customers can reduce IT costs through consolidation, manage more data on multiple compression tiers, improve performance of all applications, and make better business decisions in real time.

Use the interactive tool to explore these systems.

Sun Fire x86 Clustered Systems: New Performance Records; Lower TCO

2011-02-17T17:00:00+01:00

With the newly announced Sun Fire x86 Clustered Systems customers can avail themselves of solutions that have recently garnered five world records. Oracle's virtualized x86 systems with Oracle Linux and Oracle VM have delivered up to 48 percent better TCO than HP with Red Hat Enterprise Linux and VMware over a three-year period, Oracle reports. It is further to users' benefit that the clustered Sun Fire x86 solutions can be managed and supported as a single system with Oracle Enterprise Manager 11g.

An Offer You Cannot Refuse: Cash for Clunkers

2011-02-09T17:00:00+01:00

Enterprises running their apps on the tired, old HP Superdome now have an attractive offer that Oracle calls its "Cash for Clunkers" program, which offers customers a 50% discount on the Oracle Sun SPARC Enterprise M8000 and M89000 server series. The particulars of the deal are:

Trade in any HP Superdome server to receive 50% off the list price of all Sun SPARC Enterprise M8000 or M9000 server and eligible installed server options.

Offer good until May 31, 2011. Quotes with 50% discount generated prior to May 31, 2011 valid to the extent specified in quote terms and conditions.

Oracle sales representatives and Oracle partners have the complete details on this trade-in offer.

The Importance of the 0.5 Core Factor for the SPARC64 VII+

2011-01-06T17:00:00+01:00

Joerg Moellenkamp's blogs are becoming the locus of dispute, which makes for interesting reading. In one of his most recent "The importance of the 0.5 core factor for the SPARC64 VII+" he questions the practice of using rperf to extrapolate TPC-H performance. He contends that rperf really gives IBM's Power 7 an undeserved benefit of the doubt. His complicated argument results in the conclusion that SPARC64 is legitimately competitive with Power7 in spite of the edge IBM gets from the rperf calculation. Some of his readers disagree, however.

Accelerate Deployment of Virtual Infrastructure

2011-01-03T17:00:00+01:00

Oracle has released its new Oracle VM blade cluster reference configuration for Sun Blade 6000 modular systems, writes Monica Kumar in Oracle's Virtualization Blog, which provides high availability via the blade cluster as well as a documented best practice guide. The guide helps reduce deployment time required in assembling and integrating software and hardware systems from multiple vendors by up to 98 percent while reducing cost as well for customers implementing highly virtualized applications or private cloud Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS) architectures. Once ready, according to the Oracle press release, the infrastructure can be used to easily deploy enterprise applications in a matter of minutes to hours as opposed to days/weeks, by using Oracle VM Templates.

Oracle VM Blade Cluster Reference Configuration

2010-12-28T17:00:00+01:00

A recent Oracle InfraRed posting announced the single-vendor Oracle VM blade cluster reference configuration solution for Sun Blade 6000 modular systems. This new cluster reference configuration helps users reduce deployment time by up to 98 percent over deployments using multi-vendor configurations. In addition to the faster time to value and reduced deployment cost and risk users can derive from this reference configuration, elastic scalability is also a valuable benefit. Oracle has tested all the components in the reference configuration, which means users will not have to submit their

Sun Blade X6275 M2 Server Module: Oracle's Highest Compute Density Solution

2010-12-22T17:00:00+01:00

Oracle's diskless, dual-node Sun Blade X6275 M2 Server Module with up to 24 cores, is Oracle's highest compute density blade server and, as such, is ideally suited for cloud computing and virtualized environments. The hot-swappable Sun Blade X6275 server modules and Oracle VM, in combination with the Sun Blade 6000 chassis, deliver an elastic scalability solution capable of the rapid deployment and equally rapid scalability required in private clouds. Furthermore, the blade's high IOPS, low voltage Sun Flash modules enable savings in power and cooling costs. Yet another valuable benefit of combining the X6275 with the Sun Blade 6000 Ethernet Switched Network Express Module 24p 10GbE is that this overcomes potential network bottlenecks and reduces networking costs by eliminating an entire tier of datacenter switching and reducing cabling by 4:1.

SPARC T3-1B Server

2010-12-21T17:00:00+01:00

Learn about Oracle's new server lines and storage solutions in an on-demand webcast with EVP for Server and Storage Systems John Fowler. He discusses Oracle's new 16-core processor and the new SPARC T3 server systems, along with the Sun ZFS Storage Appliance product line and Oracle's optimized-solution applications-to-disk approach to IT.

InformationWeek Writer Sees Little Reason for Anxiety in Oracle's Executive Suite

2010-12-11T17:00:00+01:00

The slippage in Oracle's placings in the Gartner surveys of server sales volume is not necessarily cause for alarm, writes Alexander Wolfe in InformationWeek. His reasoning is that this slippage is merely the logical result of Oracle's corporate focus on optimized rather than commoditized solutions.

SPARC Solaris-Based Exalogic Elastic Cloud System

2010-12-02T17:00:00+01:00

The Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud T3-1B combines SPARC servers running Oracle Solaris 11 Express with InfiniBand-based I/O fabric, the market-leading Oracle WebLogic Server and other enterprise Java-based Oracle middleware products to bring industry-leading performance, scalability and availability of SPARC Solaris servers to users of the Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud engineered systems.

Oracle Exalogic Elastic Cloud hardware models, including the previously announced X2-2 and the new T3-1B, are engineered systems that are assembled, tested and tuned to dramatically reduce the time from machine delivery to fully operational application deployment.

SPARC Supercluster

2010-12-02T17:00:00+01:00

Oracle's SPARC Supercluster, based on SPARC T3 and M5000 servers, is a complete infrastructure solution for running Oracle database RAC environments. The SPARC Supercluster solution utilizes new SPARC servers, FlashFire, InfiniBand QDR, Oracle Solaris, and the ZFS Storage Appliance -- the technology that made it possible for Oracle to set the new TPC-C world record, The Oracle SPARC Supercluster will be available in 2011 in T3-2, T3-4 and M5000-based configurations, all of which will include SPARC T3 or M5000 servers, Sun ZFS Storage 7420 servers, and Sun Network ZFS InfiniBand Gateway Switches.

Sun Blade 6000 Modular Systems from Oracle: White Paper

2010-11-24T17:00:00+01:00

Oracle's innovative technology and open-systems approach make modular systems -- and the Sun Blade 6000 Modular Systems in particular -- attractive across a broad set of applications and activities from consolidating infrastructure through virtualization to deploying dynamic enterprise applications or cloud computing, asserts the Oracle white paper "Sun Blade 6000 Modular Systems from Oracle." Sun Blade 6000 Modular Systems from Oracle provide open modular architectures that deliver on the promises of blades without compromising features or functions, the 56-page white paper continues. The Sun Blade 6000 Modular Systems present a comprehensive multitier blade portfolio that organizations can use to deploy the broadest range of applications on the most ideal platforms, such as Oracle Linux, Oracle Solaris and Oracle VM. They are also certified, according to the white paper, to run Red Hat Enterprise Linux, SuSE Linux Enterprise Server, Windows Server and VMware. Optimized for performance, efficiency, and density, these solutions take an open systems approach that employs the latest processors, operating systems, industry-standard PCIe I/O modules, expandable storage, transparent networking, and consolidated management. With a choice of server modules based on the latest Oracle SPARC and Intel Xeon processors, organizations can select the platforms that best match their applications or existing infrastructure, without worrying about vendor lock-in.

Sun Blade X6275 M2 Server Module

2010-11-19T17:00:00+01:00

The Sun Blade X6275 M2 server features enterprise-class RAS features for mission-critical application environments. The diskless Sun Blade X6275 M2 leverages the high availability and shared resource infrastructure of the Sun Blade 6000 chassis while also supporting power- and cooling-efficient low voltage memory and Oracle's Sun Flash Modules to reduce operating costs.

Ideal for cloud computing and virtualized environments, the dual-node Sun Blade X6275 M2 server module is Oracle's highest compute density blade server. Combining the Sun Blade 6000 chassis with hot-swappable Sun Blade X6275 M2 server modules and Oracle VM provides customers with an elastic scalability solution that can be rapidly deployed or expanded to meet the dynamic requirements of private clouds.

The diskless Sun Blade X6275 M2 leverages the high availability and shared resource infrastructure of the Sun Blade 6000 chassis while also supporting power- and cooling-efficient low voltage memory and Oracle's Sun Flash Modules to reduce operating costs.

Driving Datacenter Agility and Efficiency with Oracle Sun Blades

2010-11-18T17:00:00+01:00

Oracle can provide the tools that enable organizations to enjoy enhanced performance from their datacenters, tools in the form of the Oracle Sun Blade systems, whose modular design offers unparalleled architectural flexibility that can deliver a business-driven infrastructure aligned with current business models. Blogger Ferhat Hatay alerts readers to a webcast originally delivered on November 10, 2010, by Carl J.Ray, Senior Product Marketing Director at Oracle, who explains how Oracle can help customers achieve higher performance and scale with reduced management complexity, even as they leverage investments to produce rapid ROI.

More Information

Not all x86 Servers Are Created Equal

2010-11-10T17:00:00+01:00

Given that "Not all x86 Servers are created equal" blogger Ferhat Hatay recommends using Oracle Sun x86 Clustered Systems to ensure maximum performance. The newest Intel Xeon processor 5600 and 7500 series, Hatay writes, are based on open industry standards--and provide superior performance, scale, and efficiency because Sun x86 systems are optimized to run with Oracle's portfolio of storage, operating systems, database, middleware, applications, and management software, so users can reduce complexity and accelerate ROI.

Timothy Prickett Morgan Says Oracle is Back in the UNIX Game

2010-11-02T16:00:00+01:00

Timothy Prickett Morgan recently posted an article in "The Register" stating, "Oracle has slashed prices and boosted performance to show IBM and HP that it is indeed back in the Unix game."

He says that two of the four new T-3 servers are now shipping and they are being offered in the Oracle online store and they offer "substantially better bang for the buck than their SPARC T2 and T2+ predecessors."

To show the relative improvement in bang for the buck of the T3 machines, Timothy has built a comparison table which shows the chips, cores, clocks, memory configuration, and a metric he calls Relative Ooomph. That table shows that the T3 servers offer much better price performance than the T5120, T5220, and T5420 machines they replace in the T Series server lineup.

Virtualized 10GbE Network Connection to Sun Blade 6000 Chassis

2010-10-26T16:00:00+01:00

The blog on "Virtualized 10GbE network connection to Sun Blade 6000 chassis with zero management overhead" by Ferhat Hatay points out to readers how the solution is designed to seamlessly integrate into Oracle's Sun Blade 6000 chassis and explains the benefits users will enjoy.

Introducing Oracle Exadata Database Machine X2-8

2010-10-25T16:00:00+01:00

More information is now available on the new Oracle Exadata Database Machine X2-8 in the form of a podcast by Ron Weiss, Oracle's Director of Product Management, who informs listeners about how Oracle's new product can enable customers to experience extreme performance for both high capacity data warehousing and OLTP workloads.

"Deploying Oracle Database on Oracle Sun SPARC Enterprise M-series Systems"

2010-10-14T16:00:00+01:00

The Oracle White Paper "Deploying Oracle Database on Oracle Sun SPARC Enterprise M-series Systems" provides technical information on the Oracle Sun SPARC Enterprise M-series systems and the mainframe-class RAS features and resource management capabilities that they offer. The white paper also explores the virtualization capabilities provided by Oracle Solaris and the Oracle Sun Enterprise M-series Systems, and offers as well several recommendations on how to combine virtualization technologies for enterprise deployments of Oracle Database.