It has been a little while since I shared some thoughts about moving from RISC due to a 3 month assignment managing the Nehalem-EX product line. One word describes that product, ‘wow’, and the change it will bring to the IT marketplace as we know it. But I’m not here to talk about that….

David Bowie was certainly introspective when he wrote his “Changes” song about his need to constantly look at oneself, previous decisions and the need for frequent reinvention and change. The sentiments reflected within “Changes” can be applied to all aspects of life both personal and business. Reflecting on previous business decisions and looking for newer and better ways to do things should not be seen as the previous decision being wrong, but rather should be rewarded as looking to change and do things better based upon the environment today.

Previous business decisions to deploy your IT solutions on RISC based architectures was most likely the right decision at the time based on the business need, the solutions availability and the architecture available to run that solution.  Some of these solutions are likely due for an upgrade due to changing business needs, a better version of the application now being available or have become to expensive to maintain and support on older server system. It is time to make a change and change is likely to include upgrading to next generation of software solution and choosing a new server system that will perform and work with the software solution.

With the rapid pace of technology innovation and evolution over the last number of years, the decision is not necessarily as clear cut as it may have been in the past.

What I wanted to share with you was some information around how Intel’s Xeon microprocessor has evolved and can now compete with the POWER architecture offered from IBM.  Some of you may say that this is not possible, but Xeon 5500 is getting some attention as shown with information posted on IBM website

Price/performance is a key consideration for database workloads and $ / tpmC is pretty widely accepted as a good rule of thumb. Its good to see that the IBM System x3950M2 (based on the Xeon 7400 processor) has a $1.99 $ / tpmC compared to IBM Power P570  $3.54 $ / tpmC;-)

Xeon 5500 has a performance per socket leadership against a similar class POWER 6 2S system. This can be seen by comparing results at www.spec.orgfor benchmarks such as SPECJbb2005, SPECint-rate 2006 etc. IBM makes reference to performance per core leadership over the Xeon 5500. A fair statement, but most customers look at overall system level performance to do the require task. I guess my key takeaway is that if you are looking for a solution to run infrastructure type workloads and get the best bang for your buck then the Xeon 5500 delivers best price/performance

There is also some interesting discussion around scalability of Xeon Vs POWER6. Xeon 5500 is used in 2 socket configurations, and not in scalable systems. So it seems to be a little like comparing apples to oranges!. Scalable Xeon platforms are available in the market today from both IBM and Unisys. There are also 15+ designs for scalable platforms from 8 OEMs coming with Intel’s next generation scalable Xeon product, Nehalem-EX.  Some good material was shared recently at Intel’s Developer Forum in San Francisco. Look for Mission Critical Server Deployment class at https://intel.wingateweb.com/us09/scheduler/catalog/catalog.jspThis material provides a good overview about how Nehalem-EX provides supportfor high-end computing with a scalable micro architecture, advanced RAS capabilities and how Redhat will support Nehalem-EX scalability. This presentation also shows an example of the innovation of NEC who are developing mission critical Linux solutions based on NEC’s Scalable architecture using Intel Xeon processors.

So is it the time for you to change?. Are existing options like the Xeon 5500 or the Xeon 7400 the right choice for you? Nehalem-EX is coming and I believe will bring a huge change to the marketplace as we know it today.

What do you think?

Register and mark your calendar.  On Sep 23, 10am EDT (New York) / 14:00 GMT / 16:00 CEST (Paris), Red Hat and Intel team will host another webinar, guiding you through the steps to take to migrate your enterprise workload from UNIX/RISC to RHEL/Intel.  The "why" and economics of the migration is now quite evident.  This webinar presents "how" a migration should be carried out.  The time is scheduled best for audience in Europe, Middle East, and Africa, but also works well for those on the east coast of Americias.

In the mean time, Red Hat has written this migration whitepaper that walks you through methodologies of a migration.

Happy migration!  and drive your data center cost down!

Here's the 5th video in my VMWorld Chalk Talk Series. In this one, Gerhard Schlabschi, Systems and Storage Marketing with Sun Microsystems gives a chalk talk on various virtualization systems and discusses some of the trade-offs in a virtualized environment. Enjoy .

How do I migrate my solution from RISC to x86 architecture is one of the questions that I get asked a lot these days. It is a very fair question to ask as it is only human nature to want some level of comfort when planning a transition.

There are multiple different paths available to migrate solutions and there are numerous different variables which need to be considered. There is no 'one-size fits all' approach to migration. Factors such as operating system environment, type of workload, whether packaged application and the level of custom code in your solution all come into play when trying to plan out your migration.

So, without writing 'war and peace' (an extremely long novel) I just wanted to share some perspectives and point to some resources in that jungle of resources that might help you navigate your way through a solution migration

Firstly, if your solution is an off the shelf application then moving it from one architecture type to another is a straight forward  porting and recompile process. Contrary to some popular beliefs there is not a whole separate set of application vendors and titles where the applications just run on Unix/RISC combination. Most application vendors have made their products available on multiple different operating systems that run on multiple different architectures. Unfortunately there is no master index or website out there that I have come across that would simplify the process of seeing who supports what application on what operating and what architecture. (let me know if there is something like this). Unfortunately it is a hard grind and requires a visit to each application vendors website to ensure that their application that is part of your solution is supported on your choice of operating system and your server platform of choice.

Luckily, it is not all doom and gloom and hard work. One very useful site around Solaris is the tool on SUN Microsystems website that allows you to check what applications  run on Solaris sparc or Solaris x86.http://www.sun.com/bigadmin/apps/

The last I checked over 80% of applications that run on SPARC also run on x86.

My suggestion if you draw blank here is to approach your application vendor and make business case on why they should support a Solaris x86 version. Likelihood is that the application vendor has a version running on Linux/x86 already, so getting a version to run on solaris/x86 is not a huge engineering effort. Mainly the application vendor will want to see some real demand so they can justify the support model.

There are also some useful guides out there developed by HP, Dell, Intel, SUN, IBM, Redhat, Microsoft and others that are technically focussed on the 'how to' migrate your solution.

Here is just a sample of some of the resources.

• HP www.hp.com/go/sun2hp. Not only does this site have material on SPARC, also contains material on AS400, POWER, Mainframe and other architectures. There is a wealth of information on all the HP options from Itanium to Xeon, Solaris, Linux, windows, HP-UX etc. Technical guides, TCO tools, migration resources etc
  another site that focus on providing migration assistance is www.hp.com/go/migration
• Dell http://www.dell.com/unixmigration. Don't get thrown by the title of the link. Some good content here on how to move an Oracle database and DNS server to Solaris or Linux on Dell system. Also content on why to move and how to get some support
• SUN http://www.sun.com/software/solaris/howtoguides/installationhowto.jsp How to install Solaris 10 on x86.
• Redhat http://www.redhat.com/intelligence/. This site has whitepapers, migration guides, webinars, how Linux compares to unix etc

Lastly migrating custom code is a more challenging project. There are many organizations with significant experience and expertise that offer services to assist in migration projects. Leverage these organizations to help. I know at first blush there may be concerns of the cost of paying for migration services, but look at the bigger picture. In a lot of cases the TCO benefits and improved performance will deliver business benefits that will outweigh the cost of migration in the long run.

Hopefully this is helpful. I would really like to hear what have your experiences have been with migration or what are the challenges that you face as you look forward towards migration?

Powerful Technology. Compelling Savings. Competitive Business.

Sharing others success is always really cool.  Here are my Top 10 success stories captured off of the intel customer references page located at www.intel.com/references.   These leading IT shops from around the world have successfully taken advantage of new technology to transform their business .. saving money, boosting performance, driving productivity, and increased competitiveness into their business.

Did I miss your favorite? Want to nominate one for my Q2 list? …or , just tell me your story – love to hear it

Chris

1.        Station Casinos virtualizes IT: To help control IT costs and ensure a robust customer experience, the IT group virtualized its infrastructure by running VMware* virtualization software on Dell PowerEdge* servers equipped with the Intel® Xeon® processor 5100 and 5400 series. So far, the company has eliminated almost 100 physical servers, avoided $190,000 in hardware acquisition costs, and accelerated the deployment of new services from weeks to hours. Virtualization enables Station Casinos to continue to deliver fun and relaxation while keeping the company successful even in tough economic times. http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/StationCasinos.pdf

2.        Thomson Reuters:  With virtualization software running on rack servers based on the Intel Xeon processor 7300 series, the Thomson Reuters IT team is achieving a consolidation ratio of 18:1, reducing power requirements and freeing up space to absorb future growth. “We expect to increase that ratio to 25:1 when we move to the six-core Intel Xeon processor 7400 series in the near future,” says Crowhurst. The company’s power requirements are growing by nearly 20 percent every year as busi­ness expands. By optimizing the power and cooling strategy in its new data center and concentrating more blades in less space, the IT team was able to increase power density from 100 watts per square foot to 150 watts per square foot. As a result, there is less need for new data center construction, greatly reducing future environ­mental impacts. http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/Thomson_Reuters.pdf

3.        TRW: Achieved server consolidation ratio of 20:1, Increased CPU utilization from 40% to 85%, Reduced server deployment times from two weeks to one to two days, Cut total annual power and cooling costs by 70% to 80%, Saved 50% in annual datacenter cooling costs in Malaysia alone, Enabled one IT staff member to manage up to 50 servers, Saved 80% on the potential cost of additional UPS systems across the datacenters.http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/TRW_snapshot.pdf

4.        Business & Decision Group: Power consumption was reduced by approximately 30 per cent compared to the previous generation of processors. The pure performance gains and lower energy consumption helps us deliver new solutions for our customers and will lead to a return-on-investment in less than one year. Could gain virtualization rates of 20:1 and with a processor load slightly below 55 percent.  http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/Business_and_Decision_All_Systems_Go.pdf

5.        BMW: The Intel® Xeon® processor 7300 series performed 2.75-3X faster than the implemented RISC-based servers. Based on the Intel® Core™ mircoarchitecture, it is manufactured using new materials such as hafnium-based high-k gate dielectrics and metal gates, which significantly reduces electrical leakage. http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/BMW_SAP_casestudy_FV.pdf

6.        Carnegie: Reduces yearly energy costs by approximately SEK I million (USD 167,000) thanks to an estimated 1.1 million KWh annual saving arising from the server consolidation. Carnegie then replaced 100 of its legacy servers with 16 HP ProLiant 380 G5* servers powered by the Quad-Core Intel Xeon processor 5300 series and in the process created approximately 140 virtual servers. Thanks to the reduction in physical servers it also shelved its plans for extra cooling equipment while also making a SEK 10 million (USD 1.7 million) saving by avoiding the need to physically rebuild its data centre. http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/Carnegie_final_version.pdf

7.        Kelly Blue Book: Refreshing aging servers with new Dell* servers based on multi-core Intel® Xeon® processors enables Kelley Blue Book to accelerate performance of key applications by up to 50 percent, increasing business agility. Loading and processing business warehouse data was taking 16 to 20 hours each time - now it’s taking half that amount of time. Server consolidation ratios of up to 15 to 1 and reduced energy costs with the new hardware - saving KBB approximately $10,000 each month in power and cooling costs.http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/Kelley_Blue_Book_CaseStudy.pdf

8.        PLAY: Processing all of PLAY’s historical roaming mobile transactions for 2008 to make the data available for the Optiprizer windows user application, takes just 44 minutes running on the Intel Xeon processor 5500 series, compared to 102 minutes on the Intel Xeon processor 5400 series. This represents a performance increase of 230 percent. Similarly, complex business intelligence tasks can now be performed twice as quickly. http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/PLAY.pdf

9.        Yahoo:  Upgraded their Mission Critical Oracle database with Intel Xeon 7300 based servers. Yahoo is able to support a 1.4-petabyte database with 16 servers without any additional training or operating costs, while cutting the time to run the most demanding queries by 93% (20 hours to 73 minutes). http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/Intel_ESS_Yahoo_7300_Case_Study_HR.pdf

10.     Turtle Entertainment: Europe’s largest online gaming community supports its 875,000 members with Intel Xeon processor 7400 based servers.  Consolidation with larger servers reduces network, power/cooling and space costs and enabled a 35% reduction in TCO while improving their customers gaming experience (time it took to load a web page went from 177 milliseconds to 72 milliseconds). http://www.intel.com/references/pdfs/Turtle_Entertainment_V3.pdf

Interesting new article posted on Computerworld explaining how the State of Indiana saved nearly $14M by consolidating their seven data centers into one (plus a second for disaster recovery) while also reducing server count by one-third through virtualization.

We’ve learned that they did this by standardizing on the 4 Socket Intel Xeon 7300 processor based Dell PowerEdge R900s.  This is a great example of an innovative IT department conducting large scale server consolidation to improve operational efficiency and reduce costs.

Dell IT’s own global standard virtualization model incorporates the 4 Socket Intel® Xeon 7300 processor based Dell PowerEdge R900 as the centerpiece, where they have virtualized more than 5,000 servers and saved the company over US$29 million using a scalable, worldwide virtualization model.  Click here to learn more about that as well.

Come talk to us if you’re not seeing similar consolidation benefits or savings, we’d like to help.

bryce

The industry has been waiting for Intel's new product, codenamed Nehalem - and for good reason.  With the recession in full swing and all of us re-thinking our spending habits, we are only spending our hard-earned money on the best and most important products and services ... and everyone is looking for a deal.

The Xeon 5500 based server is one of those products that is going to make IT, business leaders, financial accountants and Corporate Executives take notice.

Why? ... because an investment in a new server, used to replace nine aging single core servers, can pay for itself in an short as 8 months while dramatically reducing infrastructure space consumption, power & cooling requirements and operating costs.

For Finance, that means that a capital investment today, could create a positive cash flow stream within a year

For IT, that means newer, in-warranty servers delivering more performance per server simplifying operations and maintenance, with lower risk of problems

For Facility Managers, that means reduced power / cooling requirements and the ability to consolidate data centers and avoid new construction or retrofits

For the Corporate Executives, this means a more efficient business, with lower costs and more innovation that can spur business growth

Read My blog on the Server Room titled "Top 10 Reasons to Buy in a Recession"

View the 8 month payback calculation here

Read more about the collaboration of industry solutions in the Server Solutions Insider Forum and view the innovation from intel in the server room

Chris