Jan 2, 2002 : HP to Deliver Nexcom Blade Servers

📅 January 2, 2002 - Nexcom (nexcom.com) announced recently that Hewlett-Packard has debuted its high-density Blade Server. Nexcom has been shipping the Blade Server systems for almost a year, and its HiServer series was officially announced and delivered in Cebit Hanover on March 21, 2001.

"Foreseeing the split of the traditional Server functions by high speednetwork into the Clusters of so-called 'CPU Cloud' and 'Storage Cloud', weat Nexcom started the revolutionary project to build the ultra high densityservers, or the Blade Servers as named by the industry." Said William Chen,the VP of system business, Nexcom. "Our HiServer, or Blade Server,significantly solves all the headaches in server applications, such as thespace, the clustering, the redundancy, the failover, and the managementproblems. We have even significantly reduced the jungle of cables in thedata center."
There were several announcements on the Blade Servers during this year, mostof them designed with the Transmeta's software emulated CPU, the Crusoeseries. All these products received very limited success because the CrusoeCPU is originally targeted at the PDA or sub-notebook, the company says. TheNexcom HiServer series are built with the following features:
3U, 19" rack chassis built with 9/10, or 18/20 blades, flexible forvarious purposesFull Pentium III computing power ranging from the entry C3, Celeronup to Tualatin. All Socket 370 CPUsPatent-pending intelligent CF-KVM switch (CD-ROM, FDD, Keyboard,VGA, Mouse shared by all the blades)Four different blades to fit different applications: 1 slot bladefor high density, 2-slot blade for I/O expandability and high computingpower. Mixed blades in the same chassis for multi-applications are allowedNexCare, the Server Management, for the health monitoring and remotecontrol through serial port or LAN100 BaseT LANx3 or 1000 BaseT LANx2+100 BaseT LANx1 per bladeAll modules, including the CPU blades, the power modules, thecooling fans, are hot swappableArchitecture expandable to P4 bladesMajor applications: Web Servers, Application Servers, StreamingMedia Servers, Clustering Computing, 3D Rendering, Data Base Engines,Firewall/ VPN Array
HP is the first among the top server players announcing the Blade Servers.Other contenders planning to deliver the Blade Servers include IBM, Compaq,and Dell.
"We are pleased that all the big brothers follow Nexcom's footsteps for thisrevolutionary server architecture." Said William Chen. "We'll see a totalrestructuring of the server world into a brand new landscape in the comingfive years. Almost every serious server application could be 100% replaced,and enriched by the HiServer type Blade Servers with much lower TCO than thetraditional, semi-proprietary, bulky and hard to maintain machines."
Compared with the HP Blade Servers, Nexcom claims its HiServer hasthe following advantages:
Low barrier to entry: 3U for HiServer up to 20 Blades vs. 13U for HPup to 16 Blades100% open for sub-systems like LAN switch, NAS, SAN, vs. all tied upby HPMore than 4 types of Blade freely mixed to fit maximum applicationflexibility vs. only one x86 type of Blade for HP architectureCF-KVM, the best operation/control facility vs. unfriendly and steeplearning curve central management facility for HP Blade ServerFlexible to customization vs. rigid HP standard offering
The HiServer 309/ 310, and HiServer 318 are now being delivered. TheHiServer 320 will be available by the end of January 2002.