On Sat, 1 Nov 2003 15:21:33 -0500 Kurt Wall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
> Quoth Alan Jackson: > > [...] > > > the AMD Opteron 64 bit for clusters. IBM had a rather nice blade > > system which could take whatever you want, AMD, Intel, or other. And > > I saw a Sun system perform much like an SGI. So things are continuing to > > progress. > > Stupid question: What exactly is a "blade" server? Don't know *exactly*, but I think it's basically a sort of rack-mount chassis into which you can plug many (dozens) of self-contained cpus (blades) IBM's blades were about the size of a paperback - each one had dual cpus, a lot of memory, and plug into a high-speed bus. People worry about floor-space, power consumption, cooling, price, and capability. Trick is to find the right balance of all those for your application. Ahh... google is my friend... http://search390.techtarget.com/sDefinition/0,,sid10_gci770169,00.html A blade server is a thin, modular electronic circuit board, containing one, two, or more microprocessors and memory, that is intended for a single, dedicated application (such as serving Web pages) and that can be easily inserted into a space-saving rack with many similar servers. One product offering, for example, makes it possible to install up to 280 blade server modules vertically in multiple racks or rows of a single floor-standing cabinet. Blade servers, which share a common high-speed bus, are designed to create less heat and thus save energy costs as well as space. Large data centers and Internet service providers (ISPs) that host Web sites are among companies most likely to buy blade servers. A blade server is sometimes referred to as a high-density server and is typically used in a clustering of servers that are dedicated to a single task, such as: * file sharing * Web page serving and caching * SSL encrypting of Web communication * transcoding of Web page content for smaller displays * Streaming audio and video content Like most clustering applications, blade servers can also be managed to include load balancing and failover capabilities. A blade server usually comes with an operating system and the application program to which it is dedicated already on the board. Individual blade servers are usually hot-pluggable and come in various heights, including 5.25 inches (the 3U model), 1.75 inches (1U), and possibly "sub-U" sizes. (A U is a standard measure of vertical height in an equipment cabinet and is equal to 1.75 inches.) Also see brick server and pizza box server. -- ----------------------------------------------------------------------- | Alan K. Jackson | To see a World in a Grain of Sand | | [EMAIL PROTECTED] | And a Heaven in a Wild Flower, | | www.ajackson.org | Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand | | Houston, Texas | And Eternity in an hour. - Blake | ----------------------------------------------------------------------- _______________________________________________ Linux-users mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] Unsubscribe/Suspend/Etc -> http://smtp.linux-sxs.org/mailman/listinfo/linux-users
