Find a Dell Certified Partner. The new blade chassis being released by Dell has by far the most features, performance, lowest energy use per blade/per chassis than any of the other vendors and its got a really cool swivel display screen. Certified partners also can get you the best pricing vs the call in sales rep.
HP is good, no doubting it, you would not be sad if you went with them either. Greg From: Louis, Joe [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, April 22, 2008 4:35 PM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: RE: Need opinion on Blade Servers Get your self an HP Blade chassis, although I wouldn't put it in a closet. I wouldn't put any server in a closet. I chose HP because (beside the bill Dell sent me just to get a quote on their blade) it is very solid. When I bought mine, it was second generation. The third generation has half the bays (if you want only half). I can add 16 server blades to mine. They now make card blades for legacy applications that need a special card, tape blades for backups and more. There is a case to make with blades about less footprint, BTUs, and electricity consumption. Nice thing about the half chassis is that if gives you room to grow. It was an easy sell for me to the ownership here since the 4th server paid for itself. I say that to say that the initial investment is truly that; an investment and you save on all servers you purchase after than, since all you are doing is buying the blade. <From Joe Louis: > ________________________________ From: Sharie Breaux [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED] Sent: Tuesday, April 22, 2008 7:45 AM To: NT System Admin Issues Subject: Need opinion on Blade Servers Our company is in the process of dividing the business into two. Two principals are staying at the current location and the other two are moving to a new location. It is my job to purchase the server for the two that are moving (of which I am going with them as well). We have four servers now: Primary (which is the one I am replacing now), SQL (of which I will replace in early 2009), Exchange & a Backup server. One of the principals is pushing blade servers. He feels there is a smaller footprint, more room for growth for the future, you only need one UPS and there is less power consumption. There is only going to be 8 people at the new company with room to expand to 4 more. The current Primary server is more than adequate for the 20 people that are at the company now. There is no temperature controlled server room. There is an "IT closet" where the wiring will be (Phone & Data) which is basically only 8' wide x 30" deep with louvered doors in the common supply room. He suggested putting the servers in the closet sideways of which I am against and said no. I will be putting them in my cubicle with me as it makes it easier to manage them. Since I do not know that much about blade servers, I need all of your opinions. Sharie Breaux Systems Administrator [EMAIL PROTECTED] ~ Upgrade to Next Generation Antispam/Antivirus with Ninja! ~ ~ <http://www.sunbelt-software.com/SunbeltMessagingNinja.cfm> ~
