Dell Marks Second Anniversary of its Data Center Solutions Division with New, Cloud-Optimized Hardware

Dell celebrates the second anniversary of the creation of its Data Center Solutions (DCS) division. Established in March 2007, DCS has revolutionized the economics of hyper-scale computing with its optimized, design-to-order hardware and services.

The News:

• In March 2007, Dell created a new division, DCS, to address the cloud computing business opportunity and to meet the unique needs of companies operating hyper-scale computing environments.
• DCS customers are businesses who require a vast amount of computing horsepower to run data-intensive applications. These include major providers of Internet services, financial services organizations, national government agencies, institutional universities, laboratory environments and energy producers.

DCS works with these customers, at an engineer-to-engineer level, to develop a fully-optimized cloud computing solution that is tuned to their physical facility, operating processes and application workload.

• This unique, real-time design process enables DCS customers to quickly incorporate the latest technologies in their data centers. Cutting edge component selection, combined with Dell’s strength in mechanical and thermal design, allow customers to benefit fully from the improved efficiency and performance that a purpose-built system can deliver.
• In computing clouds, software provides application availability across thousands of servers. This architecture and operating environment render unnecessary many of the system features required by mainstream IT. By designing to customer’s specific needs, DCS eliminates these unnecessary components, driving down costs and improving efficiency.
• Dell’s customized, innovative approach helps large platform operators speed deployment, lower total operating costs and reduce the environmental impact of their data centers.

In the past two years, DCS has developed more than 19 different hardware platforms; DCS utilizes these platforms to create custom hardware solutions for some of the largest cloud computing providers in the world.

Today, DCS introduced a new hardware solution, the XS-23 II, code-named Xanadu II. XS-23 II systems are ideal for high-density x86 hyper-scale computing environments and include the following features:

• Four 2-socket servers and up to 24 rotating or solid state disk drives in a 2U standard rack mount footprint.
• Several processing architecture options including the Intel “Nehalem” Xeon family of processors.
• Shared infrastructure, including fans, power supplies and chassis that deliver lower cost and higher efficiency.
• Allow configurations of up to 88 servers with 704 processing cores and 396TB of storage, plus switching, in a single rack, delivering 25 percent higher density1 when compared to similarly equipped blade servers on a per-U basis.
• Occupy 50 percent2 less data center space than general purpose 1U servers while simultaneously improving energy efficiency by up to 15 percent.

Quote:

“Since its inception, DCS has focused on supporting the early leaders in the cloud computing space, approximately 50 companies worldwide. We developed customized servers, storage and services for these customers to help them optimize the operation of their cloud computing infrastructure and directly lower their tangible TCO,” said Forrest Norrod, vice president and general manager of Dell’s Data Center Solutions Division. “This isn’t a one-size fits all approach. Hyper-scale customers need optimized solutions, built on open, industry standards, that solve problems of scale without introducing unneeded complexity. DCS delivers those solutions.”