Mid-Range Hardware for Windows 2000 Datacenter Server

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One of the more attractive and sensible elements of the release of Windows 2000 Datacenter Server is that a person cannot just walk into a local Best Buy and purchase it nor is it available online. In order to position the software as an enterprise-only release, it can only be purchased from approved vendors, most of whom offer it on their own hardware platforms. Following are some of the main candidates. (Note: The specs have no doubt been upgraded in the time that has passed between writing this book and its appearing in print.)

Unisys ES7000

Leading the pack among the OEMs appears to be Unisys (Blue Bell, Pennsylvania), with its ES7000 Server. According to Gartner Group tests on online transaction processing, Unisys came out ahead of other vendor offerings. The analyst community in general seems taken with the ES7000. Giga Information Group (Cambridge, MA), for instance, feels that Unisys has brought the Intel world much closer to the high-availability, scalable, mainframe-class environment than any other vendor. In Giga's opinion the architecture developed by Unisys provides a far more scalable technology for multiple processor servers than the existing commodity Intel-based SMP servers.

Based on the cellular multiprocessing (CMP) architecture, the ES7000 supports server partitioning; offers process control, multiple operating systems, up to 32 Intel Xeon processors (as well as Itanium 64-bit processors), 4 to 192 GB of memory, and 8 to 160 PCI adapters for I/O; and is built to house the 64-bit Itanium processor. CMP also makes it possible to dynamically reallocate resources and offers mainframe-oriented crossbar technology that eliminates the bottlenecks associated with bus-based SMP architectures. Dedicated connections exist between memory, processors, and I/O components. CMP's support for partitioning enables administrators to create "servers within a server," thus executing multiple functions in heterogeneous operating environments within the same server.

Microsoft, for example, uses the ES7000/Datacenter server combination for Worldwide Marketing Database (WWMDB), an SQL Server 2000 database containing international and national sales and marketing data. The company initially established WWMDB on eight servers with four-way and eight-way architectures. Once the former database expanded beyond 1 TB, it no longer provided the necessary throughput. Processing levels were pegged at about 500,000 records per day. As a result, sales and marketing users experienced delays attempting to access information.

When Microsoft consolidated its eight servers into one ES7000 running Datacenter Server, the system moved up to processing more than 2 million records per day. Since that time, WWMDB has expanded beyond a 2.4-TB database with processing times increased by 53 percent.

Hewlett-Packard ProLiant DL7602G

Although Unisys currently appears to dominate the Windows 2000 Datacenter market, other vendors are attempting to close the gap. Hewlett-Packard's ProLiant DL7602G server (based on the ProLiant 8500), for example, has eight Pentium Xeon 2 GHz processors, 64 GB of SDRAM, and 11 hot-pluggable 64-bit I/O slots. It uses HP's F8 chipset architecture.

Investment banking firm Credit Suisse First Boston (CSFB), for instance, deployed two ProLiant 8500/Windows 2000 Datacenter Servers as parts of its overall plan to consolidate servers within its worldwide IT system. Currently, a blend of Sun/Solaris and Windows NT/Windows 2000 is being used for file and print servers, messaging platform, Web applications, and database and business applications.

The first implementation project of Windows 2000 Datacenter at CSFB involved file and print, using a four-server, split-site solution. The second was a two-node solution for Microsoft SQL Server 2000, using NetIQ's AppManager and AppAnalyzer products. Both run on ProLiant 8500 eight-way servers with Xeon chips. In terms of overall benefits, the company experienced better scalability across higher numbers of processors, very large memory (VLM) support, and improved performance running enterprise applications such as Microsoft Exchange 2000 and Microsoft SQL Server 2000.

IBM x440

The IBM x440 supports up to 16 Pentium Xeon processors. SDRAM memory is expandable to 32 GB.

Dell PowerEdge 8450

Dell's PowerEdge 8450, can link two sets of four processors in one server. It supports up to eight Intel Pentium Xeon processors.

Fujitsu Siemens PRIMERGY N850

Fujitsu Siemens Computers offers the PRIMERGY N850, based on an 8- and 16-way Pentium Xeon.

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