Oracle unveils next-gen Sun systems
Oracle today introduced a refreshed line of x86 Cluster Systems, moving forward on rolling out its roadmap for integration of Sun and upping its competitive game against the companies like IBM.
The announcement of the next-gen Sun Fire x86 Clustered Systems, which includes rackmount servers, blades and a 10 GbE cluster fabric, are designed for customers that run a mix of both Oracle and non-Oracle workloads across a group of systems.
The move advances the strategy that the company modeled last year. Last fall, Oracle CEO Larry Ellison said he was modeling the new Oracle - that is, the one after the Sun acquisition - after an IBM model that combines both hardware and software, a complete package that gets away from the industry's focus of selling components only.
The company said the new products will reduce management complexity, deliver "record-breaking performance" and increase efficiencies among operations. The features include:
- Integrated Lights Out Manager, which provides a single management interface for all of the hardware components - blades, servers, storage, networking, power and virtulaziation.
- Oracle Installation Assistant allows blades and rackmount servers to be installed and configured in minutes.
- A 45 percent improvement in energy efficiency, compared to previous generation systems, allows service capacity to increase without adding power or cooling loads to datacenter.
In a statement, John Fowler, executive VP for Sun Systems at Oracle, said:
The launch of our Sun Fire x86 Clustered Systems underscores our commitment to delivering the best, most differentiated x86 clustered solutions. We are the first to deliver high-performing application-to-disk solutions that can be managed and supported as a single system. This is a major step forward in providing a completely optimized solution that delivers enterprise-class performance and scale while reducing management complexity and costs for customers.