blade servers (was Re: [Bioclusters] Any experiences with these guys? reeks)

[William Harman]

You need to be more precise on the definition of a blade server.  Are
you looking at a vertical rack mount node, or some variation, a
CompactPCI form factor or some other design?

Bill  


-----Original Message-----
From: bioclusters-admin@bioinformatics.org
[mailto:bioclusters-admin@bioinformatics.org] On Behalf Of Chris
Dagdigian
Sent: Monday, November 03, 2003 11:26 AM
To: bioclusters@bioinformatics.org
Subject: blade servers (was Re: [Bioclusters] Any experiences with these
guys? reeks)



Rackable denies sending the astroturf message and points to big sales 
numbers (and order backlog) as reasons why even aggressive salespeople 
would not be out trying to drum up more business. I've been 'joe jobbed'

by spammers using one of my domain names to forge email so I am open to 
the possibility that some other sneaky stuff may be going on by people 
who are not part of Rackable. Interesting stuff but not on-topic for 
this list :)

Ok back on topic..

You bring up an interesting point about blades that I'd love to get some

discussion going.

My take is this:

(1) The real value for blade servers is mostly in the management, 
monitoring and provisioning software that you get with the blade 
platform. When done right it is the software that delivers the actual 
savings in terms of operational burden and that is what really tips the 
scales over in favor of paying extra $$ for blades.

(2) Of the blade platforms that I've looked at I found that I only 
really enjoyed working with the IBM Bladecenter and RLX product 
offerings. Both had excellent software tools IMHO.

What do others think? Is the management and provisioning software just 
as important as the form factor and wiring density savings?

-Chris




Philip MacMenamin wrote:

> First off, this mail smells bogey, and hats off to the boys who did 
> some
> sherlock holmesing. 
> 
> Second off, Blades are ALSO cool because they plug into a chassis, all

> very
> easy, nice and tidy. The fact that they do not have miles of cable
hanging 
> out of the back is a genuine advantage. I didn't read all of this mail
too 
> closely (see first point) but there seems still to be miles of cable
hanging 
> out of the back of these units. So I am still a blade convertee...
> 



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