Dell revs up PowerEdge servers and saves energy with latest Xeons

Systems promise up to 169 percent better performance per watt while using 25 percent less power

Dell is leading Intel’s fight-back on performance and power-consumption, by rolling out the latest generation of Dell PowerEdge servers with the new dual-core Xeon 5000 and, within a few weeks, the Xeon 5100. Dell, like other Intel customers, has recently been hammered by rivals, which say it has been offering underpowered servers that consume too much electricity.

Dell said the new PowerEdge 1950, 2900 and 2950 servers - and forthcoming 1955 blade server due in a few weeks - offer up to 169 percent improved performance per watt and use 25 percent less power. As well as taking advantage of the more efficient Intel chips to reduce power consumption, Dell has changed its system design by adding more efficient power supplies and the ability to throttle down fans.

Although AMD, Sun and IBM have had some recent success touting their performance-per-watt metrics, Dell said it would no longer lag behind on performance per watt, an increasingly important metric given the power demands of today’s servers and sharp rises in electricity tariffs. Recently, Dell said it would add AMD options to some high-end servers.

“Dell will absolutely achieve performance-per-watt leadership, whether that is one-socket or two-socket systems,” said Jay Parker, servers marketing director at Dell.

Martin Hingley, European vice-president of the systems group at analyst IDC, said that energy costs were “creeping up” the list of concerns - nine percent of firms cited it as a factor in IT buying decisions, according to the latest IDC data.

“A lot of IT managers are not being measured on their use of electricity,” said Hingley. “Maybe they need some help [from other parts of their organisations] on that.”

Oracle chief executive Larry Ellison has said that by swapping out larger, power-hungry servers for new units, Oracle could save up to $100m.

Other new features in the PowerEdge line including a TCP/IP offload engine capability that uses a Broadcom controller to relieve the CPU from traffic.

Also, Dell will offer the ability to mix and match 2.5in and 3.5in SAS or lower-cost Sata hard drives.

In addition, new usability features include programmable LCDs for problem diagnosis, and colour coding and labelling to make component identification simpler.

Dell has also refreshed storage lines with products based on the PowerEdge 2900 and 2950 servers and enhanced top-end tape library products.