Latest blog entries

Oracle/Sun End of Life Servers - 2012

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 19:35:03 +0000

The following is a list of Oracle/Sun end of life (EOL) servers for 2012. Though these servers are EOL, many of them are still in high demand. If you need help acquiring an Oracle/Sun EOL server, call us at (888) 486-4948!

Vintage Sun Microsystems Ad: It's No Surprise Dell's Name Rhymes with Hell

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 17:38:14 +0000

While tidying up our office recently, we happened upon this interesting Sun Microsystems magazine advertisement. The ad doesn't directly name hardware giant Dell, but the reference is beyond obvious: “Given how hot and slow our competitor's servers are, it's no surprise their name RHYMES WITH HELL.” To see a full-sized version of the ad, click the image below.

The ad compares the Sun Fire X4100 to the Dell PowerEdge 6850. The former is 50 percent faster, one-quarter the size at 1U, consumes about one-third the power and is less than half the price than the other. When the ad ran, the Sun X4100 had a list price of $2,195, while the PE6850 was at $4,899. The X4100 is also compatible with more operating environments than the PE6850 (Solaris, Linux and Windows).

Sun Microsystems was comparing a Sun Fire X4100 equipped with two AMD Opteron Model 280 processors and a Dell PE6850 with four Intel Xeon processors. The ad tells readers to “check out our cool new industry standard x64 servers.” A web address in the ad – sun.com/better – now redirects to a page on Oracle.com about Sun Microsystems' acquisition.

Another ad we found also rips into Dell, but not as viciously. The ad, pictured below, touts the Sun X4100 as being 150 percent better than the Dell PE6850. It claims the Sun system is 50 percent faster and 66 percent more energy efficient.

Oracle's SPARC T4 Servers Leverage Breakthrough SPARC Processor

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Wed, 28 Sep 2011 17:14:59 +0000

So far, four servers and one supercluster will feature the T4 processor.

Oracle's SPARC T4 Processor Sets World Records

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 13:21:35 +0000

Using a SPARC T4-4 cluster consisting of four T4-4 systems for its applications tier and an additional two T4-4s for databasing, Oracle achieved a benchmark of 40,104.86 SPECjEnterprise2010 EjOPS, according to Oracle's announcement.

Detailed Pictures of the Sun Netra X4270

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Tue, 12 Apr 2011 20:17:25 +0000

Check out these detailed close-up photos of the Sun Netra X4270 Server!

Oracle/Sun HP Superdome Server Trade-In Program

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 19:30:00 +0000

You might have heard that Oracle is offering deals for owners of HP Superdome hardware who trade in their legacy servers. Until May 31, discounts of 50 percent will be available to customers who trade in any HP Superdome server for a Sun SPARC M8000 or Sun SPARC M9000. At Acclinet, however, we're offering remarkable discounts on the same machines without requiring trade-ins.

Get Better Savings by Upgrading Your Server with Acclinet!

We're able to offer industry-leading discounts on new and refurbished M8000/M9000 servers as well as a myriad of other Sun solutions, including the M3000, M4000 and M5000. If a Sun M-Series server does not meet your datacenter's needs, our zero-cost consulting services can help you determine which system is the best fit.

The Sun servers we carry are available up to 48-month warranties. We also offer best-of-breed Sun support plans that will lower your system's total cost of ownership (TCO) by extending its service life.

For a free quote, contact one of hardware specialists today by calling (888) 486-4948!

Another major hardware catalog update!

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Thu, 23 Sep 2010 18:53:19 +0000

We've recently updated our catalog to include more than 1,500 new IT hardware items from Sun Microsystems, Oracle, Cisco, Brocade and other vendors. If you can't find the item you're seeking in our catalog, please call us at (888) 486-4948 to see if we can track it down for you. Since pricing for hardware and spare parts fluctuates constantly, the items' prices are not included in the catalog.

Here are the new catalog pages. Each one has 100 items:

Page 206
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Page 209
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Page 211
Page 212
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Major update to Acclinet online catalog

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Fri, 03 Sep 2010 17:59:26 +0000

This week, we added thousands of new items to our already expansive online catalog.

371-2482 Battery for Sun 2510, 2530 and 2540 Arrays: Available Now!

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Thu, 29 Jul 2010 20:21:52 +0000

We have 371-2482 batteries in stock right now. These batteries are compatible with the Sun StorageTek 2510, 2530 and 2540 arrays. We can have them shipped to you within 24 hours.

Brocade 5300, Brocade 4900, Brocade 48000: Available Now!

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Mon, 19 Jul 2010 13:46:32 +0000

We're offering Brocade 5300 switches, Brocade Silkworm 4900 switches and Brocade 48000 directors for remarkably affordable prices.

Sun Fire EOL (End of Life) Servers List

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Wed, 14 Jul 2010 17:53:45 +0000

Are you wondering which Sun Fire servers have reached their EOL? Many servers belonging to the Sun Fire brand, launched by Sun Microsystems in 2001, are no longer supported by their manufacturer, but still continue to power datacenters globally. At Acclinet, we carry a broad range of Sun Fire legacy servers that are new and refurbished.

Sun 3510 Battery Replacement, Sun 3511 Battery Replacements (370-5445, 371-0539)

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 20:44:33 +0000

We have Sun 3510 and 3511 battery replacements (370-5545 and 371-0539) for affordable prices. Both are difficult to find, so you won't find them for a better price anywhere else!

For pricing, contact us today by calling (888) 486-4948 or emailing specials@acclinet.com.

HP C8000 Workstation (AB629A): Hard to Find, but Available Here!

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 20:11:50 +0000

The HP C8000 Workstation (AB629A) has reached its EOL and is hard to find, but we're offering them here at Acclinet as well as parts and maintenance. Featuring a rackable minitower design, the HP C8000 Workstation scales to four PA-8900 processors, 32 gigabytes of main memory and 64 megabytes of Level 2 shared cache. It supports 80-gigabyte Ultra/ATA 100 IDE and 300-gigabyte Ultra320 SCSI drives.

If you already own an HP C8000, we also offer workstation support plans that can lower your system's total cost of ownership (TCO) considerably by extending its life. Often times, aging workstations are replaced with newer machines when they still have years of quality service ahead of them.

For pricing, contact us today by calling (888) 486-4948 or emailing specials@acclinet.com!

HP B2600 Workstation: Available Now from Acclinet!

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 19:18:22 +0000

The HP B2600 Workstation (HP Unix B2600) is EOL and hard to find at the moment, but we're offering them with discounts here at Acclinet. The HP B2600 is especially optimized for mechanical and electrical design applications. Its space-saving design makes it perfect for small office environments. Equipped with the HP-UX 11.0 or 11.1 operating system, the B2600 Workstation has four memory slots and supports 73-gigabyte and 146-gigabyte disk drives.

We're offering deals on the following HP B2600 models:

A6069B

A6070A

A6071D

A7183D

Pricing depends on the configuration. Contact us today by calling (888) 486-4948 or emailing specials@acclinet.com!

Service Plans for Oracle Servers, Workstations and Storage Arrays Available Now!

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 16:28:42 +0000

All too often, IT professionals replace aging hardware with newer machines when they could perform for years more with proper maintenance. At Acclinet, we offer incredibly cost-effective service plans for Oracle/Sun Microsystems servers, workstations and storage arrays. By investing in an Oracle service plan, you'll be lowering your system's total cost of ownership (TCO) considerably by extending the life of your hardware.

We offer service plans for EOL and newer entry-level, mid-range and enterprise-class Oracle systems. With our unique system, we're able to meet the needs of organizations of all types and sizes. To learn more about our service plans, contact us by calling (888) 486-4948 or emailing specials@acclinet.com.

541-0645 Fan Repairs for Sun T2000: Available Now!

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 14:32:46 +0000

At our facility, we can repair your 541-0645 rear fan trays. They are compatible with the Sun Fire T2000 Server. These blower tray assemblies are nearly impossible to find today, and we can repair them for just $295 apiece. Advanced exchanges available.

If you're looking for 541-0645 parts, contact us today by calling (888) 486-4948 or emailing specials@acclinet.com.

IT Hardware Sales Jobs: We're Hiring!

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Fri, 09 Jul 2010 14:21:04 +0000

We are still looking for sales professionals who have experience selling entry-level, mid-range and enterprise-class servers, workstations, storage arrays and other hardware. We're especially looking for people who've sold Oracle/Sun Microsystems, Hewlett-Packard, IBM and EMC products.

A83-FFZ2-9AQ-2G-DT Sun Ultra 40 Workstations: Rare and In Stock

webmaster@acclinet.com (Administrator) — Thu, 08 Jul 2010 20:32:14 +0000

We have Sun Ultra 40 Workstations (A83-FFZ2-9AQ-2G-DT) in stock at our facility. These workstations are almost impossible to find at the moment, and they'll surely be out of stock here soon. Call (888) 486-4948 or email specials@acclinet.com for pricing.

POWER7: Massive Multi-threading comes to Power

dmarsch@acclinet.com (Dan Marsch) — Thu, 04 Feb 2010 17:39:20 +0000

IBM's upcoming POWER7 processor will be impressive. It manages to bring a much larger number of cores and threads while maintaining a higher clock rate of about 4GHz than anyone else. Although, not as high as POWER6's 5GHz.

It will ship in a few different packages varying the number chips per MCM (multi-chip module): a blade version with a single chip, a dual-chip MCM for the majority of the Power Servers, and a quad-chip MCM for POWER7 IH node, which are currently intended only to be used in the Blue Waters supercomputer. It's temping to think that the quad-chip modules will make it into the high-end Power 595 but a need for liquid cooling at any reasonable clock rate will probably prevent this. This will certainly cause people to be confused about the performance stats of these processors because the number of cores and threads are not the only thing that varies with the three versions. Just to confuse things further, it looks like IBM will offer the single chip and dual-chip MCM with not only 8-core chips but 6-core and 4-core also. The dual-chip "rejects" will most likely only be used in the entry level systems.

A single chip contains a maximum 8-cores with support for 4 SMT threads for a total of 32 threads per chip. Most systems will contain dual-chip MCMs which offer 64 threads per socket. Assuming that IBM offers them in dual-socket books like the POWER6 chips, it will allow for 2048 threads in the top end Power 595 system. Quite a jump from the current max of 128. Perhaps more importantly to most, the Power 520 entry level systems will now have a maximum of 64 threads versus the current 8. That is assuming they are not too expensive to offer in a low end machine. Don't let the list price fool ya: You will most likely need to pay a lot more to turn everything on and then there is OS licensing, etc.

POWER7 is the first chip to use eDRAM (embedded DRAM), which allows for a greater cache size with less transistors and also power savings compared to SRAM (typical processor cache). It is a bit slower but it seems to be worth it, especially because it allowed them to bring the cache onto the chip, which counteracted this side-effect. POWER6 had its L3 cache in separate chips on the MCM. POWER7 will have 32MB L3 cache per chip. For most people, this will translate to 64MB L3 cache per socket, which is by far the largest cache seen so far in any server. The design also has 32KB L1 instruction cache, 32KB L1 data cache, and 256KB L2 cache per core. If IBM used SRAM for the L3 cache instead of eDRAM, 32MB would have required a 2.7 billion transistor design (assuming you could), more than doubling the actual 1.2 billion for the complete POWER7.

There are now 12 execution units per core including the following:

2 fixed-point units
2 load/store units
4 double-precision floating-point units
1 vector unit (supporting VSX)
1 decimal floating-point unit
1 branch unit
1 condition register unit

The pipelines have also been revamped to deal with the new execution units and increased thread count.

A feature missing from POWER6 but used in previous POWER chips, out-of-order execution, is being put back into POWER7. This is not only a performance boost but may allow some people stuck on POWER5 for software reasons to migrate to the POWER7 systems.

The Processors are directly connect as they were with POWER6. In fact, the POWER7 will actually be available as an upgrade for the Power 570 and Power 595 systems (with a few exceptions).

As for memory, POWER7 has two dual-channel DDR3 memory controllers per chip. IBM has stated that these controllers can sustain 100GB/s of bandwidth per chip. This would translate to an aggregated sustained rate of 6.4TB/s (8TB/s theoretical peak) of memory bandwidth.

These numbers aren't confirmed yet but they appear to be off the charts compared to previous generation systems from anyone. Unfortunately, it is also likely their total price tag is too.

Software Matters in Appliances

dmarsch@acclinet.com (Dan Marsch) — Mon, 01 Feb 2010 18:43:16 +0000

The iSCSI provider has been rewritten for Solaris family and has considerably changed the performance. Detailed results can be seen in this blog entry, iSCSI before and after. Some of the performance gain is actually from a change in the processors and effective interprocessor communication but the software was previously the bottleneck. Here is a quick summary:

OLD:

Sun Storage 7410 (Barcelona, 2008 Q4 software)
311 MByte/s
37,056 IOPS (512-byte)

NEW:

Sun Storage 7410 (Istanbul, 2009 Q3+ software)
2.7 GByte/s
318,099 IOPS (512-byte)

Sun and Oracle Acquisition

dmarsch@acclinet.com (Dan Marsch) — Fri, 29 Jan 2010 15:36:45 +0000

Sun Lives!

Sun Microsystems is now a wholly owned subsidiary of Oracle Corporation. All of the current hardware is still being sold and all the older hardware continues the support it had from Sun. More importantly, it ensures Sun's viability. Some people had doubts due to money troubles but Oracle has put an end to that.

SPARC is actually getting a bigger investment and so is Solaris. Virtually every software product, even those that overlap with Oracle's past offerings, is being continued for the foreseeable future.

Good news all around for those who use Sun and the industry as a whole.

IBM Blue Waters Monstrous Bandwidth

dmarsch@acclinet.com (Dan Marsch) — Tue, 12 Jan 2010 14:02:21 +0000

The Blue Waters supercomputer being built by IBM is a game changer, especially in the area of bandwidth. It has 2+ million threads, 2PB of memory with 8PB/s of aggregate memory bandwidth, and over 32,000 2nd generation x16 PCIe slots with 640TB/s aggregate bandwidth.

I based this information on a article written by Timothy Prickett Morgan at The Register, and a little math about how the bandwidth in the switch/hub chip is dedicated. I'm sure there will be more to say when the system is actually installed in 2011.

Communication Bandwidth
per Switch/Hub Chip	per drawer	per supernode	per Blue Waters (512 nodes)
192 GB/s of bandwidth into each Power7 MCM (what IBM called a host connection)
336 GB/s of connectivity to the seven other local nodes(MCMs) on the drawer
240 GB/s of bandwidth between the nodes in a four-drawer supernode	1920GB/s
320 GB/s dedicated to linking nodes to remote nodes	2560GB/s	10240GB/s (10TB/s)
total external inter-node (not including PCIe cards)	4480GB/s
40 GB/s of general purpose I/O bandwidth (PCIe)	320GB/s	1280GB/s	655360GB/s (640TB/s)

Empty spaces in the chart are values which shouldn't be aggregated

Thread Count
4 SMT threads/core
8 cores/chip (32 threads)
4 chips/MCM (128 threads)
8 MCMs/drawer (1024 threads)
4 drawers/supernode (4096 threads)
512 supernode (2,097,152 threads)

Memory Bandwidth
128GB/s per chip
512GB/s per MCM
4TB/s per drawer
16TB/s per supernode
8PB/s

DIMM Count and Memory Size
	Capacity	DIMMs
per DIMM	8GB	1
per MCM	128GB	16
per drawer	1TB	128
per supernode	4TB	512
per Blue Waters	2PB	262144

PCIe
16 x16 PCIe2 per drawer (64 per supernode, 32,768 total)
1 x8 PCIe2 per drawer (4 per supernode, 2,048 total)

Hardware threads are FREE!

dmarsch@acclinet.com (Dan Marsch) — Fri, 25 Sep 2009 18:40:56 +0000

Why split a CPU core into multiple hardware threads? Same reason as always: more power! Now there is another reason. Pricing. Most companies have ignored multiple hardware threads and charged their licensing fees based on core or socket. Assuming they charge anything. So two threads per CPU cuts your price in half, four threads is only 25% and eight is 12.5%. Who offers multiple threads? Well, basically everyone offers Intel's newest chips which allows for two (half price), but who does four or eight? Sun. It looks like it will be years before anyone else does even though Sun has offered four hardware threads since 2005.

Now what is a hardware thread? It's a little extra hardware that allows a core to process multiple software simultaneously or appear to do so. It appears to software that each hardware thread is it's very own CPU (just like cores). There are various ways to implement the feature and some work better on certain workloads than others but there is no single winner. Now if your workload works well with hardware that does 4 or 8 threads (most do) and you pay per core or socket or even system for your software, then wouldn't you like to save 75% to 87.5% on your software? By the way, there are a lot of other attractive features to the systems that support this but they aren't the focus here.

Now if you are buying Oracle, they also give a discount for multiple cores on these Sun systems, 50% discount for the machines with 4 threads and 25% for the machines with 8 threads on top of not charging for the extra threads. That turns out to be 87.5% per thread for the 4 thread machines and 90.625% per thread off for the 8 thread machines. You can also get up to 128 threads in a 1U chassis or a single blade. 256 in a 4U. Now almost 91% less per thread is handy when you have 128 or 256 threads per server. That could be 232 threads for free!

Sun/Oracle at Lightning Speed

dmarsch@acclinet.com (Dan Marsch) — Thu, 25 Jun 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Some of you may have heard Andy Becholstein mention a flash device at one of the Sun events. This device will allow for 80 Sun Flash Modules in a 1U and will do over 1 million IOPS. This level of performance will destroy the competition in almost all workloads.

For those that don't knowm Sun's Flash Modules are basically a SATA SSD in a laptop size SO-DIMM form factor. The initial options will store 32GB(up from estimated 28GB), have a 64MB cache and consume 2.5 watts when active. All the specs match or exceed current SLC SSD offerings. The sleep power is only 100mW, so all 80 in the new array could only use 8W total in sleep power mode. I'm not sure how the term sleep compares with what I would call idle.

You may be thinking, "Big deal. I'll never be able to get one." They are going to charge insane money for it, right? Not necessarily. The flash modules are also being used in the entry-level X2270 and blades so their price is not likely to get too out of hand. The chassis is a JBOD, so it is unlikely to be too pricey. Now it probably won't be the cheapest product fully loaded. Multiplying anything by 80 has a tendency to add up. You'll get a lot for your money though. Phenomenal performance, low power, truly non-volatile, and compact size just to name a few.

For those of you who know how to leverage ZFS, imagine using this as your read and write cache. Along those lines, we will most likely see a 7000 series product that does just that.

It is to be known as the Sun Storage F5100 Lightning Flash, assuming that the Sun name is still around when it comes out. I also think the Lighting Flash part may be dropped but I think it's kinda catchy.

Initial modules will allow for raw storage of 2.5TB per unit and 107TB+ per rack.

Price Check

dmarsch@acclinet.com (Dan Marsch) — Tue, 09 Jun 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Most of us have heard of Linux. It's one of those terms you can hardly miss when talking about computers. So what's so great about it? To sum it up with one phrase: It's free. We all seem to love that word even though it is rarely true. Well, for the purpose of this blog, I will say Linux is 100% truly free. No I'm not pushing Linux, so this assumption is not self serving.

People once (and still do) use something else and turned to Linux because they were being overcharged. So is there anything else that is free? Yes, there are other operating systems that are free. There are various ones, but the one I find notable is Solaris. Why? Because it has been widely used in mission-critical applications since the 80s and has had a large focus on scalability. Solaris is a Unix operating system that found itself abandoned by many for Linux. The main underlying problem was price. Well, after some controversial internal politics and legal maneuvering within Sun they released Solaris as free in 2005 and even placed development in a community-run project named Opensolaris. Problem solved. Thanks to Linux.

Some of you may be concerned with speed or compatibility but Solaris has done much to address this since it became free with numerous world records in performance and a bigger compatibility list than any single distribution of Linux.

Now why not AIX or HP-UX?. Two reasons really. They aren't free. They don't run on x86 architecture, which is by far the majority of the market.

Why not Windows? Let's go with it's not free, although there are many, many other reasons.

There is also hardware backing for Solaris from IBM, HP, Dell, Fujitsu, and of course Sun/Oracle. So will Linux end up being just a price check for Unix?