Cut your server and service costs by up to 70 percent, power and cooling costs by up to 62 percent, and footprint in half versus competing
rackmount servers. With the fastest processors, up to 4x the memory and up to 20x the I/O capacity versus competing blade servers - now run your
most demanding enterprise and technical computing applications on a modular server form factor.
Nearly every IT organization is using, or planning to use, some virtualization technology that can run
multiple operating systems and/or application instances concurrently, thus allowing for better space
utilization, power and cooling efficiencies, as well as management costs reduction.
The combination of the Sun Blade X8440 server module and VMware Virtual Infrastructure 3 software provides
a highly modular virtualization platform, as demonstrated by a record-breaking VMmark score of 7.37 @ 5 tiles,
among all systems with dual-core processors. Fueled by VMware ESX Server 3.5.0 hypervisor, that abstracts server
CPU, memory, and I/O resources into multiple virtual machines, the VMware Infrastructure 3 software takes full
advantage of AMD Virtualization (AMD-V) technology that comes standard with Sun Blade X8440 server modules,
equipped with four dual-core AMD Opteron Model 8222 processors.
It's worth mentioning that Sun has conducted tests and published results with both the most recent (VMware ESX
Server 3.5.0) and the most popular (VMware ESX Server 3.0.2) versions of the VMware Infrastructure software using
identical hardware configuration. The measured performance boost of 5%, proves that the latest version of the software
is indeed the best performing one to date.
VMmark is a free tool developed by VMware Inc. as a standard methodology for comparing virtualized systems. The
benchmark allows hardware vendors, virtualization software vendors and other organizations to measure the overall
performance and scalability of individual applications running in x86 virtualized environments. The benchmark suite
captures some of today's most commonly executed workloads such as e-mail server, Java-based application server, web
server, commercial database, file server, and an idle standby server. These six diverse workloads run concurrently
on top of their respective operating system instances and are organized in a unit of work that is called tile. Each
virtual machine in a tile is tuned to use only a fraction of the system's total resources thus requiring the execution
of multiple tiles simultaneously to achieve peak performance.
In addition to being the best in its class, Sun's publication marks the first and only result that utilizes blade
server architecture and highlights the very modular nature of that offering, as well as effectively dispels the myth
that the blade form-factor has disadvantages versus rack-mount systems. On the contrary, this benchmark proves that
the Sun Blade X8440 server module can support up to 30 fully fledged VM instances (5 tiles) per blade server and up
to 300 instances per 19 rack unit (RU) Sun Blade 8000 chassis, thus allowing for even better operational efficiencies.
For example, to support 300 VM instances, ten similarly equipped Dell PowerEdge 6950 rack-mount servers, with the posted
VMmark score of 7.11 @ 5 tiles, are needed. These servers will occupy a whopping 40 RU, or almost an entire 42 RU rack.
In comparison, Sun's solution takes less than half of that space, while delivering better performance.
Furthermore, to support these many tiles, efficient and reliable external storage is required. To satisfy that need,
Sun StorageTek 2540 fiber channel arrays (48 disks total) were used. These arrays offer enterprise-class, reliable
RAID-protected storage functionality in a high-density 2 RU package and are well suited for virtualization environments.
By contrast, the above mentioned Dell's setup required 60 disk drives, yielding a 25% storage advantage for Sun.
Taking advantage of the latest design innovations and with the help of
the Solaris 10 OS and Sun Studio 12 compiler, the Sun Blade X8440
Server Module, equipped with four AMD Opteron Model 8222 processors,
topped the charts with 8-thread World Record on the industry-standard
SPECompM2001 benchmark. The test is comprised of multiple applications
that are used in high-energy physics, weather modeling, computational
chemistry, mechanical design and several other disciplines, and consists
of medium and large problem sets. On the medium problem set , the Sun
Blade X8440 server module has broken the previous world record with 8
cores/4 chips/8 threads SPECompM2001 score of 24,24
Cut your server and service costs by up to 70 percent, power and cooling costs by up to 62 percent, and footprint in half versus competing
rackmount servers. With the fastest processors, up to 4x the memory and up to 20x the I/O capacity versus competing blade servers - now run your
most demanding enterprise and technical computing applications on a modular server form factor.
Showcasing one of the best-of-breed solutions available today, the Sun Blade 8000 Modular System, outfitted with 10 of the
fastest Sun Blade X8420 server modules and running the Solaris 10 Operating System (OS), produced a new world record on the SPECjAppServer2004
benchmark. This result highlights the performance of BEA WebLogic BEA 9.2 Application Server running on Sun's high-end enterprise x64 platform
and demonstrates the ability to run the entire application server tier of SPECjAppServer2004 benchmark within a single blade server chassis.
SPECjAppServer2004 is a multi-tier benchmark for measuring the performance of Java 2 Enterprise Edition (J2EE) technology-based application
servers that was developed to aid potential users in understanding the capabilities of different solutions under heavy load. SPECjAppServer2004
is an end-to-end application which heavily exercises all parts of the underlying infrastructure that make up the application environment,
including hardware, JVM software, database software, JDBC drivers, and the system network.
The benchmark configuration consisted of the following major components:
Hardware
Sun Blade 8000 Modular System (AMD Opteron-based with 80 cores/40 chips)
Sun Fire E6900 server (SPARC IV+ -based with 48 cores/24 chips)
Sun StorageTek 3510 FC arrays (4 units)
Software
Solaris 10 OS
BEA WebLogic 9.2 Advantage Edition
Java 2 Platform Standard Edition Development Kit 5.0 Update 10 (32-bit)
IBM DB2 Database Version 8.2.6 (64-bit)
This top-shelf solution demonstrated unprecedented performance and produced the record breaking result of 7174.56 SPECjAppServer2004 JOPS@Standard within
a single Sun Blade 8000 chassis, running in just 1/2 of a standard 19" rack. Distributed across 10 Sun Blade X8420 Server Modules, the application servers
interacted with the database tier which was implemented via the Sun Fire E6900 server, equipped with 24 UltraSPARC IV+ processors and running IBM DB2 8.2.6
database on Solaris 10 OS.
From the competitive standpoint, this SPECjAppServer2004 benchmark submission demonstrates the performance advantage against the Itanium-based HP result of
6812.79 SPECjAppServer2004 JOPS@Standard, that was achieved with 11 HP rx3600 servers (44 cores, 22 chips) and the HP 9000 Superdome (64 cores, 32 chips)
as a database server. Furthermore, Sun's blade solution is 64% better than IBM's top blade solution that produced the score of 4368.02 SPECjAppServer2004
JOPS@Standard and is Intel Xeon-based with 20 IBM xSeries BladeCenter HS20 blades (40 cores, 40 chips) and IBM eServer p5 570 server (16 cores, 8 chips).
The SPEC CPU2006 benchmark, which supersedes the SPEC CPU2000 suite, provides a broader variety of workloads and better real-world applicability of the results and consists of two benchmark suites where one suite measures and compares compute-intensive integer performance and the other measures and compares floating point performance. Beating the competition to the punch, the Sun Blade X8420 server module equipped with the fastest available Dual-Core AMD Opteron(TM) processors posted the record x86 throughput scores on both suites. The new benchmark exercises a computer's processor, memory architecture, and compilers on a variety of compute intensive workloads, including protein sequencing, MPEG-4 decoding, XML processing, fluid dynamics, structural mechanics, and speech recognition.
True innovation and best-in-class design of this system, in combination with the Solaris 10 Operating System and Sun Studio 11 software -- Sun's freely available development tool for Solaris and Linux Operating Systems -- allowed the Sun Blade X8420 server module to produce the record-breaking SPECint_rate2006 score of 93.1 and the SPECfp_rate2006 result of 87.3.
The SPEC OMPM2001 is a key benchmark that is used to compare the performance of shared memory servers executing compute-intensive scientific applications. It represents a collection of applications that are used in high-energy physics, weather modeling, computational chemistry, mechanical design and several other areas, and consists of medium and large problem sets. The Sun Blade X8420 server module, equipped with the four fastest Dual-Core AMD Opteron processors, has broken the previous world record and is now the fastest system running 8 threads. Backed by the latest versions of the Solaris 10 OS and Sun Studio 11 software, Sun's blade server surpassed the competition by posting 8 cores/4 chips/8 threads SPECompM2001 score of 23224 on the medium size problem set. That score bested the latest competing 8 thread SPECompM2001 result of
19983, achieved by 4 cores/2 chips IBM System p5 550, by 16%.
Cut your server and service costs by up to 70 percent, power and cooling costs by up to 62 percent, and footprint in half versus competing
rackmount servers. With the fastest processors, up to 4x the memory and up to 20x the I/O capacity versus competing blade servers - now run your
most demanding enterprise and technical computing applications on a modular server form factor.
The Sun Blade 8000 Modular System running BEA WebLogic 9.2, produced a
record breaking result that showcases the exceptional performance of BEA
WebLogic Server running on Sun's high-end, enterprise x64 platform and
demonstrates the ability to run the entire application server tier of
the benchmark within a single blade server chassis.
SPECjAppServer2004 is an end-to-end multi-tier benchmark which heavily
exercises all parts of the underlying infrastructure that make up the
application environment, including hardware, JVM software, database
software, JDBC drivers, and the system network.
The software part of the solution was based upon BEA WebLogic 9.2,
Advantage Edition, Java 2 Platform Standard Edition Development Kit 5.0
Update 6 (32-bit), and IBM DB2 Database Version 8.2.5 (64-bit).
The hardware part of the solution consisted of a single fully populated
Sun Blade 8000 Modular system with ten Sun Blade x8400 Server Modules
(80 cores, 40 chips) and Sun Fire E6900 server (48 cores, 24 chips). The
combined Sun and BEA solution produced the result of 6662.98
SPECjAppServer2004 JOPS@Standard. This result is 36% higher than HP's
best result of 4915.49 SPECjAppServer2004 JOPS@Standard that was
obtained with four HP rx6600 servers (32 cores, 16 chips) and HP 9000
Superdome server (64 cores, 32 chips). Additionally, Sun's blade
solution is 53% better than IBM's top blade solution that produced the
score of 4368.02 SPECjAppServer2004 JOPS@Standard and based on twenty
IBM xSeries BladeCenter HS20 blades (40 cores, 40 chips) and IBM eServer
p5 570 server (16 cores, 8 chips).
Using the most recent ECC version 5.0 of SAP software, the Sun Blade
X8400 server module, equipped with four AMD Opteron Model 885 processors
(8 cores/8 threads) and 32 GB of RAM, posted a result of 1700 benchmark
users, on Windows 2003 R2 Enterprise x64 Edition Operation System (OS)
with SQL Server 2005 database. The benchmark results fully comply with
the SAP Benchmark Council regulations and have been audited and
certified by SAP AG with Certification number 2006059, on August 21, 2006.
The SAP SD benchmark emulates typical business workloads, consisting of
complete order and invoice processing, demonstrates the ability to run
both the application and database software on a single system, and
represents the critical tasks performed in real-world e-business
environments.
This result outperforms the Fujitsu Siemens PRIMERGY BX630 blade server
by 13%. The BX630 blade server was configured with four AMD Opteron
Model 880 processors (8 cores/8 threads) and 32 GB of RAM and ran SAP
ECC version 5.0 with SQL Server 2005 database on Windows Server 2003
Enterprise Edition OS, producing a result of 1500 benchmark users that
was certified by SAP with the Certification number 2006021, on April 7,
2006.
Additionally, Sun's score is better than the HP ProLiant DL580 G4 server
by 29%. The HP ProLiant DL580 server was configured with four 3GHz Intel
Xeon processors (8 cores/16 threads) and 32 GB of RAM and ran SAP ECC
version 5.0 with SQL Server 2005 database on Windows 2003 R2 Enterprise
Edition OS, producing a result of 1315 benchmark users that was
certified by SAP with the Certification number 2006025, on May 19, 2006.
Based on real world applications, the SPEC CPU2000 benchmark measures the performance of the processor, memory and compiler on the tested system across two benchmark suites. One suite measures and compares compute-intensive integer performance and the other measures and compares floating point performance. The Sun Blade X8400 server module equipped with the fastest Dual-Core AMD Opteron(TM) processors and running SuSE Linux (SLES9), beats the competition with SPECint_rate2000 result of 156. In combination with Solaris 10 OS and Sun Studio 11 software, Sun's blade server surpasses the competition on floating point throughput metric with the SPECfp_rate2000 result of 182.
This industry standard SPEC OMP benchmark is used to compare the performance of shared memory servers executing compute-intensive scientific applications and consists of medium and large problem sets. The Sun Blade X8400 server module with four Dual-Core AMD Opteron processors, running Solaris 10 OS and Sun Studio 11 software is the world's fastest 4 socket system running 8 threads. This winning combination allowed Sun's blade server to surpass the competition by posting 4chip/8core/8thread SPECompM2001 score of 19653, which beats HP's 4chip/8core/8thread result of 17948 by 9.5% on the medium size problem set.
The Sun Blade X8400 server module, equipped with four of the fastest Dual-Core AMD Opteron processors available, set the new x86 world record on the SPECjbb2005 benchmark with the score of 121,228 SPECjbb2005 bops (30,307 SPECjbb2005 bops/JVM), using Solaris 10 Operating System. This benchmark emulates the design of real-world server-side Java applications and provides an accurate reflection of the business logic and objects, while stressing the implementation of the Java Virtual Machine (JVM) and the scalability of the system's processors and memory.
Four Sun Blade X8400 server modules, each equipped with four dual-core AMD Opteron CPUs and running 64-bit SuSE Linux (SLES9) OS, have formed a 32-core cluster that demonstrated outstanding performance on one of the most popular MCAE applications - FLUENT. The software solves fluid flow problems, is based on a numerical technique called computational fluid dynamics (CFD) and is heavily used in the automotive, aerospace and consumer products industries.
The FLUENT Version 6.2.16 benchmarking suite has a set of problems from nine industrial CFD applications that are selected to demonstrate the performance of FLUENT on a variety of hardware platforms. The problems are divided into three varying in size classes: Small, Medium and Large. Vendors benchmark their systems with the principal objective of providing comparative performance information for FLUENT software that, among other things, depends on compilers, optimization, interconnect, and the performance characteristics of the hardware.
When compared to other clusters listed on Fluent web site that have the same number of cores, Sun's solution, interconnected using InfiniBand technology via Voltaire Grid Director ISR 9096 switch, performs better than similarly configured solutions based on AMD Opteron processors and low latency interconnect. Specifically, the Sun Blade X8400-based cluster beats the IBM BladeCenter system, based on LS20 blades and Myrinet low latency interconnect, as well as the HP ProLiant DL 585-based cluster. Additionally, the scalability of Sun's offering stayed around 90%, as the cluster grew in size up to the maximum of 32 cores.
Sun Blade X8400 server module
4xAMD Opteron Model 885 CPU, 32 GB RAM, 64-bit SLES9 OS
The Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation (SPEC) is a non-profit corporation formed to establish, maintain and endorse a standardized set of relevant benchmarks that can be applied to the newest generation of high-performance computers. SPEC develops suites of benchmarks and also reviews and publishes submitted results from their member organizations and other benchmark licensees.
Standard Application Benchmarks test and prove
the scalability of mySAP Business Suite. The benchmark results provide
basic sizing recommendations for customers by testing new hardware,
system software components, and Relational Database Management Systems
(RDBMS). They also allow for the comparison of different system
configurations. The benchmarking procedure is standardized and well
defined. It is monitored by the SAP Benchmark Council made up of
representatives of SAP and technology partners involved in benchmarking.
The SAP Standard Application Benchmarks can also be used to test and
verify scalability, concurrency and multi-user behavior of system
software components, RDBMS, and business applications. All performance
data relevant to system, user, and business applications are monitored
during a benchmark run and can be used to compare platforms and as basic
input for sizing recommendations.
Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun logo, Java, J2EE, Sun Fire and The
Network Is The Computer are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun
Microsystems, Inc. in the United States and other countries. SPEC and
the benchmark names SPECint, SPEComp, SPECfp, SPECjAppServer and SPECjbb
are registered trademarks of the Standard Performance Evaluation
Corporation. Sun's results have been submitted to SPEC. Competitive data
obtained from http://www.spec.org
as of the date located next to the respective claim. See the website for latest
results. For comparison purposes, the terms CPU, chip and processor are used
interchangeably. Each chip has two or four cores. Each socket can accommodate one chip.
SAP, R/3, mySAP reg TM of SAP AG in Germany and other countries. For the latest results
and additional information visit www.sap.com/benchmark.
VMware VMmark is a product of VMware, an EMC Company. VMmark utilizes SPECjbb2005(TM) and SPECweb2005(TM), which are available from the Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation (SPEC). Results from http://www.vmware.com/products/vmmark/.
