Network infrastructure

Access routers, blade servers, dual WAN routers, Ethernet backbone and workgroup switches, wireless network gear

By Christine Burns and Keith Shaw, Network World, 02/28/05

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Winner: IBM's BladeCenter with HS20 Blade Server

The IBM BladeCenter is one of an emerging group of products that have evolved to accommodate more computing power inside shrinking data center spaces. These systems pull together multiple application servers, network switching devices and network storage appliances in a single, small footprint. And BladeCenter is accommodating, more so than the competitive server blade configurations we tested.

When it comes to raw Web and network I/O performance of the blade servers, IBM's BladeCenter chassis and HS20 Blade Server combination stands on par with competing products from HP and RLX Technologies. What puts BladeCenter above the rest is IBM Director, the most useful and flexible management application of the lot, says Thomas Henderson, a Network World Lab Alliance partner. Director supplements the functionality of the management module blade that plugs into the BladeCenter backbone and offers a welcome superset of functionality over those supplied in the module. It can help ease deployment and ongoing administration of the IBM blade system in large data centers and remote branch offices alike.

Using IBM Director, you can manage the BladeCenter chassis and all components including the Brocade Communications and QLogic storage-area network (SAN) and Cisco Ethernet switches that slide into it. The Director query process discovers each item sitting in the chassis, then delivers information about the devices to the Director database. The Director GUI then taps into that data to help administrators manage the components in great detail.

"Director is the greatest strength of the IBM BladeCenter and was a pleasure to use," Henderson notes.

Update THE PRODUCT: Since our August test, IBM has become even more accommodating with its Blade- Center system, bringing InfiniBand switching into its chassis via a partnership with Topspin Communications and supporting Layer 2-7 switching through a deal with Nortel. IBM also has opened its technical specification to partners wanting to design blades for plugging into BladeCenter. Additionally, IBM has tailored its longtime UpdateXpress utility — a simple tool that helps push out server BIOS and code updates to its devices — so it can be used to update all portions of the Blade- Center, including server blades, expansion cards and management, storage and Ethernet switch modules. And, to let more legacy applications run on blade form factors, IBM released a PCI Expansion Unit that lets customers install two traditional PC cards into the same blade. In October, IBM rolled out a new HS20 800 blade that supports a 64- bit Intel configuration featuring the Nocona processor and new small form factor SCSI hard disk drives for greater performance and capacity. At the same time, IBM introduced the JS20 PowerPC blade to the BladeCenter family. This lets Unix and Linux applications run side by side with Windows programs.

PRODUCT MASTERMIND

The man: Dhruv Desai, distinguished engineer

Job duties: He acts as lead system architect for BladeCenter.

Favorite Feature: BladeCenter's ability to integrate storage, networking and KVM/management switching inside the chassis, which means faster deployment times, fewer cables, lower cost and easier management.

Finalists Dell’s PowerConnect 6024 Gigabit Ethernet Layer 3, 24-port switch earned a Clear Choice Award because of its fine mix of performance, features and price. Targeted for data center server connectivity, wiring closet aggregation and core switching for smaller networks or branch offices, this gear features serious routing protocol support, physical redundancy, QoS and access control lists, all for about $3,000. Extreme Networks’ Summit 400-48t earned its finalist spot because it pushes the bar on gigabit to the desktop. The switch’s high port density, rich feature set and good performance make it a strong candidate for network managers looking to add capacity to their wiring closets. HP’s BL20p G2 Blade Server and BL30p Blade placed a strong second in our test of server blade combinations. The blade server, which posted strong individual blade performances, features many configuration and management tools for managing the server blades, and a number of other network and storage switches you can plug into the 6U server chassis.