HP adds blade, SMB servers

HP last week added to its blade server line-up and to its already expansive family of ProLiant servers.

The BL30p blade is ultra-dense and has up to two Xeon processors. As many as 16 blades can fit in a 6U enclosure, twice the number of blades as previous versions. Further, the BL30p can be intermixed in the same enclosure with other blades without affecting power, cooling management or blade interconnects. Designed for application servers or Web hosting, the BL30p can optionally be attached to Fibre Channel storage-area networks.

HP also announced the ProLiant ML110, a server for small and midsize businesses, which the company claims is easy to use and maintain. It is designed to serve as a file server, firewall, Web server or messaging server.

HP also enhanced its integrated management processor integrated into the ML110 with the optional Integrated Lights Out Advanced Pack. The Advanced Pack allows the remote control of media devices so that maintenance time and deployment can be shortened.

The ML110 has internal storage of as much as 320G bytes. It will run both Windows and Linux.

By contrast, Dell has the PowerEdge 600SC, which starts at $400. The 600SC has either a Pentium or Celeron processor but does not ship factory-installed with Windows. Shipped with an operating system the 600SC starts at $1,300.

Low-end servers of this type are especially needed in the small and midsize business market, which is very price-conscious. They also compete with so-called ‘white box vendors,’ which sell servers for as little as $280.

The HP ProLiant ML110 is available now, with Windows Small Business Server, starting at $500. The ProLiant BL30p will be available in the second quarter. It has not been priced yet.