Sun Microsystems, Fujitsu expand SPARC Enterprise server line with first systems based on UltraSPARC T2 processor

Together with it`s parent company Fujitsu Limited (TSE:6702) and the mutual partner Sun Microsystems (NASDAQ: JAVA), Fujitsu Siemens Computers has expanded its SPARC Enterprise server line, with the introduction of the SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers - the first servers using the new UltraSPARC T2 processor.

The new SPARC Enterprise servers run the Solaris Operating System (OS) and are ideal platforms for customers needing to achieve increased scale, density and performance, particularly in the Web and application tiers and for online transaction processing (OLTP) and technical workloads.

Built-in, no-cost virtualisation capabilities in the servers also enable IT staff to easily maximise system utilisation, helping to lower the cost of delivering new IT services.

"Our new SPARC Enterprise systems, based on the UltraSPARC T2 processor, are completely changing the economics of application deployment. Our customers will benefit from lower acquisition and operational costs and will receive a better return on assets when using our new SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers," said John Fowler, executive vice-president of Systems Group at Sun Microsystems.

"Our SPARC Enterprise Alliance continues to be of great value to customers," said Jens-Peter Seick, Senior Vice-President of Enterprise Server Business at Fujitsu Siemens Computers.

"The innovative SPARC Enterprise Servers T5120 and T5220 and Solaris OS - combined with Fujitsu Siemens Computers Dynamic Data Centre strategy - benefit customers by providing a very fast, low-cost and secure solution that can run the thousands of commercial and open source applications that are important to our customers. The `Eco-friendliness` of the SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 is an extra benefit to our customers in terms of lowering their environmental costs."

SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers double the number of processing threads and increase floating point capabilities eight times over the previous generation.

The first servers to integrate 10Gb Ethernet technology and I/O directly on the chip, ready for the emerging generation of network-intensive services, allow for 12 times higher network peak bandwidth than competitive servers, without additional NIC costs.

SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 systems are capable of Web serving over four times the number of users, all while maintaining over six times better performance per watt, and while demonstrating industry-leading price/performance, compared to competitive UNIX/RISC-based servers.

By combining 64 processor threads per UltraSPARC T2 processor and open source, no cost virtualisation technology such as Solaris Containers and Logical Domains (LDoms), the SPARC Enterprise 5120 and 5220 servers enable IT staff to achieve high levels of system utilisation.

IT staff can securely deploy many applications on a single SPARC Enterprise T5120 or T5220 server. Consolidating many applications on individual servers results in better resource utilisation, which means lower acquisition cost, lower administration cost and improved flexibility in meeting the constantly changing IT requirements.

The SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers offer more virtualisation flexibility than any other server in its class, with up to 64 isolated domains in a single system, and without the premium charged for proprietary virtualisation solutions.

The new SPARC Enterprise servers have advanced reliability, availability, and serviceability (RAS) features, such as the ability to turn off bad threads, detect multiple memory errors and reallocate bad memory blocks.

The implementation of common Integrated Lights Out Management (ILOM) tools enable the SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers to be integrated and managed within industry-standard enterprise management frameworks and element managers, resulting in decreased installation time, improved time to market, increased agility and reduced management overhead for ongoing maintenance and patching.

Integrating key server features such as networking, interconnect and cryptography not only improves performance but reduces server component counts, which increase reliability. Native on-chip support for 10 of the most common cryptographic ciphers allows the SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers to deliver, with minimal overhead per processor, over 20 times more cryptographic operations per second than competitive x86 processors and 17 times more operations per second than dedicated cryptographic accelerator cards.

The new SPARC Enterprise 5120 and 5220 servers are outperforming the competition with the following record benchmarks:

* SPECweb2005: Best secure Web serving performance, outperforming the HP Proliant DL380G5 server by 1.8x and demonstrating 2.3x better performance per watt than the HP DL585G2 server.
* Lotus R6 iNotes: Breakthrough single-socket mail server performance with exceptional price/performance per user, outpacing IBM x3650 by 2x while delivering 2.1x better performance per watt.

SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers are immediately available for purchase, with pricing starting at EURO 11 500. All Fujitsu-branded, Fujitsu Siemens Computers-branded and Sun-branded SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers will be marketed worldwide. All other features are identical.

For more information, please visit www.fujitsu-siemens.com, www.fujitsu.com, or www.sun.com.

1) SPEC, SPECweb reg tm of Standard Performance Evaluation Corporation. Results from http://www.spec.org/ as of 8 October 2007. Sun SPARC Enterprise T5220 (8 cores, 1 chip) 34000 SPECweb2005, submitted to SPEC for review. HP DL380G5 (8 cores, 2 chips) 20 387 SPECweb2005. HP DL585G2(8 cores, 4 chips) 22 254 SPECweb20055. HP DL585G2 power consumption from HP Power Calculator for system configured with 4 x AMD 8222 3.0GHz processors, redundant PSU, 16 x 4GB DIMMs, 2 x HBAs and 2 x 146GB SAS drives, 80% utilisation on 6/4/07: http://h30099.www3.hp.com/configurator/powercalcs.asp

Sun SPARC Enterprise T5220 power consumption taken from measurements made during the benchmark run.

2) NotesBench R6iNotes Sun SPARC Enterprise 5220 (1x1400 MHz UltraSPARC T1, 64GB), 6 partitions, Solaris [TM] 10, Lotus[R] Domino 7.0.2, 43 000 users, $2.89 per user, 36 240 NotesMark tpm, 584 ms avg NotesBench R6iNotes. NotesBench R6iNotes IBM x3650 (2 x 3GHz Intel Xeon 5160, 24GB), 4 partitions, SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 9.0 SP3, Lotus[R] Domino 7.0, 22,000 users, $3.47 per user, 17 777 NotesMark tpm, 3.056 seconds avg NotesBench R6iNotes. IBM x3650 power consumption from IBM Power configurator for system configured with 2 x Xeon 5160 3.0GHz processors, redundant PSU, 12 x 2GB DIMMs, and 2 x 74GB SAS drives, on 24/8/07: http://www-03.ibm.com/systems/bladecenter/powerconfig/ Sun SPARC Enterprise T5220 power consumption taken from measurements made during the benchmark run.