IBM BladeCenter HS21 Product Manual

Workhorse 2-socket dual and quad-core Intel Xeon blade server

Product Guide

May 2008

Product Overview

CONTENTS
Product Overview 1
Selling Features 2
Key Features
5
Key Options 10
HS21 Images 11
HS21 Specifications 12
The Bottom Line 14
Blade Workload Matrix
15
For More Information 16
Legal Information 16
1
Actual data transfer speed will vary and is often less than the maximum possible. Gigabit Ethernet transfer speed requires support on both
system and server, and appropriate network infrastructure.
Please see the Legal Information section for important notices and information.
IBM BladeCenter HS21
Uncompromising 2-socket blade server for business-
critical or telecommunications applications
Suggested uses: Front-and mid-tier applications requiring high performance, enterprise-class
availability and extreme flexibility and power efficiency.
Today's data center environment is tougher than ever. You are looking to reduce IT cost,
complexity, space requirements, power consumption and heat output, while increasing flexibility,
utilization and manageability. Incorporating IBM
®
BladeCenter HS21 blade server, combined with the various BladeCenter chassis, can help
you accomplish all of these goals.
Reducing an entire server into as little as .5U of rack space does not mean trading away
features and capabilities for smaller size. Each HS21 blade server offers features comparable to
many 1U rack-optimized full-featured servers: The HS21 supports up to two of the latest high-
performance or low-voltage quad- and dual-core Intel
processors are designed with 4MB or 6MB (dual-core), or 8MB or 12MB (quad-core) of L2
cache, a leading-edge 1066MHz or 1333MHz front-side bus (FSB), and 64-bit extensions
(EM64T), to help provide the computing power you require to match your business needs and
growth. The HS21 supports up to 32GB of 667MHz PC2-5300 Fully Buffered ECC (Error
Checking and Correcting) double data rate II (DDR2) memory in 8 DIMM slots, using the
Memory and I/O Expansion Unit, with optional Chipkill
reliability. The base HS21 is packaged as a single-wide (30mm) blade and supports up to 16GB
of memory in 4 DIMM slots.
Integrated dual Gigabit Ethernet
and offering TOE (TCP Offload Engine) support, load-balancing and failover capabilities. The
Memory and I/O Expansion Unit provides two additional Gigabit Ethernet controllers (without
TOE support). Via optional expansion cards, each blade can also connect to additional Ethernet,
Myrinet, Fibre Channel, iSCSI, InfiniBand
housed in the chassis. Optional 2-port Expansion Cards add additional fabrics to the HS21
server as needed. This blade is designed with power management capability to provide the
maximum uptime possible for your systems. In extended thermal conditions or power
brownouts, rather than shut down completely, or fail, the HS21 automatically reduces the
processor frequency to maintain acceptable thermal and power levels.
All HS21 models offer impressive features at an equally impressive price, including up to two
SAS hard disk drives, with RAID-0 data striping or RAID-1 disk mirroring support standard, or
support for two SATA-based 15.8GB Solid State Drives, or two SATA-based 31.4GB Solid
State Drives. An optional 30mm Storage and I/O Expansion Unit connects to a blade (model-
dependent) to provide an additional three 2.5" SAS HDDs with hot-swap support, optional
RAID-5 with battery-backed cache, and four additional communication ports. Moreover, the
HS21 is optimized for diskless operation, offering each blade server access to essentially
unlimited storage capacity via Fibre Channel or iSCSI.
A single BladeCenter E or BladeCenter H chassis supports up to 14 hot-swappable 30mm-
wide HS21 blades in only 7U (BladeCenter E) or 9U (BladeCenter H) of rack space or up to 8
hot-swappable blades in the rugged 8U BladeCenter T chassis or up to 12 in the 12U
BladeCenter HT high-speed telecommunications chassis, including NEBS-3/ETSI-compliant
blade servers. In addition to the blade servers, these chassis also hold up to four (BladeCenter
E/BladeCenter T) communication switches, or up to eight or ten switches/bridges
(BladeCenter HT and H, respectively) internally. Not only can this save significant data center
space (and therefore the cost of floor space and rack hardware) compared to 1U servers, it also
consolidates switches/bridges and cables for reduced complexity and lower cabling costs, and
allows clients to manage everything in the solution as one. Using a BladeCenter E chassis, up to
® ™
X-Architecture
® ®
Xeon processors. The Xeon
™
protection, for high performance and
1
controllers are standard, providing high-speed data transfers
™,
and other high-speed communication switches
features, the IBM
1.