Key Features - IBM System x3550 M3 Product Manual

Key features

The challenge of a high-performance business is to do more with less—serve more Web pages, handle
more secure connections, support more email users. You need to reduce the costs of doing business and
improve the service you deliver to your customers while lowering your overall risk. The dual-socket IBM
System x3550 M3 can reduce your costs with its energy-smart design. It can improve service with
reduced operational complexity and increased management functionality. It will lower your IT risk with the
resiliency that comes from having no single point of failure. And like all IBM servers, the x3550 M3 offers
you the trust that comes from IBM global reach, service, and support.
Performance
The x3550 M3 offers numerous features to boost performance and reduce costs:
Up to two 6-core Xeon 5600 series processors offering superior performance. Xeon 5600 series
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processors offer up to 54% better performance than the previous generation 5500 series processors
(workload dependent).
Eighteen DIMMs of registered 1333 MHz DDR3 ECC memory provide speed, high availability, and a
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memory capacity of up to 288 GB.
High-performance 6 Gbps SAS RAID controllers and 15K RPM 6 Gbps SAS disk drives in a variety of
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capacities to suit your local storage requirements.
The use of solid-state drives (SSDs) instead of or along with traditional spinning drives (HDDs) can
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significantly improve I/O performance. An SSD can support 20,000 I/O operations per second (IOPS)
whereas a typical HDD handles fewer than 500 IOPS.
Flexibility and scalability
The x3550 M3 has the ability to grow with your application requirements with these features:
Very high density computing in a 1U dual-socket server.
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A choice of 4-core or 6-core processors with clock rates from 1.6 GHz to 3.6 GHz.
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18 DIMM sockets allowing memory expansion of up to 288 GB.
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A choice of power supplies including 460 W, 675 W AC or DC, or energy-efficient 675 W.
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Five USB 2.0 ports available - two front, two rear, and one internal for an embedded hypervisor.
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Storage bay flexibility: Up to eight hot-swap 2.5" drive bays for SAS or SATA HDDs, or solid-state
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drives (intermixing supported); or four 2.5" bays plus an internal optical drive bay.
Direct-attach SAS storage with the EXP2512, EXP2524, and EXP3000 storage enclosures is

supported. IBM System Storage servers, including network-attached storage (NAS), and iSCSI or
Fibre Channel-attached storage, can also be attached.
The x3550 M3 provides two PCI Express (PCIe) 2.0 x16 I/O slots for increased network or storage

connectivity.
Manageability and security
Powerful systems management features simplify local and remote management of the x3550 M3:
The x3550 M3 includes an Integrated Management Module (IMM) to monitor server availability,
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perform Predictive Failure Analysis, and trigger IBM Systems Director alerts.
IBM System x3550 M3 2