Memory Subsystem; Registered Dimm; Memory Placement Rules - IBM Power 710 Technical Overview And Introduction

2.3 Memory subsystem

The Power 710 is a one-socket system supporting a single POWER7 processor module. The
server supports a maximum of eight DDR3 DIMM slots, with four DIMM slots included in the
base configuration and four DIMM slots available with an optional memory riser card. Memory
features (two memory DIMMs per feature) supported are 4 GB, 8 GB, 16 GB, and 32 GB
running at speeds of 1066 MHz. A system with the optional memory riser card installed has a
maximum memory of 128 GB.
The Power 730 is a two-socket system supporting up to two POWER7 processor modules.
The server supports a maximum of 16 DDR3 DIMM slots, with four DIMM slots included in the
base configuration and 12 DIMM slots available with three optional memory riser cards.
Memory features (two memory DIMMs per feature) supported are 4 GB, 8 GB, 16 GB, and
32 GB running at speeds of 1066 MHz. A system with three optional memory riser cards
installed has a maximum memory of 256 GB.
These servers support an optional feature called Active Memory Expansion (#4795) that
allows the effective maximum memory capacity to be much larger than the true physical
memory. This feature executes innovative compression or decompression of memory content
using processor cycles in order to provide memory expansion up to 100% depending on the
workload type and its memory utilization. A server with a maximum of 128 GB can effectively
be expanded up to 256 GB. This can enhance virtualization and server consolidation by
allowing a partition to do significantly more work with the same physical amount of memory or
a server to run more partitions and do more work with the same physical amount of memory.

2.3.1 Registered DIMM

Industry-standard DDR3 Registered DIMM (RDIMM) technology is used to increase reliability,
speed, and density of memory subsystems.

2.3.2 Memory placement rules

These memory options are orderable:
4 GB (2 x 2 GB) Memory DIMMs, 1066 MHz (#EM04)
8 GB (2 x 4 GB) Memory DIMMs, 1066 MHz (#EM08)
16 GB (2 x 8 GB) Memory DIMMs, 1066 MHz (#EM16)
32 GB (2 x 16 GB) Memory DIMMs, 1066 MHz (#EM32)
A minimum of 1 GB memory per core on the 4-core POWER7 modules and 2 GB memory per
core on the 6-core and 8-core POWER7 modules is required. There can be different valid
memory configurations that meet the minimum requirement.
The maximum memory supported is as follows:
Power 710: 128 GB (four 16 GB DIMMs on each of two memory cards)
Power 730: 256 GB (four 16 GB DIMMs on each of four memory cards)
Remember: DDR2 memory (used in POWER6 processor-based systems) is not
supported in POWER7 processor-based systems.
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IBM Power 710 and 730 Technical Overview and Introduction