A highly available and expandable, rack-dense, 1U dual-socket SMP server, for application
serving in Web environments
Please see the Legal Information section for important notices and information.
1
Product Guide
March 2008
IBM
System x3550
Product Overview
CONTENTS
Product Overview
1
Selling Features
1
Key Features
4
Key Options
11
x3550 Images
12
x3550 Specifications
13
The Bottom Line
16
For More Information
18
Legal Information
18
Outstanding performance and manageability in only 1U
Suggested Uses:
Medium-to-large businesses requiring a general-purpose server in space-
constrained data centers, and Scientific/Technical computing customers who require
cluster
nodes.
Your challenge is to do more with less—serve more Web pages, handle more secure
connections, support more e-mail users—all while reducing costs and saving space. The
dual-
socket
IBM
®
System
x3550
, incorporating IBM
X-Architecture
™
features, meets that challenge.
It supports the latest
quad-
and
dual-core
Intel
®
Xeon
™
processors (including
50W low-voltage
quad-core
Xeon processors), designed with up to a leading-edge
1333MHz
front-side bus (FSB),
64-bit extensions
(
EM64T
), and either
6MB
or
4MB
(dual-core) or
8MB
or
12MB
(quad-core) of
L2 cache, to help provide you with the computing power you need to match your business needs
and growth. In addition, the x3550 uses industry-standard
fully buffered
667MHz
memory with
Chipkill
™
ECC
(Error Checking and Correcting) protection—for high performance and reliability.
For even higher levels of availability, the x3550 also offers a choice of optional online hot-spare
memory or memory mirroring.
Dual
integrated high-speed
Gigabit Ethernet
controllers with
TOE
(TCP Offload Engine) and
Jumbo Frame
support are standard, as are high-performance adapter
slots (
PCI-E x8
and optional
PCI-X/133
).
All models offer impressive scalability, including dual-processor support, up to
32GB
of memory
and a choice of high-performance hard disk drives with an internal storage capacity of
600GB
(
two 3.5-inch hot-swap Serial-Attached SCSI
),
587.2GB
(
four 2.5-inch hot-swap SAS
) or
2TB
(
two 3.5-inch simple-swap Serial ATA II
).
The integrated SAS controller provides
hardware
-based
RAID-0/1/10
standard for SAS drives. (SATA models offer
firmware
-based RAID
0/1 support standard.) Additional RAID support is available via the optional IBM ServeRAID
™
family of SAS and SATA controllers. The ultradense
1U
form factor allows businesses to increase
their computing power and spread their workload without outgrowing their current data center. Up
to
42
of these
1U
servers can be installed in a single 42U rack, for a total of up to
84
processors,
offering tremendous deployment flexibility. Optional Advanced Connectivity Technology (
ACT)
interconnect cabling reduces cable clutter and cost and minimizes installation time when
interconnecting many rack-mounted servers.
Standard in the x3550 is an integrated Baseboard Management Controller (BMC) that enables
the user to manage and control the server easily—both locally and remotely. This high level of
manageability is designed to keep costs down and the system up—even when network usage
increases. The drop-down
light path diagnostics
panel enables quick servicing of the system if
a problem develops. These advanced features help maximize network availability by increasing
uptime, as do
simple-swap SATA HDDs
;
hot-swap/redundant SAS
HDDs
,
power
and
fans
;
Active Memory
™
; integrated
RAID
;
temperature-controlled fans
with
Calibrated Vectored
Cooling
™
;
IPMI 2.0
support, including
highly secure remote power control
and
Serial over
LAN
; as well as
text-console redirect over LAN
.
With the inclusion of unique IBM service and support features such as the BMC, light path
diagnostics,
IBM Director
,
IBM Systems Director Active Energy Manager for x86
(formerly
known as PowerExecutive),
IBM ServerGuide
™
and
support for the optional slotless
Remote
Supervisor Adapter
II SlimLine
, the x3550 is designed for superior uptime.
If you need highly manageable, dual-socket/multi-core computing power in a rack-dense
package, the x3550 is the ideal system.
Selling Features
Price/Performance
The x3550 offers numerous features to boost performance and reduce product and operating
costs:
•
Up to
two quad-
or
dual-core
Xeon processors, high-end
1333MHz
or
1066MHz
front side
bus and
4MB
to
12MB
(processor-specific) of integrated Level 2 cache per processor, offer
