IBM slims blade servers for SMEs, branches

Stephen Withers
Thursday, 14 June 2007 04:14

Your IT - Home IT

Blade servers are usually associated with data centres, but IBM has announced a new model designed to sit on a desktop to suit smaller businesses and branch offices.

The BladeCenter S has no special power or environmental needs, and its compact chassis can accommodate up to six blades plus associated storage and I/O devices. An installation wizard simplifies setup, or IT administrators can preconfigure the systems before shipping them to branch locations where all that's necessary is to plug the BladeCenter into the main supply and the network.

According to IBM officials, it was designed to run typical business functions such as antivirus/firewall, VoIP, email, collaboration, back-up and recovery, and file and print services.

Replacing conventional standalone servers with a blade server reduces the amount of space required, cuts power consumption (and therefore the cooling load) and improves manageability. IBM claims the BladeCenter S can help reduce the 25 to 45 servers used by an average mid-sized company by up to 80 percent.

"Growing businesses with constrained resources have been grappling with ways to leverage technology advances to improve their competitive advantage without increasing costs," said Alex Yost, vice president and business line executive, IBM BladeCenter. "IBM's introduction of a purpose built BladeCenter for small offices and distributed locations will now help smaller firms get the simplification and integration that the biggest companies have been getting from blades, in a package that is optimised for their business."

The BladeCenter S should ship in the fourth quarter. Pricing was not included in the announcement.