IBM System x iDataPlex dx360 M3 Product Guide

A revolutionary new concept for energy-efficient data centers,
using industry-standard components
®

Product Guide
February 2011

IBM System x iDataPlex dx360 M3
Product Overview An innovative integrated data center solution that maximizes
performance and optimizes energy and space efficiencies
Suggested uses: Web 2.0, HPC clusters, and large corporate data processing.
® ® ™
IBM System x iDataPlex servers are modular, highly dense systems, designed around a
CONTENTS highly flexible architecture, for companies running large scale-out data centers that need energy
efficiency, optimized cooling, extreme scalability, high density at the data center level and high
Product Overview 1 performance at an affordable price. iDataPlex solutions can help cost-effectively scale
processing power to meet even the most demanding Web 2.0 and high-performance computing
Selling Features 2
workloads.
Key Features 6 The iDataPlex design is the next-generation data center solution for customers finding
Key Options 17 limitations in their scale-out computing environments. By delivering customized solutions that
help reduce overall data center costs, IBM addresses the business growth challenges in the
iDataPlex Images 19 massive scale-out marketplace. The iDataPlex solution incorporates innovative ways to
integrate x86-based processing performance at the node, rack, and data center levels. The
iDataPlex Specifications 21 iDataPlex solution provides customers with outstanding energy and cooling efficiency, multi-rack
The Bottom Line 25 level manageability, complete flexibility in configuration, and minimal deployment effort.
A typical iDataPlex solution consists of multiple fully populated rack installations. The
Server Comparison 26
groundbreaking iDataPlex solution offers increased density in a new rack design. It uses the
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For More Information 27 dimensions of a standard 42U enterprise rack but can hold 100U of equipment, populated with
up to 84 servers, plus 16 1U vertical slots for switches, appliances, and PDUs (power
Legal Information 27 distribution units).
This added density addresses the major problems that prevent most data centers today from
reaching their full capacity: insufficient electrical power and excess heat.
The energy-efficient design of the iDataPlex servers and chassis can reduce the incoming
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energy requirement by up to 40% vs. standard 1U servers. In addition, the optional liquid-
cooled IBM Rear Door Heat eXchanger mounted to the back of the rack, can remove 100% of
the heat generated within the rack, drawing it from the data center before it exits the rack. In
fact, it can even go beyond that, to the point of helping to cool the data center itself and
reducing the need for Computer Room Air Conditioning units (CRACs). This fact allows racks to
be positioned much closer together, actually eliminating the need for “hot aisles” between rows
of fully populated racks.
With the iDataPlex chassis design, air needs to travel only 18 inches front to back, rather than
the 30-plus inches of a typical enterprise server. This shallow depth is part of the reason the
cooling efficiency of iDataPlex servers is so high—shorter distance means better airflow. In
addition, the new design uses four large 80mm fans per 2U or 3U chassis for more efficiency
and lower noise than the eight small 40mm fans used in standard 1U servers. The increased air
pressure resulting from the shorter distance through the rack and the larger fans makes for one
of the most efficient air-cooled solutions on the market. In fact, unlike most conventional racks,
which are often left largely empty due to power and cooling limitations, the iDataPlex Rack can
be fully populated, while removing all rack heat from the data center (at least 100,000
BTUs/30kW), using the Rear Door Heat eXchanger. In addition, iDataPlex chassis use highly
efficient (92%+) power supplies, reducing energy draw and waste heat further.
The end result is that a well-designed iDataPlex data center can contain as many as 2.6 times
the number of servers and other rack equipment as today’s standard racks and data centers can
support. (More, actually, considering that today’s racks can rarely be fully populated, unlike
iDataPlex racks). In addition, by using 6- or 4-core processors in an iDataPlex solution, rather
than the more prevalent 2-core processors, computing density can be increased by more than 5

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There are 2 additional 1U horizontal slots at the bottom for low-power/infrequent-access devices.
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Using dual Intel LV Xeon processors, 8GB Memory (4 x 2GB), 4 x 500GB SATA HDDs, and 900W power supplies.

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Please see the Legal Information section for important notices and information.


times previous capacity. iDataPlex servers can also help to achieve greater density even if
installed in standard enterprise racks with an optional rail kit, or as part of a growing cluster
configuration that begins with only a few individual chassis.
For ease of serviceability, all hard drive, planar, and I/O access is from the front of the rack.
There is no need to access the rear of the iDataPlex rack for any servicing except for the Rear
Door Heat eXchanger.
The racks are populated with a number of 2U or 3U system chassis. The 2U chassis holds two
trays that slide into the chassis. A tray can contain a server, additional storage, or additional
I/O, and can be combined in a number of different ways to form compute servers, storage
servers, I/O servers, or GPU-intensive servers. This innovative blade-like design helps reduce
power and cooling costs, for more affordable computing.
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As for the servers themselves, they use the latest Intel Xeon 5600 and 5500 Series 6-core
and 4-core processors for high performance combined with energy efficiency. Processor
choices include the highest-performance 95W, lower-cost 80W, and energy-efficient 40W
and 60W Xeon processors.
The Xeon processors are designed with up to 12MB (processor-specific) of shared cache,
leading-edge memory performance (up to 1333MHz, depending on processor model), to help
provide the computing power you require to match your business needs and growth. The dx360
M3 supports up to 192GB of registered double data rate III (DDR3) ECC (Error Checking and
™ 3
Correcting) memory with optional Chipkill protection in 16 DIMM slots for high performance
and reliability. A dual-port integrated high-speed Gigabit Ethernet controller is standard, as are
an additional of Gigabit Ethernet port for dedicated systems management and high-performance
PCIe adapter slots.
All models offer impressive flexibility, including dual-processor support, large memory
capacity and a wide variety of high-performance internal hard disk and backup drive
configurations (using 2U and 3U chassis): up to 12 3.5-inch hot-swap Serial-Attach SCSI
(SAS) drives with an internal storage capacity of 24TB; up to 12 3.5-inch hot-swap Serial ATA
(SATA) drives with an internal storage capacity of 24TB; up to 8 2.5-inch simple-swap SAS
drives (4.8TB); up to 8 2.5-inch simple-swap solid-state drives (400GB); up to 5 simple-
swap 3.5-inch SATA drives (10TB); as well as several other possible configurations, depending
on the chassis and drives used. Optional IBM ServeRAID SAS/SATA controllers provide
multiple RAID levels with high performance. Integrated cable-management features in the rack
help reduce cable clutter, improve behind-rack airflow, and minimize installation time when
interconnecting many rack-mounted servers.
Standard in the iDataPlex server is the IBM Integrated Management Module that enables the
user to manage and control the server easily—both locally and remotely. In conjunction with the
IMM, the dx360 M3 supports an optional Virtual Media Key, which provides additional systems
management capabilities, including remote presence. This high level of manageability is
designed to help keep management costs down and the system up, as are IPMI 2.0 support,
including highly secure remote power control and Serial over LAN, IBM Systems Director,
next-generation BIOS (UEFI), Dynamic Systems Analysis programs, hot-swap/redundant
HDDs, and simple-swap HDDs.
An iDataPlex rack is built with industry-standard components and building blocks for servers,
chassis and networking switches. Racks can be ordered with any combination of configured
chassis installed in the rack. IBM manufacturing sites integrate on-site and test as a complete
solution before shipping fully configured to the customer. Upon receipt at the customer's
location, the rack is uncrated, placed in its proper location, powered up and connected to the
network in minimal time. IBM personnel ensure that the servers and network are functioning
properly before customer acceptance.
If you need a balance of high-performance dual-socket processing and energy-efficiency in a
rack-dense environment, the iDataPlex is the ideal solution.

Selling Features Price/Performance
The iDataPlex offers numerous features to boost performance and reduce product and
operating costs:
• dx360 M3 flexibility allows you to configure a model to fit all budgets. The dx360 M3 offers a
choice of high-performance 6-core, 4-core, or 2-core Xeon 5600 Series and 5500 Series
processors with integrated memory controllers, clock rates from 1.6GHz to 3.2GHz, 4MB to
12MB of shared cache, and energy usage ranging from 40W to 95W. Xeon 5600 Series
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processors offer up to 60% better performance than the previous-generation 5500 Series
processors (depending on workload), while Xeon 5500 Series processors offer up to 225%
better performance than the previous-generation 5400 Series processors and up to 900%

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Chipkill protection on the dx360 M3 requires x4 DIMMs; Chipkill protection is not available with x8 DIMMs.
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Based on Intel measurements.

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better performance than the single-core processors of a few years ago that you may still be
using.
• Low-voltage processors draw less energy and produce less waste heat than higher-voltage
processors, thus helping to reduce data center energy costs. On a per-core basis, the
standard 80W 4-core processors are extremely economical, consuming only 20W per core.
For even greater energy savings, some low-voltage 4- and 6-core Xeon processors consume
only 10W per core.
• dx360 M3 servers using 1333MHz E56xx, L56xx and X56xx processors support 2 DIMMs
per channel (2DPC) at 1333MHz (when using memory running at 1.5V).
• Up to two NVIDIA GPUs offer supercomputer-level graphics processing at x86 prices.
• Up to 192GB of registered DDR3 ECC memory operates at 800MHz to 1333MHz
(depending on the system configuration), for high performance and wide memory bandwidth.
• Depending upon the configuration, up to three high-speed PCIe adapter slots per chassis
offer potential investment protection by supporting high-performance adapters, such as 10Gb
Ethernet, Fibre Channel, InfiniBand and GPU cards.
• The integrated ServeRAID-BR10il v2 controller (model-specific) provides RAID-0/1/1E and
full-duplex (bidirectional 3Gbps) data transfers for SAS/SATA/SSD drives without
consuming a valuable adapter slot. Optional ServeRAID-M5014 and M5015 controllers offer
even higher performance and data security, due to 6GBps throughput, RAID-5/50 support
standard, 256MB or 512MB of onboard cache (controller-specific), standard or optional
battery backup, optional RAID-6/60, and optional self-encrypting drive (SED) support. The
optional ServeRAID-B5015 is similar to the M5015, but optimized for SSDs, offering
greater performance than RAID controllers optimized for HDDs.
• Up to twelve 3.5-inch hot-swap SAS or SATA drives or eight 2.5-inch simple-swap SAS
or SATA drives offer high-performance with high availability. 2.5-inch drives consume
approximately half the power of 3.5-inch drives. 2.5-inch solid-state drives use
approximately 1/5 the power of 2.5-inch HDDs, with triple the reliability and higher read
performance than HDDs.
• The integrated dual-port Gigabit Ethernet controller with IPMI 2.0 support provide high-
speed network communications, and a dedicated 10/100 Ethernet management port is
standard as well.
• A high degree of device integration, including SAS or SATA, dual Gigabit Ethernet, IMM,
and video controllers, helps to lower costs and frees up valuable adapter slots.
• The design of the servers, the rack, and the Rear Door Heat eXchanger, plus the use of low-
voltage processors and memory, as well as energy-efficient fans and power supplies,
help significantly reduce the energy required to power and cool the data center.

Flexibility
The iDataPlex can be configured in a number of ways to best suit your needs, thanks to:
• Up to 2 Xeon 5600 or 5500 Series processors per server (up to 12 cores); up to 84 servers
per iDataPlex rack (up to 1008 cores).
• A choice of processor speeds from 1.6 to 3.2GHz, 4 to 12MB of shared cache, and a choice
of power draws from 40W to 95W.
• A choice of memory speeds from 800MHz to 1066MHz or 1333MHz.
• Sixteen DIMMs of registered DDR3 memory with Chipkill ECC protection provide speed,
high availability, and a memory capacity of up 192GB.
• A choice of either 1.5V DIMMs, or 1.35V DIMMs that consume up to 19% less energy.
• One to three high-performance PCIe adapter slots (depending on configuration).
• A choice of 2U or 3U chassis (server-specific), each supporting two trays containing various
combinations of server(s), storage, and I/O. These trays can be mixed-and-matched in
several combinations, including two 1U servers, a 1U server and a 1U I/O tray, a 1U
server and a 1U storage tray, or a 1U server and a 2U storage tray. 2U and 3U Storage
configurations allow for both hardware RAID adapters and an available PCIe slot for high
bandwidth networking options.
• Anywhere from one to twelve SAS or SATA HDDs (depending on the configuration of
chassis and trays) or up to eight SSDs can be installed in a chassis. This provides from
50GB to 24TB of storage per chassis.
• A choice of power supplies, including high-efficiency 900W nonredundant, high-efficiency

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550W nonredundant supply for lower power needs, and 750W dual-AC power supply.
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• Two USB 2.0 front-mounted ports that are up to 40X faster than older USB 1.1 ports. This
provides speedy access to external flash drives, optical drives, tape drives, and other USB
devices.
• An optional rail kit for standard enterprise racks, and cable routing designs for attaching
storage or heavy-use networking cabling.
• Front-access cabling that can be routed either downwards for raised floor environments or
upwards for installation in a portable data center container or on concrete flooring.
• A choice of direct-attach, network-attached storage (NAS), or iSCSI or Fibre Channel-
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attached storage that can be attached using IBM System Storage servers.

Manageability / Security
Powerful systems management features simplify local and remote management of the
iDataPlex :
• The dx360 M3 server includes an Integrated Management Module (IMM) to monitor server
availability, perform Predictive Failure Analysis, etc., and trigger IBM Systems Director
alerts. The IMM performs the functions of both the Baseboard Management Controller (BMC)
of earlier systems and the Remote Supervisor Adapter II and is upgradeable to remote
presence/cKVM.
• An optional Virtual Media Key provides additional systems management capabilities,
including Web-based out-of-band control; virtual floppy and optical drive support; Windows
“blue screen” error capture; LDAP and SSL support; and remote redirection of keyboard, PCI
video and text, and mouse (cKVM). And it does all this without consuming a valuable adapter
slot.
• Integrated industry-standard Unified Extensible Firmware Interface (UEFI) next-generation
BIOS. New capabilities include:
– Human readable event logs – no more beep codes
– Complete setup solution by allowing adapter configuration function to be moved into
UEFI
– Complete out-of-band coverage by Advance Settings Utility to simplify remote setup
• Text Console Redirection support allows the administrator to remotely view dx360 M3 text
messages over Serial or LAN.
• Integrated Trusted Platform Module (TPM) provides a highly secure start-up process from
power-on through hand-off to the operating system boot loader. ACPI support is provided to
allow ACPI-enabled operating systems to access the security features of this module. (TCG
V1.2-compliant.)
• Industry-standard AES NI support for faster, stronger encryption (in 5600 Series processors
only).
• Integrated IPMI 2.0 supports alerts of anomalous environmental factors, such as voltage and
thermal conditions. It also supports highly secure remote power control using data
encryption.
• IBM Systems Director is included for proactive systems management and works with both
the blade’s internal IMM and the chassis’ management module. It comes with a portfolio of
™
tools, including IBM Systems Director Active Energy Manager , Service and Support
Manager, and others. In addition, IBM Systems Director offers extended systems
management tools for additional server management and increased availability. When a
problem is encountered, IBM Systems Director can issue administrator alerts via e-mail,
pager, and other methods.
• IBM Systems Director Active Energy Manager, an IBM-exclusive, is designed to take
advantage of new system power management features, by monitoring actual power usage
and providing power consumption capping features. More accurate power usage data helps
with data center construction planning and the sizing of power and cooling needs, as well as
allowing you to use available energy more efficiently and capping energy usage by server.

Availability and Serviceability
The iDataPlex provides the right features to simplify serviceability and maintain system uptime:
• A dual AC cord power supply as an optional chassis component for virtualized and storage
intense applications, non-grid workloads, smaller clusters or performing line feed
maintenance.
• dx360 M3 servers offer Chipkill ECC memory protection (when using x4 DIMMs). Chipkill
memory is up to 16X better than standard ECC memory at correcting memory errors. This
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Data transfer rates may be less than the maximum possible.

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can help reduce downtime caused by memory errors.
• The dx360 M3 offers memory mirroring for redundancy in the event of a non-correctable
memory failure
• Solid-state drives offer up to triple the availability (MTBF rates) of conventional SAS HDDs.
This can lessen the need for redundant drives.
• All components can be removed from the front of the rack by sliding out the trays or the
chassis, for easy, quick servicing.
• Optional RAID arrays enable the server to keep operating in the event of a failure to any
one drive.
• IBM Thermal Diagnostics allows the administrator to evaluate thermal data on the server
without taking the hardware offline. This can provide greater server uptime.
• IPMI 2.0 supports highly secure remote system power control using data encryption. This
allows an administrator to restart a server without having to visit it in person, saving travel
time and getting the server back up and running quickly and securely. It also adds new
features to those provided by IPMI 1.5, including VLAN support, Serial over LAN, enhanced
authentication and encryption algorithms (RMCP+ and AES) and a firmware firewall.
• Large, temperature-controlled fans adjust to compensate for changing thermal
characteristics. At the lower speeds they draw less power and suffer less wear. Equally
important in a crowded data center, temperature-controlled fans produce less ambient noise
in the data center than if they were constantly running at full speed.
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• The three-year (parts and labor) limited onsite warranty helps afford you peace of mind
and greater investment protection than a one-year warranty does.

Is iDataPlex the Right Choice?
IBM delivers variety of product innovations that meet specific customer needs. The right product
choice depends on the customer’s business requirements, target applications, and operating
environment. iDataPlex focuses on price/performance per watt; fast, large scale-out
deployments; compute density; customization; targeted workloads; and a data center model for
easily replaceable resources. The iDataPlex hardware platform is positioned for cost-conscious
large enterprise businesses that rely on a recovery-oriented architecture, which enables
redundancy through the software layer instead of redundant hardware.
The iDataPlex architecture is the right choice if you answer Yes to any or all of the following
questions:
1. Do you require a scalable infrastructure to meet changing application demands and
workloads?
2. Are you planning to build a new data center to support HPC, Web or Cloud applications, or
planning to enhance the existing data center environment with additional computing power
using industry-standard x86 processor-based servers?
3. Do you need to reduce operating costs and to improve the energy efficiency of your data
center?
4. Are you spending too much money on cooling your current IT infrastructure?
IBM’s BladeCenter and iDataPlex product platforms each offer advantages over the other. The
following table helps in comparing the two alternatives:

Advan
Attribute iDataPlex -tage
BladeCenter

168 processors in 42U 168 processors in 42U rack
Rack density
rack footprint (2 tiles)
= = footprint (BladeCenter E)

High-efficiency power
High-efficiency power
supplies (92%+);
Energy efficiency
leadership SpecPower;
= = supplies (94%+); 1.35V
DIMM support
1.35V DIMM support

24 x 2000 watt power
42 x 900 watt power
Power circuit feed supplies = 48kW or 230A at
supplies = 37kW or 182A
requirements per rack 208V maximum
at 208V maximum
(BladeCenter E)

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For terms and conditions or copies of the IBM Statement of Limited Warranty, call 800-772-2227 in the U.S. In Canada call 800-
426-2255. Telephone support may be subject to additional charges. For warranties including onsite labor, a technician is sent after
IBM attempts to resolve the problem remotely. International warranty service is available in any country in which this product is
sold.

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Fault tolerance should be Redundant power, cooling,
built into software, midplanes, switches etc.
Fault tolerance
optional dual AC cord Designed for no single
power supply point of failure (all chassis)

288GB, or 320GB DDR3
192GB DDR3 memory
memory capacity in HS22V
Memory performance capacity; 1333MHz
and HX5 servers; 1333MHz
throughput
throughput

High-end 130W Xeon
Processor
95W Xeon processors processors; POWER6/
performance
POWER7 processors

Intel, AMD, IBM POWER,
Processor choices Intel-only IBM PowerXCell™, Cell
Broadband Engine™

12 3.5-inch HDDs per 3U 12 3.5-inch HDDs per 7U
Direct-attach storage
iDataPlex chassis BladeCenter S chassis

Up to 2 supercomputer-
Up to 2 supercomputer-
level GPUs per BPE4 blade
level graphics processing
Graphics
units (GPUs) per 2U = = (1U equivalent for server
plus BPE4 blade inside BC
chassis
E chassis)

Up to 2 servers per 14 servers per BladeCenter
chassis in a rack of up to E chassis in a rack of 6 7U
42 2U chassis (84 chassis (84 servers);
Integration
servers); individually connections built into
cabled externally; midplane, eliminating most
external switches cabling; internal switches

Limited software or Extensive hardware-level
optional hardware management via the
management for up to 84 Advanced Management
Management individual servers per Module for all servers in
rack; remote each chassis; manage up
management of up to to 256 chassis and 3,584
252 servers blades with BOFM

Lower cost due to the
Higher cost due to custom
use of industry-standard
server blade components,
parts, elimination of
inclusion of fault tolerant
Cost many fault tolerant
components and flexible
components and a direct
sales model and additional
sales model and direct
networking layer
port-attached networking

Key Features Chassis
The iDataPlex Rack and Rear Door Heat eXchanger are only part of the solution. The modular
2U Compute configurations design of the iDataPlex system components makes it possible for you to order customized
server solutions that meet the specific needs of your current environment. Yet the ability to
reuse of off-the-shelf parts means we can keep the cost of the solution quite low.
The iDataPlex architecture promotes flexibility through the use of multiple chassis offering
multiple configurations of servers, I/O, and storage, using IBM Flex Node technology.
• The iDataPlex dx360 M3 server tray provides up to two 4- or 6-core Intel Xeon processors,
192GB of memory operating at 800MHz to 1333MHz (processor-specific) in 16 DIMM slots,
one x16 PCIe Gen 2 adapter slot, one dual Gigabit Ethernet controller, and an Integrated
2U I/O Server configuration Management Module (IMM), for systems management.
• The iDataPlex 2U Flex Chassis can hold a) two 1U iDataPlex server trays or b) one
server tray and either one 1U I/O tray or one 1U storage tray:
– For maximum computing density, customers can populate each chassis with two
server trays. Each server in this configuration can connect to one internal 3.5-inch
2U GPU Server configuration simple-swap SATA HDDs (two per chassis), or one 3.5-inch simple-swap SAS HDD
(two per chassis), or two internal 2.5-inch simple-swap SATA HDDs or SSDs (four
per chassis). A two-server configuration offers one PCIe x16 slot per server (two per

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chassis) standard. These configurations offer similar compute density to blade servers
(84 servers per iDataPlex rack).
– For more I/O capacity, customers can attach one I/O tray supporting either one
2U Storage configurations additional 3.5-inch (two per chassis) simple-swap SATA or SAS HDD or up to two
additional 2.5-inch (four per chassis) simple-swap SAS/SATA HDDs or SSDs, to one
server tray. Either configuration offers two x16 and one x8 PCIe Gen 2 slots per
chassis.

For supercomputing-level graphics processing, up to up to two NVIDIA GPUs may
be installed in the PCIe slots.
– For more storage capacity, customers can attach one server tray and one storage
tray per chassis, containing up to four additional 3.5-inch drive bays, which support up
to four 3.5-inch simple-swap SAS, four or five 3.5-inch simple-swap SATA drives
(depending on configuration), or eight 2.5-inch simple-swap SAS/SATA HDDs or
3U Storage configuration SSDs. All HDD configurations offer an internal slot for RAID, plus one extra x16 PCIe
Gen 2 slot per chassis.

• The iDataPlex 3U Chassis offers a storage-rich server. It can accommodate up to 12 3.5-
inch hot-swap SAS or SATA (24TB) internal HDDs in addition to one dx360 M3 server.
(Note: SAS and SATA drives cannot be mixed within a chassis.) This configuration offers
maximum storage density, at up to 672TB per iDataPlex rack or 336TB per standard 42U
enterprise rack, and outstanding dollars-per-GB pricing.
Racks are orderable and deliverable with any combination of configured chassis in the rack, up
to a total of 84U in an iDataPlex rack (42 x 2U chassis, 28 x 3U chassis, or a mixture of the two).
This provides maximum flexibility for data center solutions to incorporate various configurations
in a rack.

High-Performance / High-Efficiency Xeon 5600 / 5500 Processors
The dx360 M3 supports up to two high-performance Intel Xeon 5600 Series or 5500 Series
processors. The dx360 M3 offers a choice of processor clock rates, memory access speeds and
energy draw, including:
5600 Series
• 95W 6-core Xeon 5600 series models X5675, X5670, X5660 or X5650 running at 3.06, 2.93,
2.8 or 2.66GHz, respectively, with reduced power draw and impressive performance/watt
(only 15.83W per core; 6.4Gtbps QPI speed), 12MB of L3 processor cache, 1333MHz
memory access, 2 threads per core, and Intel Turbo Boost technology
• 95W 4-core Xeon 5600 series models X5672 or X5667 running at 3.2 or 3.06GHz
(respectively), with reduced power draw and impressive performance/watt (only 23.75W per
core; 6.4Gtbps QPI speed), 12MB of L3 processor cache, 1333MHz memory access, 2
threads per core, and Intel Turbo Boost technology
• 80W 6-core Xeon 5600 series models E5649 or E5645 running at 2.53 or 2.4GHz,
respectively, with reduced power draw and impressive performance/watt (only 13.33W per
core; 5.86GTps QPI speed), 12MB of L3 processor cache, 1333MHz memory access, 2
• 60W 6-core Xeon 5600 series low-voltage model L5640 running at 2.26GHz, respectively,
with low power draw and impressive performance/watt (only 10W per core; 5.86GTps QPI
speed), and 12MB of shared L3 cache, 1333MHz memory access, 2 threads per core, and
Intel Turbo Boost technology
• 80W 4-core Xeon 5600 series models E5640, E5630, or E5620 running at 2.66, 2.53, or
2.4GHz, respectively, with reduced power draw and impressive performance/watt (20W per
core; 5.86Gtps QPI speed), 12MB of L3 processor cache, 1066MHz memory access, 2
• 40W 4-core Xeon 5600 series low-voltage model L5630 running at 2.13GHz, with extremely
low power draw and amazing performance/watt (only 10W per core; 5.86GTps QPI speed),
12MB of L3 processor cache, 1066MHz memory access, 2 threads per core, and Intel Turbo
Boost technology
• 40W 4-core Xeon 5600 series low-voltage model L5609 running at 1.86GHz, with extremely
low power draw and amazing performance/watt (only 10W per core; 4.8GTps QPI speed),
12MB of L3 processor cache, and 1066MHz memory access
respectively, with reduced power draw and impressive performance/watt (20W per core;
4.8GTps QPI speed), 8MB of L3 processor cache, and 1066MHz memory access
• 80W 4-core Xeon 5600 series model E5603 running at 1.6GHz with reduced power draw and
impressive performance/watt (20W per core; 4.8GTps QPI speed), 4MB of L3 processor
cache, and 1066MHz memory access

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5500 Series
• 95W 4-core Xeon 5500 series models X5570, X5560, or X5550 running at 2.93, 2.86, or
2.66GHz (respectively), with impressive performance/watt (23.75W per core; 6.4GTps QPI
speed), and 8MB of L3 cache
• 60W 4-core Xeon 5500 series low-voltage models L5520, or L5530 at 2.26 or 2.4GHz
(respectively), with low power draw and impressive performance/watt (only 15W per core;
5.86GTps QPI speed), and 8MB of L3 cache
• 80W 4-core Xeon 5500 series models E5520, E5530, or E5540 at 2.26, 2.4, or 2.53GHz
(respectively), with reduced power draw and impressive performance/watt (only 20W per
core; 5.86GTps QPI speed), and 8MB of L3 cache
• 60W 4-core Xeon 5500 series low-voltage model L5506 running at 2.13GHz, with low power
draw and impressive performance/watt (only 15W per core; 4.8GTps QPI speed), 4MB of L3
processor cache, 800MHz memory access, 2 threads per core, and Intel Turbo Boost
technology
respectively, with reduced power draw and impressive performance/watt (20W per core;
4.8GTps QPI speed), 4MB of L3 processor cache, and 800MHz memory access
• 80W 2-core Xeon 5500 series model E5502 at 1.86GHz (40W per core; 4.8GTps QPI
speed), and 4MB of L3 cache
Note: Because of the integrated memory controllers the former front-side bus (FSB) no longer
exists.
With the Xeon 5500 and 5600 Series processors, Intel has diverged from its traditional
Symmetric Multiprocessing (SMP) architecture to a Non-Uniform Memory Access (NUMA)
architecture. The processors are connected through serial coherency links called QuickPath
Interconnect (QPI). QPI is capable of 6.4, 5.6 or 4.8 GT/s (gigatransfers per second), depending
on the processor model.
2-core Xeon processors contain two complete processor cores; 6-core processors, similarly,
contain six cores. Each 5600 Series processor contains one 256KB L2 cache per core and one
12MB L3 cache shared by all the cores. The shared cache is dynamically allocated between the
cores as needed. The multiple cores appear to software as multiple physical processors. The 2-
core processors offer considerably higher performance than a same-speed Xeon processor with
a single core. Likewise, 4- and 6- core processors offer considerably higher performance than a
same-speed Xeon processor with 2 cores.
Turbo Boost Technology increases performance by translating the temperature, power and
current head room into higher frequency. It will dynamically increase by 133MHz for short and
regular intervals until the upper limit is met or the maximum possible upside for the number of
active cores is reached. The maximum frequency is dependent on the number of active cores.
The amount of time the processor spends in the Turbo Boost Technology state depends on the
workload and operating environment, providing the performance you need, when and where you
need it. For example, a 2.93GHz 6-core X5670 processor with 4-6 cores active can run the
cores at 3.06GHz. With only one or two cores active, the same processor can run those cores
at 3.2GHz. Similarly, a 3.06GHz 4-core X5667 processor can run at 3.2GHz or even 3.33GHz.
When the inactive cores are needed again, they are dynamically turned back on and the
processor frequency is adjusted accordingly.
In processors implementing Intel Hyper-Threading Technology, each core has two threads
capable of running an independent process. Thus, a 6-core processor can run 12 threads
concurrently.
Intelligent Power Capability powers individual processor elements on and off as needed, to
reduce power draw.
Execute Disable Bit functionality can help prevent certain classes of malicious buffer overflow
attacks when combined with a supporting operating system.
Intel’s Virtualization Technology (VT) integrates hardware-level virtualization hooks that allow
operating system vendors to better utilize the hardware for virtualization workloads.

DDR3 Registered Memory with Chipkill ECC Protection
The dx360 M3 uses registered double data rate III (DDR3) LP (low-profile) DIMMs and provides
Active Memory features, including advanced Chipkill memory protection, for up to 16X better
error correction than standard ECC memory. In addition to offering triple the memory
bandwidth of DDR2 or fully-buffered memory, DDR3 memory also uses less energy. DDR2
memory already offered up to 37% lower energy use than fully buffered memory. Now, a
generation later, DDR3 memory is even more efficient, using 10-15% less energy than DDR2
memory.

8


The dx360 M3 also supports either standard 1.5V DIMMs or 1.35V DIMMs that consume 10%
less energy. Redesign in the architecture of the Xeon 5500 and 5600 Series processors bring
radical changes in the way memory works in these servers. For example, the Xeon 5500 and
5600 Series processors integrate the memory controller inside the processor, resulting in
two memory controllers in a 2-socket system. Each memory controller has three memory
channels. Depending on the type of memory, population of memory, and processor model, the
memory may be clocked at 1333MHz, 1066MHz or 800MHz.
If only one processor is installed, only the first eight DIMM slots can be used. Adding a second
processor not only doubles the amount of memory available for use, but also doubles the
number of memory controllers, thus doubling the system memory bandwidth. If you add a
second processor, but no additional memory for the second processor, the second processor
has to access the memory from the first processor “remotely,” resulting in longer latencies and
lower performance. The latency to access remote memory is almost 75% higher than local
memory access. So, the goal should be to always populate both processors with memory.
It is important to populate all three memory channels in each processor. The relative memory
bandwidth decreases as the number of channels populated decreases. This is because the
bandwidth of all the memory channels is utilized to support the capability of the processor. So,
as the channels are decreased, the burden to support the requisite bandwidth is increased on
the remaining channels, causing them to become a bottleneck.
If 1.35V and 1.5V DIMMs are mixed, all DIMMS will run at 1.5V. If Chipkill and non-Chipkill
DIMMS are used, all memory will run in non-Chipkill mode.

Xeon 5600 / 5500 Xeon 5600 / 5500
Processor 0 Processor 1

QPI
Memory Controller Memory Controller

Ch0 Ch1 Ch2 Ch0 Ch1 Ch2

1 4 7 9 12 15

2 5 8 10 13 16

3 6 11 14

The 1333MHz E56xx, L5640, and X56xx processor models support up to 1333MHz memory
clock speed, and 2 DIMMs per channel (2DPC) at 1333MHz with single-rank and dual-rank
1.35V or 1.5V RDIMMs running at 1.5V. Other 5600 series processors access memory at
1066MHz. The E550x and L5506 models support 800MHz clock speed.
Running memory at 1333MHz (where supported) versus 1066MHz offers up to 9% better
performance, while memory running at 1066MHz produces up to 28% better performance than
memory running at 800MHz. Xeon 5500/5600 Series processors access memory with almost
50% lower latency than the previous generation 5400 Series processors. That can result in
faster processing of latency-sensitive workloads.
Regardless of memory speed, the Xeon 5500/5600 platform represents a significant
improvement in memory bandwidth over the previous Xeon 5400 platform. At 1333MHz, the
improvement is almost 500% over the previous generation. This huge improvement is mainly
due to the dual integrated memory controllers and faster DDR3 1333MHz memory. Throughput
at 800MHz is 25 gigabytes per second (GBps); at 1066MHz it’s 32GBps; and at 1333MHz it’s
35GBps. This improvement translates into improved application performance and scalability.
Memory interleaving refers to how physical memory is interleaved across the physical DIMMs. A
balanced system provides the best interleaving. A Xeon 5500/5600 Series processor-based
system is balanced when all memory channels on a socket have the same amount of memory.
The 5500 and 5600 Series processors support single-, dual-, and quad-rank memory. A memory
rank is simply a segment of memory that is addressed by a specific address bit.
A typical memory DIMM description is 4GB 2Rx4 DIMM:
• The 2R designator is the rank count for this particular DIMM (2R = dual-rank)
• The x4 designator is the data width of the rank

9


It is important to ensure that DIMMs with the appropriate number of ranks are populated in each
channel for optimal performance. Whenever possible, use dual-rank DIMMs in the system.
Dual-rank DIMMs offer better interleaving and hence better performance than single-rank
DIMMs. For instance, a system populated with six 2GB dual-rank DIMMs outperforms a system
populated with six 2GB single-rank DIMMs by 7% for SPECjbb2005.
Another important guideline is to populate equivalent ranks per channel. For instance, mixing
one single-rank DIMM and one dual-rank DIMM in a channel should be avoided.
In addition to Chipkill error correction, the dx360 M3 offers an additional level of IBM Active
Memory protection: memory mirroring.
Memory mirroring works much like disk mirroring. The total memory is divided into three
channels: a primary channel, a backup channel, and an unused channel. Data is written
concurrently to both the primary and backup channels. If a DIMM fails in one of the DIMMs in
the primary channel, it is instantly disabled and the mirrored memory in the backup channel
becomes active (primary) until the failing DIMM is replaced. One-third of total memory is
available for use at any one time with mirroring enabled. (Note: Due to the double writes to
memory, performance is affected.) Because the third channel is disabled with mirroring active,
there is no point in populating it with memory.
Mirroring is handled at the hardware level; no operating system support is required.
DDR3 memory is currently available in 2GB, 4GB, 8GB, and 16GB RDIMMs. DIMMs are
installed individually (not in pairs). However, for performance reasons, in a 2-processor system,
it’s best to install a DIMM per processor.
Maximum memory capacity and speed in 2-processor configurations include:

Memory DIMMs per Max. Memory
5600 Series 5500 Series
Frequency Channel Capacity

1333MHz 1 X5650, L5640,
96GB X5550 and above
(1.35V) (6 DIMMs) E5650 and above

1333MHz 2 X5650, L5640, X5550 and above
192GB
(1.5V) (12 DIMMs) E5650 and above (via CTO)

2 E5620, L5609 and
1066MHz 192GB E5520 and above
(12 DIMMs) above

3 E5503 - E5507
800MHz 192GB All
(16 DIMMs) and above

800MHz- 192GB total
3
1333MHz (96GB All All
(12 DIMMs)
(Mirroring) available)

High-Performance Adapter Slots
The dx360 M3 configurations offer up to three PCIe (PCI Express) Gen 2 adapter slots—one in
the server, and two in the I/O tray. PCI Express Gen 2 is the next-generation of high-
performance, low-latency, serial I/O bus.
7
The dx360 M3 includes a physical/electrical x16 Gen 2 slot (up to16GBps ), which supports x1,
x4, x8, or x16 Gen 1 or Gen 2 cards at their native speeds. The I/O tray replaces the base slot
with a 3-slot riser. This riser provides two physical/electrical x16 Gen 2 slots and one
physical/electrical x8 Gen 2 slot (up to 8GBps). Together, these slots can support three high-
throughput adapters, such as two GPUs and one InfiniBand card, or three High IOPS SSD PCIe
Adapters.
The slot in the server is full-height/half-length, and the slots in the I/O tray are full-height/full-
length.
Because the SAS/SATA, dual Gigabit Ethernet, IMM and video controllers are integrated onto
the system board, the adapter slots are all available, which offers you a wide degree of latitude
in expansion options.

Video Controllers
A Maxim VCS452 (Matrox G200eV core) controller contained on the IMM provides up to
1280x1024 resolution, with a color depth of 32 bits at 75Hz refresh rate.
The optional NVIDIA Quadro FX 3800 controller uses 1GB of onboard GDDR3 memory to
provide digital 2560 x1600 resolution, with a color depth of 32 bits at 60Hz refresh rate, or
7
Actual throughput achieved depends largely on the adapters used, and may be less than the maximum.

10


analog 2048 x1536 resolution, with a color depth of 32 bits at 85Hz refresh rate, and a
maximum bandwidth of 51.2 GBps. The FX 3800 includes 3 digital outputs (up to 2 active at a
time) and 1 analog output. It requires a PCIe slot and consumes up to 108W of power. Up to
two are supported in the I/O tray.
For more graphics-intensive workloads, up to two NVIDIA Tesla GPUs are supported.

Graphics Processing Units (GPUs)
For those customers with heavy graphics processing needs, the dx360 M3 supports up to two
NVIDIA Tesla M1060 Processors or two M2050, M2070, or M2070Q Computing Modules per
I/O Tray in a 2U iDataPlex chassis. Each adapter requires one PCIe slot.
• The M1060 generates up to 78 gigaflops of double-precision floating-point performance (933
gigaflops single-precision) and includes 4GB of 800MHz GDDR3 memory (102 GBps
bandwidth). The memory capacity allows large data sets to be held in memory to reduce data
transfers and maximize performance. Each M1060 GPU can deliver greater than 8X the
double-precision horsepower of a quad-core x86 CPU. The M1060 GPU consumes up to
190W of power.
• The M2050, M2070, and M2070Q generate up to 515 gigaflops double-precision (1,030
gigaflops single-precision) and include 3GB (M2050) or 6GB (M2070, M2070Q) of 1.55GHz
GDDR5 ECC memory (148 GBps bandwidth). Each M20xx GPU can deliver greater than
10X the double-precision horsepower of a quad-core x86 CPU. The M20xx GPUs consume
up to 225W of power. (The M2070Q is the same hardware as the M2070; only the software
stack is different, designed for professional graphics visualization.)
Two M1060 or M20xx GPUs can work together on a common workload for double the
performance.

Disk Controllers
All iDataPlex models include an integrated six-port Serial ATA II (SATA II) controller. This
controller supports up to five (depending on the configuration) internal simple-swap (SS) SATA
II drives, or 4 SS SSDs. Hot-swap SAS or SATA HDDs, or simple-swap SAS HDDs, require
an optional adapter.
8
The 3Gbps (x4 PCIe) ServeRAID-BR10il v2 controller offers hardware RAID-0/1/1E support
(no cache) for up to 4 HDDs or SSDs.
The 6Gbps (x8 PCIe) ServeRAID-M1015 SAS/SATA controller supports RAID-0/1/10 (no
cache) for up to 16 drives (limited by available bays). The IBM ServeRAID M1000 Series
Advance Feature Key adds RAID-5 with SED support.
The 6Gbps (x8 PCIe) ServeRAID-M5014 SAS/SATA controller offers enhanced performance
with 256MB of cache memory, and supports RAID-0/1/10/5/50 for up to 16 drives (limited by
available bays).
The 6Gbps (x8 PCIe) ServeRAID-M5015 SAS/SATA controller offers enhanced performance
with 512MB of cache memory and battery backup, and supports RAID-0/1/10/5/50 for up to 16
drives (limited by available bays).
The 6Gbps (x8 PCIe) ServeRAID-B5015 SAS/SATA controller provides enhanced SSD
performance with SSD-optimized microcode, offering the highest IOPS performance for SSDs in
a RAID controller. It supports RAID-0/1/5 for up to 8 drives (limited by available bays). Because
of the throughput of the SDS storage, no cache is needed for top performance.
The IBM ServeRAID M5000 Series Advance Feature Key adds RAID-6/60 with SED support
to the M5014 and M5015. The IBM ServeRAID M5000 Series Battery Key adds battery
backup support to the M5014.
The ServeRAID controllers provide SAS data transfer speeds of up to 3Gb per second in each
direction (full-duplex), for an aggregate speed of 6Gbps. The serial design of the SAS bus
allows maximum performance to be maintained as additional drives are added. Both controllers
support either SAS or SATA, hot-swap or simple-swap, 3.5-inch or 2.5-inch drives. However
these drives cannot be intermixed. All drives must be the same type, the same physical size,
and use the same interface.
SATA II drives also operate at a data transfer speed of up to 300MB per second (but in half-
duplex mode). This throughput is similar to that of Ultra320 SCSI, with lower latency.

Flexible Internal Storage
The iDataPlex nodes offer a wide array of storage options, supporting between 1 and 12 (3.5-
inch) or between 2 and 8 (2.5-inch) hard disk drives, or up to 8 2.5-inch solid-state drives
(SSDs), depending on the chassis used and the configuration. The drives can be high-

8
Data transfer rates depend on many factors and are often less than the maximum possible.

11


performance Serial-Attach SCSI (SAS) drives, high-capacity enterprise-class Serial ATA
(SATA) drives, or high-reliability, high-IOPS SATA-interface SSDs. The 3.5-inch SAS/SATA
HDDs are offered in both hot-swap and simple-swap formats. The 2.5-inch SAS/SATA HDDs
and SSDs are available in simple-swap format only. Drive options include:
3.5-inch HS SAS
• 15K RPMs — 146.8, 300, 450, or 600GB (7.2TB maximum capacity, using 3U chassis)
• 7.2K RPMs — 1 or 2TB (24TB max., using 3U chassis)
3.5-inch SS SAS
• 15K RPMs — 146.8, 300, 450, or 600GB (2.4TB max., using 2U chassis)
• 7.2K RPMs — 1 or 2TB (8TB max., using 2U chassis)
3.5-inch HS SATA
• 7.2K RPMs — 250, 500, or 750GB, 1 or 2TB (24TB maximum capacity, using 3U chassis)
3.5-inch SS SATA
• 7.2K RPMs — 250, 500, or 750GB, 1 or 2TB (10TB maximum capacity, using 2U chassis)
2.5-inch SS SAS
• 15K RPMs —146.8GB (1.174TB max., using 2U chassis with 1U Storage tray)
• 10K RPMs —300, 600GB (4.8TB max., using 2U chassis with 1U Storage tray)
2.5-inch SS SATA
• 10K RPMs — 300, 500GB (4TB max., using 2U chassis with 1U Storage tray)
• 7.2K RPMs — 160, 500GB (4TB max., using 2U chassis with 1U Storage tray)
2.5-inch SS SSD
• SATA interface — 50GB capacity (400GB max., using 2U chassis with 1U Storage tray)
High IOPS SSD PCIe Adapter
• x8 PCIe slot — 160 or 320GB capacity (960GB, using the 2U chassis and 1U I/O tray)
Maximum capacity of each type of drive depends on the configuration of server and chassis.
Supported configurations include:
2U Chassis with 2 1U Server trays
• 2 3.5-inch SS SATA HDDs (1 per server)—using the onboard controller
• 2 3.5-inch SS SAS HDDs (1 per server)—requires ServeRAID-BR10il v2 or M1015
• 4 2.5-inch SS SAS HDDs (2 per server)—requires ServeRAID-BR10il v2 or M1015
• 4 2.5-inch SS SATA HDDs (2 per server)—using the onboard controller or ServeRAID-
BR10il v2
• 4 2.5-inch SS SATA SSDs (2 per server)—using the onboard controller, ServeRAID-BR10il
v2, B5015, or IBM 6GB SSD HBA Card
2U Chassis with 1 Server and one 1U Storage tray
• 5 3.5-inch SS SATA HDDs (1 per server, 4 per tray)—5 using the onboard controller or
ServeRAID-BR10il v2
• 4 3.5-inch SS SAS HDDs (0 per server, 4 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-BR10il v2, M1015
M5014, or M5015
• 4 3.5-inch SS SATA HDDs (4 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-BR10il v2, M1015, M5014, or
M5015
• 8 2.5-inch SS SAS HDDs (0 per server, 8 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-M1015, M5014,
or M5015
• 8 2.5-inch SS SATA HDDs (0 per server, 8 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-M1015, M5014,
or M5015
• 8 2.5-inch SS SATA SSDs (0 per server, 8 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-M1015, M5014,
M5015, B5015, or IBM 6GB SSD HBA Card
2U Chassis with 1 Server and one 1U I/O tray
• 2 3.5-inch SS SATA HDDs (1 per server, 1 per tray)—using the onboard controller or
ServeRAID-BR10il v2
• 2 3.5-inch SS SAS HDDs (1 per server, 1 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-BR10il v2, or
M1015
• 4 2.5-inch SS SATA HDDs (2 per server, 2 per tray)—using the onboard controller, or
ServeRAID-BR10il v2 or M1015
• 4 2.5-inch SS SAS HDDs (2 per server, 2 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-M1015

12


• 4 2.5-inch SS SSDs (2 per server, 2 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-M1015, M5014,
M5015, B5015, or IBM 6GB SSD HBA Card
3U Chassis with 1 Server and one 2U Storage tray
• 12 3.5-inch HS SATA HDDs (0 per server, 12 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-M1015,
M5014, or M5015
• 12 3.5-inch HS SAS HDDs (0 per server, 12 per tray)—requires ServeRAID-M1015, M5014,
or M5015
Notes: Enterprise-class 500GB or higher SATA drives offer increased reliability compared to
lower-capacity SATA drives. Simple-swap drives are not hot-swappable (the system must first
be powered off); however, no tools or jumpers are required for installation and removal, allowing
for faster, simpler servicing than fixed drives. If you need more storage space, terabyte
capacities are possible with external direct-attach, NAS and SAN solutions.
Due to the statistically higher failure rates for traditional spinning media, IBM recommends the
use of the solid-state drives (SSDs) as an alternative. They store data on flash memory chips,
rather than on magnetic media. Like HDDs, SSDs can be used as boot media and for random
access storage. However, SSDs offer higher thresholds of shock and vibration, and a higher
operating temperature range (between 0 and 70 degrees C). This yields a failure rate only 1/3
that of HDDs (approximately 3,000,000 hours MTBF vs. 1,000,000 hours). In addition, the 50GB
2.5” Solid State Drive uses as little as 2W of power per drive vs. as much as 7-10W for a 2.5-
inch HDD. This reduces the storage power requirement and heat output by as much as 80%,
compared to 2.5-inch HDDs. If used as a boot device, no special device drivers are required.

Hot-Swap/Redundant Components
System availability is maximized through the use of hot-swap and redundant components,
including:
• Dual 750W AC power supplies that are bussed together inside the power supply container,
providing 900W total in redundant mode, with two discrete line feeds to split power to
separate PDUs
• Redundant memory protection (with Chipkill ECC correction)
• Hot-swap, redundant 3.5-inch SAS and SATA hard disk drives (with optional RAID-
0/1/10/5/50/6/60), depending on configuration

Gigabit Ethernet Controller
The iDataPlex dx360 M3 server includes one integrated dual-port Intel 82575 Gigabit Ethernet
controller. This controller enables up to 10X higher maximum throughput than a 10/100 Ethernet
controller
The controllers also support highly secure remote power management using IPMI 2.0, plus
®
Wake on LAN and PXE (Preboot Execution Environment) flash interface. Optional PCIe
adapters offering failover and load balancing between adapters are available for added
throughput and increased system availability.

Ultra-Efficient Cooling
Large, strategically located fans, combined with efficient airflow paths, short distance front to
back, and the optional rack-mounted Rear Door Heat eXchanger for iDataPlex, provide highly
effective system cooling for the iDataPlex rack and the entire data center. The 2U and 3U
chassis include four fans in a replaceable fan pack. The extra-large 80mm fans are high-
efficiency/low-energy-draw devices, to help improve airflow and reduce energy costs. In fact, the
fans in a 2U chassis containing two server trays draw approximately 1/6 the energy of the fans
in two typical 1U servers. To put it another way, the fans draw approximately 2% of the total
power of an iDataPlex server, vs. the 10-20% power usage of typical 1U server fans. The larger
fans are also quieter than typical 40mm fans.
The fans automatically adjust speeds in response to changing thermal requirements, depending
on the internal temperature. When the temperature inside the server increases, the fans speed
up to maintain the proper temperature. When the temperature returns to a normal operating
level, the fans return to their default speed. Why not simply run the fans at 100% capacity all the
time? For several good reasons: to reduce the ambient noise, reduce the wear-and-tear on the
fans and reduce the server power draw. The reduction in ambient noise and power draw may be
relatively minor for a single server, but put hundreds in a data center and it can make a big
difference.
The IBM Rear Door Heat eXchanger for iDataPlex is a closed-system water-cooled door
mounted on the rear of the iDataPlex rack to cool the air exiting the devices inside the rack. A
supply hose delivers chilled water to the Rear Door Heat eXchanger. Another hose returns the
warmed water to a Coolant Distribution Unit (CRU).

13


For customers able to cool their data centers with water, the Rear Door Heat eXchanger can
withdraw 100% of the heat coming off a rack of servers (at least 100,000 BTUs/30kW) to
alleviate the cooling challenge that many data centers experience. By selecting the correct water
inlet temperature and water flow rate, you can achieve the optimal heat removal. In fact,
depending on the amount of heat generated within the rack and the temperature of the water, it
may even be possible to remove more heat from the data center than that generated by the
rack, lowering the overall data center ambient temperature. With enough iDataPlex racks (and
Rear Door Heat eXchangers), a data center might be able to eliminate the air conditioning
requirement altogether (except for minimal conditioning for humidity control).
This cooling scheme is important because newer, more powerful processors generate a
significant amount of heat, and both server and data center heat must be controlled for the
system to function properly.

Energy-Smart Features
IBM servers work hard to keep your energy bills low—from high-efficiency power supplies and
fans to lower-draw processors, memory, and solid-state drives. Technologies such as these,
along with the Xeon 5500/5600 Series processors that intelligently adjust their voltage and
frequency, help take costs out of IT:
• 40W 4-core processors use 50% less energy than 80W processors.
• 60W 6-core processors use 37% less energy than 95W processors.
• 1.5V DDR3 DIMMs consume 10-15% less energy than 1.8V DDR2 DIMMs used in older
servers.
• 1.35V DDR3 DIMMs consume up to 19% less energy than 1.5V DDR3 DIMMs.
• Solid-State Drives consume up to 80% less energy than 2.5-inch HDDs and up to 88% less
than 3.5-inch HDDs.
• Operating at as much as 92% efficiency, high efficiency power supplies use less energy
than competitive power supplies that average only 70-80% efficiency, and produce less
waste heat that needs to be cooled.
• Dynamic fan speeds — In the event of a fan failure, the other fans will run faster to
compensate until the failing fan is replaced. Competitive fans must run faster at all times, just
in case, wasting power.

Other Features
• USB 2.0 ports — Provides flexibility to add high-speed external devices. The USB 2.0
specification supports up to 480Mbps transfer rates. (Note: Not all USB 2.0 devices are
capable of achieving this rate.) Two ports are provided on the front of each dx360 M3 server.
• Toolless chassis — The cover can be opened without tools, and many components can be
removed and replaced without tools, including the server, I/O, and storage trays, hot-swap
and simple-swap HDDs, power supply, and PCIe adapters. This can save a servicer
significant time.

Rack Cable Management
The snarl of cabling behind most racks is at best inconvenient to work around and at worst an
expensive logistical nightmare that requires the rewiring of servers, PDUs, KVM switches, and
other equipment whenever a rack server is added or removed. Even worse, the veil of cables
blocks rack airflow and can actually contribute to equipment failure due to overheating.
The design of the iDataPlex Rack provides side vertical cable management channels to simplify
cabling and reduce the clutter, eliminate air blockage behind the servers, and minimize
installation time when interconnecting many rack-mounted servers.

System Support Features
The IBM services and technical support portfolio provides world-class, consistent, high-quality
service and support. The iDataPlex solution offers a number of tools and services designed to
make ownership a positive experience. From the start, IBM programs make it easier for you to
plan for and purchase iDataPlex servers, get them running and keep them running long-term.
®
These features include IBM ServerProven , Product Customization Services, IBM Global
Financing, and extensive technical support offerings.
The IBM ServerProven program provides the confidence that specific options and operating
systems have been tested on the server and are officially supported to work together. It is
updated frequently to ensure that the latest compatibility information is always at your fingertips.
The iDataPlex offering features several hardware validation and test services, collectively
referred to as Product Customization Services. These services include the integration of

14

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