IBM zEC12 mainframe with 5.5 GHz processors and transactional memory

In fact, IBM has been producing mainframes for cloud services for several decades, although earlier the “cloud” had other names. In connection with the current fashion for the first time, IBM has inserted the words Elastic Cloud right into the name of the mainframe.

The new IBM mainframe zEnterprise EC12 has a modular design and impressive technical features :
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• The world's fastest processor, six cores with a clock frequency of 5.5 GHz. Active cores can be configured as central processing units (CPs), processors for Linux virtual machines — Integrated Facility for Linux (IFL), application processors (zAAP), integrated information processors (zIIP), Internal Coupling Facility (ICF).

• Crypto Express4S cryptographic coprocessor for each core on the main processor performs data compression tasks and specific cryptographic tasks, with built-in support for AES, SHA, DES algorithms. In the previous model of the IBM z196 mainframe, one coprocessor accounted for two cores, so that some progress has been made.
• Media on SSD (first time in IBM mainframe), using new technology Flash Express to improve performance.
• Transactional memory was first implemented in conventional IBM servers, previously it was used only when creating the IBM Blue Gene supercomputer for developing nuclear weapons in the Livermore National Laboratory. E. Lawrence (by the way, Blue Gene is still the most powerful supercomputer in the world.
• Enhanced virtualization support: you can make a multiplatform data center with thousands of Linux virtual machines on a single mainframe.

In zEC12, transactional memory is used to perform simultaneous operations on the same data set, for example, when processing exchange transactions on a single set of accounts.

In the lower right corner of the diagram - a place for the elements of the water cooling system.



One “book” with a multiprocessor MCM module in a case for water cooling and memory.



The logical structure of the "book".