IBM will offer the Open Compute Project community an alternative to x86 processors

Render server from Google and Rackspace

Our company plans to start its own development of servers based on Power processors and the Open Compute Projec t (OCP) architecture. The general manager of the IBM Power System division, Doug Ballog, is confident that in the near future there will be considerable demand for such processors. Power servers will have an open architecture; this will be a rather serious alternative to IBM integrated systems. These systems include, for example, Pure Power. Due to openness, users of such servers can get a wider choice of internal components of server systems.

OCP servers can also be considered as a supplement to the already well-known open server architectures based on x86 chips. Users of machines of this type will be able to create hyper-scalable systems, alternative to platforms with Intel processors.

The exact timing of the emergence of Power-servers with an open architecture is difficult to call. Nevertheless, both Google and Rackspace are already developing Zaius servers based on IBM Power 9 processors. Perhaps it is on their basis that servers will be created for the Open Compute Project community. Previously, Rackspace created and proposed a new Barreleye server with a Power 8 processor . POWER is a microprocessor-based architecture with limited instruction set (RISC) developed and developed by IBM. The name was later decoded as Performance Optimization With Enhanced RISC (Performance Optimization Based on RISC Advanced Architecture). This word is also called a series of microprocessors using the specified set of commands. They are used as a central processor in many microcomputers, embedded systems, workstations, mainframes and supercomputers.
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Project Open Compute Project was announced in 2011 by Facebook. The goal of the project is to encourage companies and individual developers to create and use standard equipment architectures to create energy-efficient and cost-effective data centers. The project started with the development of equipment for the Facebook data center in Prineville (Oregon, USA). The company has decided to make the architecture of such servers fully open. This also applies to server boards, power supplies, server chassis and racks. In general, this is the "hardware" analogue of the project Open Source. Now OCP has a huge community that offers its own ideas and also uses the ideas suggested by others.



One of the main advantages of open servers and data centers working with such equipment is cost savings. As a result - the ability to provide customers with cheaper services. This is a solid advantage in such a highly competitive market as data centers and cloud services. The same Facebook data center in Oregon consumes 38% less energy than comparable data centers with proprietary software and hardware.

Most OSR servers use Intel processors. We want to offer an alternative - Power processors. The dynamics of using partners IBM servers based on such processors is positive. Work on the improvement of the proposed concept is constantly being conducted, including within the framework of the Open Power Foundation association. This association was created by IBM, now it includes companies such as Google, Samsung and NVidia. Some manufacturers of server hardware began to offer their own versions of systems with processors Power.

Our company plans to develop and offer customers servers worth about $ 6000 and above. Equipment that costs less will be manufactured by other companies, including Tyan, Supermicro, and others. By the way, now adapted servers with OCP architecture are based on the Power8 architecture. As for servers with new Power9 processors, they should appear later - in the second half of next year. New processors support NVLink technology, where the bandwidth is five times higher than that of PCI-Express 3.0.