Achieve Flexible Performance With Dell EMC PowerEdge Servers and 3rd Gen Intel® Xeon® Scalable Platform

Today's technology challenges are diverse and unprecedented in scope, requiring IT staff to maintain a keen focus on driving value while delivering cloud-like agility to achieve desired outcomes for any workload, anywhere. In response to these challenges, WWT partner Dell announced on May 12 the release of its 15th generation Dell EMC PowerEdge server portfolio, consisting of 17 workload-centered models to address a range of business needs and IT challenges.

The new portfolio of servers features the performance and flexibility of 3rd generation Intel® Xeon® Scalable processors, as well as the large capacity and data persistence of Intel® Optane™ 200 Series Persistent Memory, both representing a foundational advancement in data center transformation. Dell is the first OEM to incorporate and bring to market Intel's newest server processor platform, and, WWT is pleased to be among the first to make these new servers available to customers. 

We'd like to share just a few of the key features that make this new portfolio offering an appealing choice for workload-driven environments.

Addressing the obstacles and opportunities of business and IT 

In today's business environment, IT issues are everyone's issues, with considerations and challenges that ripple out across the entire organization. For example, businesses need the flexibility to analyze and extract actionable insights on data wherever it resides.

But, different workloads and use cases often require a specialized server solution designed for that particular environment, thus contributing to data center cost and complexity. Adding to the challenge, IT staff is also tasked with optimizing power and cooling to match diverse workloads — making the best use of finite and costly energy resources, which can have significant financial and environmental impacts.

Visibility is the key to achieving such a balancing act, as these disparate systems require well-designed, easy-to-use monitoring and management tools to track performance and efficiency, with the capability to make adjustments in real time. Ultimately, however, simply having this or that capability is not enough — wherever possible, modern IT organizations should leverage the speed and reliability of advanced automation to truly maximize value. Automation frees valuable human assets from mundane, repetitive tasks and can do most jobs faster, cheaper and with fewer resources.

The new Dell EMC PowerEdge portfolio with the 3rd gen Intel Xeon Scalable processor addresses all these needs and more.

Key advancements of PowerEdge servers with 3rd gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors

• Flexibility to grow and change – Virtually every organization needs at least some general-purpose servers to address today's virtualized workloads, but they also must take future growth plans and changing considerations into account. The new Dell EMC PowerEdge server portfolio includes a flexible general-purpose server that can fulfill the mission of a workhorse server but also possesses the capacity for modification and scaling as required.
• Built-in Acceleration – Intel is actively pursuing its "XPU vision" to deliver a mix of architectures for a unified software experience. As part of Intel's commitment to that vision, it developed the oneAPI toolkit, a toolbox of application-specific processors and accelerators, and the Dell EMC PowerEdge server portfolio can offer a range of processors, SDKs, FPGA and GPU accelerators. In addition, these servers can also feature:
  • Intel® Optane™ Persistent Memory 200 Series, combining large memory capacity and data persistence for improved server CPU utilization.
  • Intel® Optane™ SSD P5800X, for storage performance with near-nanosecond latency to support data-intensive workloads.
  • Support for up to 16 DIMMs / 8 channels per processor at 3200MHz, compared to 12 DIMMs / 6 channels per processor at 2933MHz in previous generation processors.
  • Core density increase of 40, versus 28 cores in previous generations.
  • Sixty-four lanes of PCIe Gen4 per socket, versus 48 lanes of PCIe Gen3 per socket in previous generations.

To help customers specify and deploy these new solutions with confidence, WWT is working on new Intel® Select Solutions offerings that leverage these technologies.

• Power/cooling constraint – Today's advanced chips can have significant power requirements that can pose cooling challenges. Moreover, because energy resources are finite, they need to be optimally managed to derive the most benefit while minimizing waste. In response, Dell now offers more slots for fans to maximize airflow, and it has re-architected internal components to optimize airflow. In addition, Dell is among the first OEMs to introduce liquid cooling in this server class. Intel contributes to the cooling solution with Intel® Data Center Manager (Intel® DCM) for out-of-band monitoring and management of server health, firmware, power and thermals. Intel DCM caps and controls systems to reduce power consumption, control rack capacity and prevent circuit tripping.
• Visibility through OpenManage Enterprise – Dell's unique dashboard offers IT an array of granular statistics: it provides detailed usage histories, recording the resources servers are consuming, and when. OpenManage Enterprise offers the ability to limit and manage usage, directing resources where they're needed most.
• Flexible core utilization – The 3rd Gen Intel® Xeon® Scalable platform now features Intel® Speed Select Technology (Intel® SST), allowing users to prioritize critical processes when switching between workloads for improved throughput. Custom-tuning cores and frequencies with Intel SST optimizes CPU utilization, allowing for multiple configurations in a single processor to meet specific workload needs.
• Built-in Security – Dell Technologies Secured Component verification validates that every PowerEdge server element originates from a certified source for end-to-end supply chain assurance and cryptographically verified hardware integrity. Complementing Dell's proactive resilience for platform security are an array of Intel security features, including Intel® Software Guard Extensions (Intel® SGX), Crypto Acceleration and Silicon Root of Trust.

Explore Dell PowerEdge servers and the 3rd Gen Intel Xeon Platform in the ATC 

Dell is the first to incorporate these advancements into its PowerEdge server portfolio, designed to address a range of specific customer workloads while offering the performance, flexibility and scalability of the 3rd Gen Intel Xeon Scalable platform. You can soon preview a wide selection of them — both PowerEdge 15G rack mount R650 and R750 servers along with PowerEdge 15G MX750c blade servers — in our Advanced Technology Center (ATC). Learn more about this new standard in flexible performance — contact us.