Sun Fire X4500

The Sun Fire X4500 data server (code-named Thumper) integrates server and storage technologies. It was announced in July, 2006 [cite web|url=http://blogs.sun.com/jonathan/entry/the_rise_of_the_general|accessdate = 2007-10-31| publisher = Sun Microsystems|title=Jonathan Schwartz's Weblog: The Rise of the General Purpose System] and is part of the Sun Fire server line from Sun Microsystems.

In July 2008, Sun announced the X4540 model, which doubles the processing power of the X4500.

Hardware

The Sun Fire X4500 supports 2 dual-core AMD Opteron processors. With forty-eight 1000 GB SATA drives, it provides 48 TB of storage in four rack units.

The Sun Fire X4540 supports 2 quad-core AMD K10 (Barcelona) processors. The new model also uses PCI Express IO technology, and added a compact flash disk slot for booting the operating system.

Supported Operating Systems

* Solaris 10
* Red Hat Enterprise Linux 4.0
* SUSE Linux Enterprise Server 10
* Rocks Cluster Distribution [cite web
url = https://lists.sdsc.edu/pipermail/npaci-rocks-discussion/2007-June/025487.html
title = on an X4500: ROCKS:searching for USB key on device ... and reboots
accessdate = 2007-06-14]
* Microsoft Windows Server 2003 (Standard and Enterprise) [cite web
url = http://research.microsoft.com/~Gray/papers/JHU_thumper.pdf
title = Performance of a Sun X4500 under Windows, NTFS and SQLserver 2005
accessdate = 2007-04-28
publisher = Jim Gray, Microsoft]
* Microsoft Windows Server 2008 [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/blueprints/1107/820-3781.html
title = Installing Microsoft Windows Server 2008 on Sun x64 Servers
accessdate = 2007-12-02
publisher = Sun Microsystems]

Solutions using X4500/X4540

* Sun Streaming System [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/servers/networking/streamingsystem/
title = Sun Streaming System - Overview
accessdate = 2007-04-28
publisher = Sun Microsystems]
* Sun Visualization System [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/servers/cr/visualization/index.xml
title = Sun Visualization System - Overview
accessdate = 2007-04-28
publisher = Sun Microsystems]
* Sun Secure Data Retrieval Server (SDRS) [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/aboutsun/pr/2007-06/sunflash.20070607.1.xml
title = Sun Microsystems Launches Unique Data Management Appliance for Communication Service Providers
accessdate = 2007-06-07
publisher = Sun Microsystems]
* Sun Constellation System [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/servers/hpc/SunConstellation_start.jsp
title = Sun Constellation System
accessdate = 2007-06-26
publisher = Sun Microsystems]
* Sun StorageTek Virtual Tape Library Value ("VTL Value") System [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/storagetek/tape_storage/tape_virtualization/vtl_value/
title = Sun StorageTek Virtual Tape Library Value
accessdate = 2007-08-09
publisher = Sun Microsystems]
* Sun Scalable Storage Cluster [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/servers/cr/scalablestorage/
title = Sun Scalable Storage Cluster - Lustre on Thumper
accessdate = 2007-08-01
publisher = Sun Microsystems]
* Luminex Virtual Tape Solution for IBM zSeries mainframes via FICON [cite web
url = http://www.luminex.com/products/channel_gateway/firex4500.htm
title = Universal Storage Networking featuring FICON and ESCON mainframe channel gateways, connectivity and data storage products
accessdate = 2007-04-28
publisher = Luminex]
* SAS Intelligence Storage [cite web
url = http://www.sas.com/ctx/whitepapers/whitepapers.jsp?code=362
title = The Simplicity of Achieving High-End Performance at a Low Cost
accessdate = 2007-05-08
publisher = SAS Institute Inc.]
* Greenplum's Sun Data Warehouse Appliance [cite web
url = http://www.greenplum.com/partners/data_warehouse_appliance/
title = Greenplum Data Warehouse Appliance
accessdate = 2007-05-28
publisher = Greenplum]
* ipConfigure - Enterprise Video Surveillance [cite web
url = http://www.ipconfigure.com
title = ipCofnigure Home Page
accessdate = 2008-08-28
publisher = ipConfigure]
* G10 Enterprise Video Manager [cite web
url = http://www.g10ipcctv.com
title = G10 Home
accessdate = 2007-08-28
publisher = G10]
* Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/bigadmin/sundocs/articles/sfx4500_mediaserver.jsp
title = Sun Fire X4500 as a Media Server for Symantec Veritas NetBackup 6.5
accessdate = 2008-04-22
publisher = Sun Microsystems]
* Cypress Storage Appliance [cite web
url = http://www.green-bytes.com/
title = Cypress: SUN X4540 and ZFS+
accessdate = 2008-09-15
publisher = Greenbytes ]

Forty-two Sun Fire X4500 data servers are used to provide Lustre cluster filesystem storage in the TSUBAME supercomputer [cite web
url = http://www.sun.com/blueprints/0507/820-2187.html
title = Tokyo Tech Tsubame Grid Storage Implementation
accessdate = 2007-06-21
publisher = Sun Microsystems] , which was number 7 on June 2006 TOP500 list.

TPC-H World Record

In October 2007, Sun submitted TPC-H result with an X4500 running Sybase IQ. At US $8.11/QphH, it archived the best price/performance among the 1,000 GB results [cite web
url = http://www.tpc.org/tpch/results/tpch_result_detail.asp?id=107101502
title = TPC-H Details
accessdate = 2007-11-07
publisher = Transaction Processing Performance Council] .

References

External links

* [http://www.sun.com/servers/x64/x4500/ Sun Fire X4500 Server]
* [http://www.sun.com/servers/x64/x4540/ Sun Fire X4540 Server]
* [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwT3Hrk4BSo Sun Fire X4500 System Walkthrough] and [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kPzQOXTDrzo Part 2] (YouTube Video)
* [http://www.sun.com/bigadmin/sundocs/articles/enterprise_vault_x4500_naas.jsp Configuring the Sun Fire X4500 Server as Network Attached Archival Storage for Symantec Enterprise Vault]