IBM unveils new improved eX5 –based server technology

IBM on Tuesday unveiled a new server technology that will dramatically improve performance at the same time slash computing costs for businesses that run their applications and storage on industry-standard, Intel-based servers.

The company's eX5 chipset, announced at the CeBIT industry conference in Hannover, Germany, promises to deliver a reduction in the number of servers required for a given workload by 50 per cent, cut storage costs by 97 per cent, and lower licensing fees by half, according to the company.

According to IBM, the quantum jump in productivity is the result of a $800 million engineering project that delivered a system that uses memory much more efficiently than previous generations of server chipsets, including IBM's X4 technology.

With eX5 systems do not need to use chip-side memory for speed critical tasks as it allows chips to access extended memory as fast as native memory.

"With independent memory scaling offering 600 per cent more memory than is available across the industry today, and unique, next-generation flash-storage technology, the eX5 portfolio of systems will display economy-altering capabilities," IBM said.

According to the company eX5 systems' ultra-efficient memory use allows for extreme virtualisation to deliver 30-times better database performance as compared with current systems, 99 per cent better performance-per-watt, and the ability for companies to run 78 per cent additional virtual servers at the same licensing cost.