German IT services company myLOC is set to launch dedicated servers based on HP’s Moonshot micro-server architecture – which will ultimately replace shelf after shelf of individual tower servers.
The firm has 12,500 servers it runs in three carrier-neutral data centres in Dusseldorf, with a total area of 25,000 square metres. It does managed IT services, co-location, and dedicated servers for business and consumers, as well as games servers for consumers through the myLOC, Webtropia and Gamed!de brands.
Christoph Herrnkind (pictured), chief operating officer at myLOC, turned to HP for a more condensed approach to delivering dedicated servers. He was replacing an unusual setup involving batteries of tower servers on shelves in its warehouse premises.
Why does the existing service look this way? “The advantages are a lower cost – tower servers are cheaper than 19 inch rack servers, and shelves are cheaper than racks,” Herrnkind told journalists visiting HP’s Moonshot Discovery Labs in Grenoble. The servers also run pretty cool, as there is plenty of space around the chips.
Those downsides were enough to push Heernkind to board Moonshot. Each Moonshot module has multiple system-on-a-chip processors, which can operate as dedicated servers.
There’s not a lot of storage on board: 32GB is a lot smaller than you’d expect in a dedicated tower. To solve this problem, myLOC had HP connect an SL4500 storage unit to several Moonshot servers, giving them a proper sized disk.
In March, myLOC ordered a set of Moonshot modules, and now has 675 servers in a single rack, taking up 3.5 square metres. This includes two modules of Intel Atom based “Borman” servers (225 servers in all), five modules of AMD-based m700 units (360 servers) and 90 Intel Avoton based servers housed in two more modules.
“That’s much less space – 0.0052 square metres per server,” says a proud Herrnkind. “That is 24 times more servers per square metre.”
The Moonshot modules simplify the wiring massively, and the heavy lifting is gone, he told us. It’s far easier to pop out cartridges for repair or replacement than accessing a whole tower server.
The downsides are surprising, perhaps: the servers are so much closer together that, even though they use very low power, (the whole thing runs on three normal 1.5kW plenum-rated power supplies) they now require specialised cooling.
While the towers could tolerate 40C, the new microservers have to be taken down to 28C, and that requires indirect free cooling, and redundant cooling systems, Herrnkind told us.
The servers are now being rented out, at €20 per month for a 2GHz two-core Atom server, €25 for a four-core 1.5GHz AMD Opteron server, and €45 for a 2.3GHz eight-core Avoton based server. There are no set-up fees.
For myLOC, the server costs are actually up, while the power and space costs are way down (by 59 and 79 percent respectively), and the handling costs have been lowered by a third. As a result, the customer pays the same price, and the firm makes 28 percent more.
The servers will be available to a wider customers base from 5 May.
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