IBM rolls out new server with help from Nvidia and the OpenPower Foundation

Jonathan Vanian

Thu, Oct 2, 2014, 10:01 PM

IBM has announced a new server that combines IBM’s POWER8 processor and Nvidia’s GPU accelerator, as part of the OpenPower Foundation created by IBM to help manage its open source lineup of chips.

The new servers are designed to meet the needs of the webscale crowd that needs servers and data center gear that can accommodate the types of massive workloads seen at Google and Facebook. Called the Power S824L, the new server will begin shipping on October 31.

Although IBM launched its Power Systems lineup of servers in April, this new hardware is the first to incorporate gear from an OpenPower Foundation partner. With Nvidia’s GPU accelerator integrated into the server, users should be able to tackle big workloads and process big data tasks using NoSQL databases like Redis, explained Brad McCredie, an IBM fellow and vice president with IBM’s systems and technology group.

“We want to address the Linux scale-out market,” said McCredie when asked who IBM expects will be the server’s intended buyers.

IBM Power S824L server

It will be interesting to see how the webscale market responds to the new servers and IBM’s POWER8 processors, which IBM positions as a competitor to Intel’s x86 chips. IBM is hopeful that the gear created under the OpenPower Foundation will give it an edge and be attractive to the big internet companies that dig open source technologies.

McCredie maintains that IBM is not trying to control all the manufacturing or other processes connected to the OpenPower Foundation, and instead wants to foster innovation so that at the end of the day it can attract more users.

“We are enabling an ecosystem to innovate and make money,” said McCredie.

The OpenPower Foundation, formed in 2013, includes Google, Nvidia and Altera among its members.

Post and thumbnail images courtesy of Shutterstock user Tomasz Bidermann.

Image copyright Tomasz Bidermann/Shutterstock.

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