Computing Cisco UCS blade servers The computing component of the UCS is available in two versions: the B-Series (a powered chassis and full and/or half slot blade servers), and the C-series for 19-inch racks (that can be used with fabric interconnects). The compute hardware managed by the UCS Manager software on the fabric Interconnects can be B-Series (blades), C-Series (rackmount) or a combination of the two. Both form factors use standard components, including Intel processors and DIMM memory. The servers are marketed with converged network adapter and port virtualization. Around 2010, an extended memory technology expanded the number of memory sockets that can be connected to a single memory channel in some models. Virtualization Cisco UCS supports several hypervisors including VMware ESX, ESXi, Microsoft Hyper-V, Citrix XenServer and others. VMware Virtualization is provided through a partnership with VMware and uses a version of that company's ESXi. Unlike the VMware Workstation software, ESX and ESXi run directly on the system hardware without the need for any other software (called Bare Metal), and provide the necessary hypervisor functions to host several guest operating systems (such as Windows or Linux) on the physical server. Guest operating systems are limited to 255 GB of vRAM and 8 virtual processors in vSphere 4.x, upgraded to 1 TB of vRAM and 32 vCPUs in vSphere 5.0. Additionally, the Cisco UCS Virtual Interface Cards incorporate VM-FEX technology that gives virtual machines direct access to the hardware for improved performance and network visibility. Networking The Cisco Fabric Interconnects (or "FI") provide network connectivity for the chassis, blade servers and rack servers connected to it through different speeds of ethernet and Fiber Channel over Ethernet (FCoE). The fabric interconnects are derived from the Nexus 5000 series switch and run NX-OS as well as the UCS Manager software. The FCoE component is necessary for connection to SAN storage, since the UCS system blade servers have very little local storage capacity. Cisco has produced the following series: 6100 Series Fabric Interconnects (discontinued) 6200 Series Fabric Interconnects 6300 Series Fabric Interconnects The fabric interconnect can further connect to multiple Fabric Extenders (or "FEX"), Port Extenders using VNTag to the fabric interconnects, allowing up to 160 servers to be managed by one fabric interconnect (or two in Active-Active failover). Management Management of the system devices is handled by the Cisco UCS Manager software embedded into the Fabric Interconnect, which is accessed by the administrator through a common browser such as Internet Explorer or Firefox, or a Command line interface like Windows PowerShell or programmatically through an API like Python. Virtual machines can be moved from one physical chassis to another, applications may be moved between virtual machines, and management may even be conducted remotely from an iPhone using SiMU - Simple iPhone Management of UCS. In addition to the embedded software, administrators may also manage the system from VMware's vSphere. The Cisco Integrated Management Controller (CIMC) is used to configure and manage C-Series servers not connected to a UCS environment. The CIMC can also be used to manage B-Series blades in addition to the UCS Manager application if configured. In November 2012, Cisco announced the addition of UCS Central which extends management across multiple domains of UCS and as many as 10,000 servers. UCS Central extends the same model based, open API approach established with UCS Manager. Each compute node has no set configuration. MAC addresses, UUIDs, firmware and BIOS settings, the existence of IO adapters, RAID settings, etc. are all configured on the UCS manager in a Service Profile and applied to the servers. This allows for consistent configuration and ease of re-purposing. Cisco offers a UCSM Platform Emulator, where the full logical configuration of a server can be created from the user interface or the API methods, and later applied to the physical hardware.

Whether you are accelerating data center modernization or deploying a hybrid cloud, VxRail delivers a turnkey experience that enables our customers to continuously innovate. The only fully integrated, pre-configured, and pre-tested VMware hyperconverged system on the market, VxRail transforms HCI networking and simplifies VMware cloud adoption, while meeting any HCI use case, including support for many of the most demanding workloads and applications. VxRail, powered by Dell EMC PowerEdge server platforms, features next-generation technology that provides future proofing for your infrastructure, including NVMe cache drives, SmartFabric Services supported by the Dell EMC PowerSwitch family, deep integration across the VMware ecosystem, advanced VMware hybrid cloud integration, and automated tools and guides to simplify deployment of a secure VxRail infrastructure.

• Consolidates compute, storage, and virtualization with end-to-end automated lifecycle management
• Automates network setup and lifecycle management with SmartFabric Services, greatly accelerating deployment and simplifying operations
• Delivers enterprise edge solutions with support for 2-node clusters
• Provides a single point of support for all software and hardware
• Offers smarter operations and infrastructure machine learning as part of the VxRail HCI System Software

Benefits: Dell Technologies Cloud Platform: VMware Cloud Foundation on VxRail delivers full stack integration and simplified path to hybrid cloud that is future-proof for next generation VMware Cloud technologies. Jointly engineered: Enables 2.5x faster time to value with synchronous availability of VMware core HCI and full stack HCI software with unique integration enabled by VxRail HCI System Software. Operational transparency: 100% of VxRail value-added software capabilities and management available through VMware vCenter. Automated connectivity: The first and only HCI appliance with network configuration automation reduces deployment and administration by 98%.

HPE SimpliVity - innovative and scalable all in one virtualized solution that integrates software-defined compute, storage, and networking into a single, easy-to-manage platform. COMBINE. STREAMLINE. CONVERGE. Hyperconvergence means more than just merging storage and compute into a single solution. When the entire IT stack of multiple infrastructure components is combined into a software-defined platform, you can accomplish complex tasks in minutes instead of hours. Hyperconvergence gives you the agility and economics of cloud with the enterprise capabilities of on-premises infrastructure. Take control with Hyperconverged Infrastructure See the top reasons customers choose SimpliVity as an award-winning, high-performance solution for consolidating IT infrastructure, protecting data, and simplifying remote office IT. Scale VDI resources and minimize user downtime Store more VMs with HCI’s dedupe and compression capabilities. Data protection and replication get users back up and running faster with persistent desktops. Centralize IT for ROBO operations Multiple sites running disparate platforms equals a genuine hassle for IT. A common hyperconverged infrastructure brings order to administration, support, deployment, and data protection. Protect and recover data With a distributed model that replicates data across multiple nodes, HCI’s built-in redundancy minimizes the impact of a lost node on your operations and simplifies disaster recovery. Architect’s Guide to HCI Learn how to architect the hyperconverged data center, what resources to consolidate, and how to mitigate the perceived challenges of hyperconvergence. Administrator’s Guide to HCI Design the hyperconverged data center to address the pain points of data center metrics — like the relationship between performance and virtual machine density.

Lenovo ThinkAgile VX is an all-in-one hardware and software solution, Hyper-converged infrastructure (HCI), built on Lenovo ThinkSystem physical servers and VMware vSAN software. The system is designed to increase the flexibility and cost-effectiveness of IT infrastructures for enterprises of all sizes, and facilitate the transition to software-defined data centers.   ThinkAgile VX is a pre-configured and pre-configured solution that reduces data center complexity by combining servers, storage and virtualization software platforms into a common, managed resource pool. VX Series solutions are easily scalable, allowing customers to start with three physical nodes and gradually expand system capacity to almost any limit (hundreds or thousands of servers).   The platform is shipped with the Lenovo ThinkAgile Advantage service, through which Lenovo (or regional vendor partners) will install and configure the solution and provide training to the customer's employees who will operate the HCI system. As a result, the VX platform will be ready to use in a matter of hours, rather than a few days or weeks, as is the case with conventional IT solutions based on separate servers and storage systems.

Key Benefits Proven, affordable performance • Increase search performance by up to an average of 118% compared to commodity servers with internal disks • Speed data analysis from weeks to hours and generate reports 3x faster • Leverage a hybrid architecture to optimize performance and capacity buckets for Splunk’s hot, warm, and cold data tiers Security and reliability with best-of-breed solution • Get greater than 99.999% hardware availability backed by experience from more than 1 million deployments • Enable media erasure and full disk encryption • Improve reliability with a groundbreaking solution that leverages enterprise storage building blocks Simplified deployment and access to data • Scale compute and storage independently to better match application workloads • Simplify deployment and accelerate time to value from months to weeks with a pretested NetApp Verified Architecture • Easily install and administer your storage systems by using on-box, web-based, and powerful NetApp® The NetApp Converged Infrastructure Solution for Splunk brings together the latest storage, networking, and server technologies in a pretested, prevalidated reference architecture to help you simplify deployment of Splunk environments. Accelerate your time to insight so you can drive rapid innovation and discover new ways to engage with your customers. Composed of Cisco UCS C-Series servers, Cisco Nexus switches, and NetApp E2800 hybrid storage systems, this groundbreaking infrastructure delivers superior performance for faster decision making and improved business agility. NetApp E-Series storage systems provide better performance, data availability, scalability, and data protection for Splunk workloads compared to commodity servers with internal drives. Together, the solution’s prevalidated architecture and modular scalability make it easy to deploy and scale as you grow. Proven, Affordable Performance Powered by the speed of NetApp E2800 hybrid flash storage systems, the NetApp Converged Infrastructure Solution for Splunk increases performance compared to commodity servers with internal storage, enabling you to search and analyze Splunk data in less than half the time. Recent testing that closely simulated real-world Splunk search performance showed conclusively that operations have much to gain from the NetApp storage approach. Searching was significantly faster with NetApp versus commodity servers with internal storage, on average up to 118% faster. Very dense searching was up to 35% faster, and rare search performance was up to 200% faster. NetApp installations have seen even faster search run times. 

Nutanix AOSзначительно повышает эффективность ИТ-инфраструктуры и упрощает процесс управления ею, автоматизирует рутинные операции и сохраняет инвестиции, интегрируя службы хранения, сети и вычислительные мощности в единое решение, обладающее неограниченной масштабируемостью. Программное обеспечение HCI Nutanix может хранить данные локально, чтобы обеспечить максимальную производительность, а также снизить нагрузку на сеть, а передовая технология машинного обучения позволяет сбалансировать потребление ресурсов во всей среде HCI для максимальной оптимизации.

• Система управляется с посредством единого интерфейса.
• Поддерживается несколько гипервизоров, в т.ч. VMware ESXi, Microsoft Windows Hyper-V, Nutanix AHV.
• Решение ориентировано на работу в облачных средах.
• Кластеры Kubernetes могут быть развернуты за считанные минуты всего несколькими щелчками мыши.
• Комплекс поставляется с ПО для централизованного мониторинга и автоматического обновления.

Nutanix Enterprise Cloud is a hyper-converged software-defined infrastructure that is changes the way data center is equipped.

Nutanix Enterprise Cloud is a hyper-converged software-defined infrastructure that is changes the way data center is equipped. The solution innovative combines components that create a solution together, delivering new levels of flexibility, reliability and performance.

The hardware platform is represented by unified x86 servers (nodes), the configuration of which is selected in such a way as to best suit a specific type of customer's tasks. The minimum configuration is three standard nodes, to which you can add any number of new nodes as needed. At the same time, thanks to the use of a proprietary software package, the integration of new servers, respectively, an increase in power, performance and capacity of the system occurs automatically, without interrupting work.

Dedicated software enables deep virtualization of compute and storage resources, providing the highest degree of flexibility and manageability across the Nutanix platform.

Simplification and unification of IT infrastructure
Nutanix Enterprise Cloud dramatically simplifies virtual machine deployments. Consolidation of computing power and storage devices on a single software platform allows IT professionals to quickly and easily deploy new VMs.

Reduced IT costs
Eliminate costly and difficult-to-maintain networked storage systems to reduce capital and operating expenses. With its unprecedented post-deployment virtual machine capability, Nutanix provides a simple, modular approach to building a modern data center.

Equipping the central office and remote branches
The platform is suitable for the implementation of almost any task at the level of not only the central data center, but also branches. Ideal for on-premises application deployment, VDI, file services, DHCP and DNS printing, WAN optimization, and security-focused virtual appliances.

Exadata is a modern architecture featuring scale-out industry-standard database servers, scale-out intelligent storage servers, state-of-the-art 3D V-NAND NVMe PCI Flash storage servers and an extremely high speed InfiniBand internal fabric that connects all servers and storage. Unique software algorithms in Exadata implement database intelligence in storage, PCI based flash, and InfiniBand networking to deliver higher performance and capacity at lower costs than other platforms. Exadata runs all types of database workloads including Online Transaction Processing (OLTP), Data Warehousing (DW), In-Memory Analytics and consolidation of mixed workloads. Simple and fast to implement, the Exadata Database Machine powers and protects your most important databases and is the ideal foundation for a consolidated database cloud. Exadata X6-2 Features Up to 836 CPU cores and 28.5TB memory per rack for database processing Up to 360 CPU cores per rack dedicated to SQL processing in storage From 2 to 19 Database Servers per rack From 3 to 18 Storage Servers per rack Up to 460 TB of flash capacity (raw) per rack Up to 1.7 PB of disk capacity (raw) per rack Hybrid Columnar Compression often delivers 10X-15X compression ratios 40 Gb/second (QDR) InfiniBand Network Complete redundancy for high availability Exadata X6-2 Benefits Uncompressed I/O bandwidth of up to 350 GB/second per full rack from SQL Ability to perform up to 5.6M database 8K read I/O operations or 5.2M database 8K write I/O operations per second Easily upgrade to meet the needs of any size application Scale by connecting multiple Exadata Database Machine X6-2 racks or Exadata Storage Expansion Racks. Up to 18 racks can be connected by simply connecting via InfiniBand cables and using internal switches. Larger configurations can be built with external InfiniBand switches Pre-configured system optimized for all database applications

EVO:RAIL enables power-on to Virtual Machine creation in minutes, radically easy VM deployment, easy non-disruptive patch and upgrades and simplified management. EVO:RAIL is a scalable Software-Defined Data Center (SDDC) building block that delivers compute, networking, storage, and management to empower private and hybrid cloud, end-user computing, test/dev, and branch office environments. Building on the proven technology of VMware vSphere,  vCenter Server, and VMware Virtual SAN, EVO:RAIL  delivers the first hyper-converged infrastructure appliance  100 percent powered by VMware software. EVO:RAIL Software Bundle:

• EVO:RAIL rapid deployment, configuration and management engine;
• Compute, network and storage virtualization enabled with vSphere and Virtual SAN.

2U 4-node hardware platform optimized for EVO:RAIL:

• Four independent nodes for compute, network and storage;
• Each node has dual processors and 192GB memory;
• Total of 16TB of SSD and HDD storage via Virtual SAN;
• Phone and in-field hardware and software  Support & Services (SnS).

EVO:RAIL is delivered as a complete appliance solution with hardware, software, and support through Qualified EVO:RAIL Partners; customers choose their preferred brand.