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Although much of the underlying technology is similar, Intel processor-based servers (commonly referred to as "x86" or " x64" servers) are substantially different than a commodity PC. Support for additional RAM, multiple processor (CPU) sockets, high-performance fault-tolerant disk arrays and sophisticated remote management features are commonly available. Not to mention the 1" high, 19" wide, 3' deep shape of the common rackmount server these days - in a standard 42" high rack, factoring in the need for power and cooling, we can easily get 15 or more servers in a small amount of floor space. At the moment, CNS manages 40 physical servers at any given time, mostly located in Brothers College and the Learning Center, with a couple of few servers in Pepin as well. In addition, CNS maintains an additional 45 55 virtual servers.
At Drew, we have standardized on HP (formally Compaq) Proliant servers using Intel server processors. Our "typical" server is a multi-core processor DL360 G5 with dual SAS (Serial-Attached SCSI) hard drives. We then add equipment (RAM, fibre channel cards for SAN storage, etc.) depending on the intended use of the server.
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To support certain applications, sich as our VMware ESX Server virtualization environment or the CBORD CS Gold card system database server, we buy slightly different Proliant hardware. For our VMware ESX Server systems, weWe're using HP Proliant DL380 G5 systems as our VMware ESX server hosts. Similar to the DL360 servers above, the DL380 G5 allows for additional adapter cards and more local hard disk storage (eight disks), giving us additional space to store virtual server configuration files.
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