HP Releases the Next Generation Gen9 Proliant Servers

By George Sruthin - September 26, 2014

Building on 25 years of server industry leadership, HP announces a bold new compute strategy to help customers thrive in the era of Big Data, mobility and the cloud. Traditional server silos are too inefficient and slow for the New Style of IT. HP is reimagining the server and thinking instead about compute — the vast pool of processing resources that are converged, software-defined, cloud-ready and workload-optimized for business growth.

The new HP ProLiant Gen9 portfolio is HP’s latest compute milestone, helping customers:

Lower IT service costs
Accelerate IT service delivery time
Boost IT business value

Now available, HP ProLiant Gen9 platforms with Intel Xeon E5-2600 v3 processor series: BL460c, DL160, DL180, DL360, DL380, ML350, XL230a (HP Apollo 6000), and XL730f (HP Apollo 8000).

Rear view of a DL 380 Gen9 Server

The Comman Slot power supplies are replaced by Flexible slot power supplies , so the Gen8 power supplies does not fit in Gen9. by choosing for the flexible power supplies this gives you the options to choose for 2 redundant power supplies or for 1 power supply and a battery based power supply in the second slot.This battery gives you up to 5 minutes of power in the server. Power supplies are now rated 500W,800W, 1400W and there is also a 550W power supply for the Gen9 entry level servers DL160 and DL 180

The Smart Array controller is not on-board anymore. This means the RAID controller is now like a FlexLOM Ethernet adapter or add-on card on the motherboard of the server. HP provides besides Smart Array controllers also FlexHBA's which you need for Microsoft Storage Spaces

In Some models like DL380 Gen9 there is an additional drive cage at the back of the server for 2 SFF or 3 LFF drives . this means you can have up to 26 disks in a DL380 Gen9 - 24 at the front and not 25 any more like in Gen8 , and 2 at the back. by using a SAS expander this can be all managed by 1 RAID Controller Supports in "DL 180, DL380 ,ML 350"

The backup power for the FBWC Smart Array controllers is centralised now in 1 New smart storage battery. it is a single long life Lithium Ion battery which lasts for at least 7 years "Where was the time it was 3 days to survive a weekend?" for all Smart Array controllers and other devices (up to 16 ) . the cabling is also much simpler since power is directly drawn from the motherboard.

The HP Proliant Gen9 Servers support improved ambient temperature ASHAE A3 and A4 3 standards helping to reduce your cooling expenses . Temperatures up to 45°C are supported in select configurations .