SGI Previewed In-Memory Appliance

Silicon Graphics International Corp. previewed a single-node appliance at the SAPPHIRE NOW conference being held June 3-5 in Orlando, FL.

Building on SGI’s in-memory computing and January development announcement for the SAP HANA platform, the forthcoming solution is expected to enable real-time business at extreme scale and HA, without complexity.

Utilizing a scale-up, single-node architecture with coherent shared memory, the appliance is being built to enable organizations to run ERP, data warehouse, and other applications on a single, in-memory system and scale beyond 6TB.

Freed from the limits and complexity of clustered appliances, large enterprises across industries will be able to perform analytics, transactions, and processes in real time for faster, smarter decisions and greater competitive advantage.

• Bankers can view customers holistically to enhance long term value;
• Manufacturers have real-time knowledge of operations to optimize costs and assets;
• Retailers can consolidate point of sale, e-commerce, and ERP data for a 360-degree view of customer activity;
• Healthcare organizations can analyze clinical data from greater sample sizes to improve patient care.

The SGI appliance will feature a new offering in the SGI UV server line designed for in-memory data management and application platforms, and leverages seventh generation SGI technology and over 100 patents in shared-memory innovation.

The first release of the appliance will contain an 8-socket UV system utilizing Xeon E7 8890 v2 processors coupled with 6TB of shared memory that is designed to scale to 32 sockets and 24TB of shared memory as a single-node system. By adding sockets and memory, enterprises will be able to expand their platform and overcome the performance degradation and complexity challenges of clustered solutions. Performance will scale linearly, automatically, and without need to re-distribute data or balance I/O.

Shared memory communication within the appliance will be achieved using fast, low latency SGI NUMAlink 7 interconnects. To protect data against memry power loss, data and log files willbe stored on disk using dual NetApp E2700 RAIDs. And to simplify deployment and accelerate time to value, the appliance will arrive pre-racked and pre-configured with SUSE Linux Enterprise Server.

HA
To fulfill the uptime demands of global, online environments, maintain high service levels, and guard against costly downtime, the appliance will provide HA with simplified administration. Utilizing two single-node systems, enterprises will be protected against logical, system, and site failure, and restore critical applications and data analytics ins.

“Large enterprises are striving for the performance and simplicity of single node systems beyond the current threshold for an appliance running SAP HANA,” said Jorge Titinger, president and CEO, SGI. “Drawing on the experience gained in the delivery of hundreds of shared-memory solutions to HPC customers, SGI is designing a single-node system with unprecedented scale that will enable our customers to confidently leverage the full power of SAP HANA to achieve their business objectives.”

In partnership with enterprise analytics experts Cognilytics, Inc., SGI previewed the appliance during SAPPHIRE Now in Orlando, FL, June 3-5, 2014. The company also presented the solution architecture and joining with Cognilytics, presented business use cases, at scheduled attendee sessions.