XServe RAID and XServe

On Monday Apple updated their XServer server line hardware. They added one
new member on their XServe family. XServer RAID adds high performance, high
capacity and relialble storage solution and competes to existing storage
hardware vendors, namely Dell, IBM and the likes. Here are some key features:

• Storage - Up to 2.53TB on 14 drive module
• Rate of Transfer - Up to 400MB/s in dual Fibre Channel connection
• RAID Support - hardware RAID for Level 0, 1, 3, 5.
  Can combine with Software RAID using Mac OS X.
• Reliable - Redundant Power and Fan module, and battery backup
• Monitoring and Adminstration - Java Admin Application.
  That means it runs on any platform and does not rely on Mac OS X.

It looks promising. And one thing to note, it seems to use IBM/Hitachi 180GB
ATA/100 harddrive. This harddrive equipped with 8MB Cache. My company had
deployed SUN A1000 array in a production system. This storage unit uses
SCSI disks and SCSI connection instead of ATA disk and Fibre Channel. But what
is the difference between SCSI-based and ATA-based array? Apple does not compare
the performance of XServe RAID to these storage systems.

Along with XServe RAID, Apple also updates their XServe line. Upgrading to 166MHz
system bus would boost overall performance in I/O and memory, not just CPU.
But I would see Firewire 800 is just an upgrade to in-sync with their technology.
Firewire 800 and USB is less useful in server.

Well, they are beautiful. I was in question why I would buy Apple server products
instead of others. But why I should buy XServe? To run just Web Server
and J2EE? May be running Samba, Mail Server, DNS, etc.? If so,
why not consider Linux or FreeBSD? XServe seems not persuaded me yet.

And what's next? Will anyone like to see Apple offer midframe class UNIX server
that competes with Sun V880, 3800, 4800 and IBM p670/p650? But before Apple put
them into the market, they need the following technology:

• Partition Technology
  - so it could run multiple Mac OS X and Liunx PPC systems in one big box.
• Multi-processor Scalablility
  - it needs many things.
  The kernel must be highly scalable without significant overhead.
  Processor interconnects must be fast enough to support high bandwidth.
• NUMA (Non-uniform Memory Access)
  - Machines to support NUMA.
  OS needs to be aware of where memory is located, and keep memory used as close
  as possible to the user of the memory.
• Clustering
  - provide high reliability to system
• Large Volumn Manager
  - to add and hotswap hard drive, and to add disk space to the existing
  volumn dynamically

But seems Apple put focus on large digital design and media house. The
largest customer would be film makers like Pixar or Disney.
Why do they need a midframe UNIX server from Apple but not Sun?
Will anyone like to run Oracle in Mac OS X than in Sun Solaris?