X4LIVE

Every now and than IBM releases new videos on topics related to green computing, bladecenter or system x.

In this case they uploaded the video 'BladeCenter - Right Choice' to YouTube.

You can watch this video by clicking on Read More.

Thanks to the broad expertises of our multi-disciplinair team they have a strong relationships with our resellers.

Contact ETC Distribution and join their IBM Business Club today

This IBM Director 5.20.3 will propably be the latest version of IBM Director in the 5.20.x range. The next major release is IBM Systems Director 6.1 which is available now.

UPDATE: The Systems Director 6.1 press release has been published HERE and is available for download HERE

This 5.20.3 version adds official support for Windows 2008 and several additional hardware support like iDataPlex, the Cisco Catalyst switches. the RAIDed SAS switch, 8GB FC cards and resolves a number of APAR's.

Source: Release Notes 5.20.3, What's New and IBM Support Download 5.20.3 and 6.1

A tool that helps ensure business resilience by offering simplified failover and storage management solutions for BladeCenter S.

What is BladeCenter Integrated Manager?

Business resilience is more than continuity of business operations. Regulatory compliance, high availability, security and data protection, and integrated risk management are needed to help businesses rapidly adapt and respond to risks and maintain continuous business operations.

IBM BladeCenter Integrated Manager provides failover functions with simplified manageability to help ensure business resilience.

This tool provides flexible functions, including:

IBM Systems Director 6.1 is available NOW!! ........ download it here!

The management software will be included on a CD with every IBM system from december 12th onward.
The september 23rd official press release on IBM Systems Director 6.1 can be found HERE.

An update on IBM Director 5.20 has also been posted to the IBM support site.   This 5.20.3 release now support Windows Server 2008 and additional new hardware e.g..

Lenovo has introduced their new ThinkServer line that will be available for purchase at Lenovo Business Partners on september 30. In january this year we published that Lenovo would introduce servers based on System x technology. Read that story again HERE

Blades and high-end systems as well as the tower and rack servers IBM is selling now will still be sold tomorrow. With the Lenovo ThinkServer System x technology will be sold on places IBM itself is not selling at this moment.
The competitive mapping of ThinkServer versus System x is (T=Tower, R=Rack, S=Single socket, D=Dual socket): 

TS100 vs x3200 M2, TD110 vs x3400, TD110x vs x3500, RS110 vs x3250 M2 and RD120 vs x3650

Source: IBM and Lenovo Agreement, Lenovo ThinkServer, Announcement

The BladeCenter S can now be equiped with a second ethernet switch and if you add the 2/4 port Ethernet Expansion Card (CFFh), partnumber 44W4479, you can have up to 6 ethernet ports on each blade installed in the BladeCenter S.  This means that the BladeCenter S can now be used in virtualised environments as well.

This 2/4 port Ethernet Expansion Card has been announced and will be GA at the end of this month (august 2008).  The BladeCenter Interoperability Guide and BladeCenter Products and Technology Guide will be updated shortly. 

Here are some examples on what is now possible: