Blades lend themselves to a much more manageable setup, Intels Buddenbaum says. You can start integrating the networking capabilities with the compute capabilities. [Theyre] breaking down the silos where you have duplicate efforts going on... And they offer quicker redeployment. You can swap out a compute or a networking blade in seconds.
From a storage perspective, blade servers can also make life a lot easier, Buddenbaum says. This blade platform would want to be deployed in enterprise systems, he says. There are certainly many customers that would want to connect their server to their SAN.
In fact, Intel has partnered with QLogic Corp. (Nasdaq: QLGC) to simplify the Fibre Channel connectivity to the new blade servers. QLogic announced today that both its SANbox switches and its SANblade software are interoperable with the blades (see QLogic Works With Intel Blades).
Each Intel blade server supports two Fibre Channel switch modules, thus eliminating the need for a separate Fibre Channel infrastructure. In addition, Intel is offering a Fibre Channel Expansion Card that integrates onto the Intel Server Compute Blade and connects directly with the Fibre Channel switch. According to QLogic, this removes as many as 28 cables from the equation, creating a cable-less configuration.
Intel is offering an unbranded QLogic switch as part of its new blade server package for an additional $9,800.
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