IBM System z10 at a glance

The IBM System z10 EC is a world-class enterprise server designed to meet your business needs. The System z10 EC is built on the inherent strengths of the IBM System z platform and is designed to deliver new technologies and virtualization that provide improvements in price/performance for key new workloads. The System z10 EC further extends System z leadership in key capabilities with the delivery of expanded scalability for growth and large-scale consolidation, improved security and availability to reduce risk, and just-in-time capacity deployment, helping to respond to changing business requirements. The System z10 EC delivers:
# Improved total system capacity in a 64-way server, offering increased levels of performance and scalability to help enable new business growth.

# z10 quad-core 4.4 GHz processor chips that can help improve the execution of CPU-intensive workloads.

# Up to 1.5 terabytes of available real memory per server for growing application needs (with up to 1 TB real memory per LPAR).

# Increased scalability with 36 available subcapacity settings.

# Just-in-time deployment of capacity resources which can improve flexibility when making temporary or permanent changes. Activation can be further simplified and automated using z/OS® Capacity Provisioning (available on z/OS V1.9 with PTF and on z/OS V1.10, when available).

# New temporary capacity offering Capacity for Planned Event (CPE), a variation of Capacity Back Up (CBU). CPE can be used when capacity is unallocated, but available, and is needed for a short-term event.

# A new 16 GB fixed Hardware System Area (HSA) which is managed separately from customer memory. This fixed HSA is designed to improve availability by avoiding outages.

# Memory and books that are interconnected with a point-to-point symmetric multi processor (SMP) network running with an InfiniBand host bus bandwidth at 6 GBps designed to deliver improved performance.

# The new InfiniBand Coupling Links (planned to be available second quarter 2008) with a link data rate of 6 GBps, designed to provide a high-speed solution and increased distance (150 meters) compared to ICB-4 (10 meters).

# The new OSA-Express3 10 GbE LR (planned to be available second quarter 2008) with double the port density, increased throughput, and reduced latency.

# HiperSockets improvements with Multiple Write Facility for increased performance and Layer 2 support to host IP and non-IP workloads.

# Encryption accelerator provided on quad-core chip, which is designed to provide high-speed cryptography for protecting data in storage. CP Assist for Cryptographic Function (CPACF) offers more protection and security options with Advanced Encryption Standard (AES) 192 and 256 and stronger hash algorithm with Secure Hash Algorithm (SHA-512 and SHA-384).

# HiperDispatch for improved efficiencies between hardware and the z/OS operating system (z/OS 1.7 and above).

# Hardware decimal floating point unit on each core on the Processor Unit (PU), which can aid in decimal floating point calculations and is designed to deliver performance improvements and precision in execution.

# Large page support (1 megabyte pages).

# Up to 336 FICON™ Express4 channels.

# Fiber Quick Connect (FQC), a fiber harness integrated in the System z10 EC frame for a 'quick' connect to ESCON® and FICON LX channels.

# Support for IBM Systems Director Active Energy Manager (AEM) for Linux™ on System z for a single view of actual energy usage across multiple heterogeneous IBM platforms within the infrastructure. AEM V3.1 is a key component of IBM's Cool Blue portfolio within Project Big Green.1

# The IBM System z9 Enterprise Class (z9 EC) and System z9 Business Class (z9 BC) servers are the last servers to support participation in the same Parallel Sysplex with IBM eServer zSeries 900 (z90), IBM eServer zSeries 800 (z800), and older System/390 Parallel Enterprise Server systems.

Overview

The System z10 EC is a marriage of evolution and revolution, building on the inherent strengths of the System z™ platform, delivering new technologies and virtualization that are designed to offer improvements in price / performance for key workloads as well as enabling a new range of solutions. The z10 EC further extends the leadership of System z in key capabilities with the delivery of expanded scalability for growth and large-scale consolidation, availability to help reduce risk and improve flexibility to respond to changing business requirements, and improved security. The z10 EC is at the core of the enhanced System z platform that is designed to deliver technologies that business needs today along with a foundation to drive future business growth.
With a modular book design, the z10 EC E64 is designed to provide up to 1.7 times the total system capacity of the z9 EC Model S54 and up to three times the available memory of the z9 EC. Significant steps have been taken in the area of server availability in the z10 EC design. Preplanning requirements are minimized by delivering a fixed, reserved Hardware System Area (HSA) and new capabilities intended to allow you to seamlessly create logical partitions (LPARs), include logical subsystems, change logical processor definitions in an LPAR, and add cryptographic capabilities for an LPAR without a power-on reset.

z10 EC introduces just-in-time deployment of capacity resources designed to provide more flexibility to dynamically change capacity when business requirements change. You are no longer limited by one offering configuration; instead you can define one or more flexible configurations that can be used to solve multiple temporary situations. You can now have multiple configurations active at once and the configurations themselves are flexible so you can activate only what is needed from your defined configuration. As long as your total z10 EC infrastructure can support the maximums that are defined, they can be delivered. A significant change is the ability to add permanent capacity to the server when you are in a temporary state. The combination of these updates can change the way you think about on demand capacity.
New integrated clear-key encryption security features on z10 EC include support for a higher advanced encryption standard and more secure hashing algorithms. Performing these functions in hardware is designed to contribute to improved performance.

Integrated on the z10 EC processor unit is a Hardware Decimal Floating Point unit to accelerate decimal floating point transactions. This function is designed to markedly improve performance for decimal floating point operations which offer increased precision compared to binary floating point operations. This is expected to be particularly useful for the calculations involved in many financial transactions.

New innovations on the z10 EC are designed to give needed capacity and memory along with the just-in-time management of resources. Advanced virtualization technologies aid in server consolidation, satisfying high I/O requests and dynamic provisioning of new servers.