Intel will soon to launch its fourth generation of Core processors, also code named as Haswell. With a new architecture that’s built on Intel’s cutting edge 22nm tri-gate fabrication processor, Intel hopes to bring Core processors into even smaller, more portable systems, helping save energy and increase efficiency.

The effect on common mobile devices that everyday people use is apparent, however the use of these processors in dedicated servers is relatively overlooked.

What to Expect from the All-New HASWELL

As with every new release of a CPU from Intel, the change isn’t usually anything drastic, rather it is a small enhancement and refinement on the previous technology. It is often described as a tick-tock upgrade system, which demands rhythmic updates of the company’s processor architecture, with this year being the ‘tock’ upgrade.

The two common upgrade areas for CPU’s are trending to be efficiency and performance. Better performance allows more powerful devices and faster processing, and better efficiency means less energy is wasted processing information.

Efficiency

Obviously, any device that can have its efficiency improved in today’s world gives it an economical boost. Intel appears to be focusing their efforts on increasing the efficiency of their 4th generation processors rather than aiming to increase the performance dramatically. One would assume this is because of the every growing uptake of mobile devices and their battery issues. This means the use of Haswell CPUs in mobile devices will see the most dramatic improvement, while desktops will see the least.

What does this mean for servers? You are unlikely to see a massive reduction in the power saved for one small-dedicated server; rather the efficiency boost will be seen in large data centers, hosting hundreds, or thousands of servers. Collectively, the energy saved with the new CPU’s will be dramatic. This will, in turn, do two things: Firstly, it will reduce the running cost for an entire data center and secondly, it will help the environment by reducing unnecessary emissions.

Performance

As expected, the 4th-generation processors are quicker, with Intel claiming a 15 percent improvement over the previous generation. Overall, the performance gains for this model are modest because Haswell is programed to focus mainly on efficiency.

The performance increase with the new CPU’s will probably appeal to companies who are looking to purchase new-dedicated servers. This is due to getting more bang for your buck per core. At this time, Intel has yet to officially announce a 6 or 8 core version; however, there are rumors of an 8-core version coming soon. This means that in dedicated servers, for the best performance overall (not per core), Ivy Bridge based Xeon E5 v2 processors are the best bet right now.

What this Innovation Means in Other Areas

Laptops and Ultrabooks will have a more dramatic change it seems, with Intel unveiling a concept of a hybrid laptop at CES 2013, which promised 13 hours of battery life yet used a 4th-gen processor. The built-in graphics in the CPU will also improve HD video playback and gaming.

About the Author: Alex Burgess is in the marketing team and is a blog writer for Servers Australia.

The post Intel Haswell: Subtle Improvements, More Bang-for-the-Buck appeared first on Colocation America.

Guaranteeing that a website is always up and running for people to browse, buy from and enjoy is ultimately what every webmaster would like to claim.

There have been many instances in the past where there is so much demand on a website that the server crashes and becomes inaccessible and completely unusable.

This usually doesn’t happen to any plain old website. There needs to be a lot of traffic directed to it in a short period of time. We commonly see this in websites that have some kind of special offer running, or a great ‘deal’ that expires within a very short amount of time. Once a lot of people start trying to access a website at the one time, things become too much for the server to handle and everything comes to a grinding halt.

Hosting your web applications and/or websites on a single server leaves you open to a single point of failure, placing you at risk of having your server crash due to extremely high amounts of traffic. There are two ways to keep your server running without any downtime: Load Balancing or High Availability.

Load Balancing

Load balancing is simply a set of servers in which the traffic is evenly spread between them to help reduce the load on a single server. An application delivery device is needed to do this, such as A10’s AX Series Application Delivery Controller. For example, if 5000 people are trying to access a website and you having load balancing set up between two servers, then 2500 people will be directed to each server, helping to spread the load to gain optimal efficiency of a server, and to help stop a server from crashing. The more load balanced servers that are set up, the more the load can be spread out between them.

High Availability

High availability is a form of Load Balancing where you have multiple servers running simultaneously in a primary/secondary arrangement. If traffic to the first server gets too much and the primary server goes down, the secondary servers becomes active and would then deliver your content without anyone losing connection to your site or application.

The degree of‘high availability and load balancing’ is determined by how much money one is willing to invest in ensuring that their website is not going to go down as a result of spikes in traffic. The best way to ensure your site doesn’t go down is to do the following:

• -Run Load Balancing and/or HA on multiple servers
• -Run this over multiple data centres
• -Run them over multiple networks

This is generally an expensive option and not many companies in the world can do it (due to the multiple networks), but the ones that can do ensure that even if an entire data center, or even an entire network were to go offline for some reason, then delivery of your content would continue to run.

To give you an idea, some load balancing devices are able to handle up to 300, 000 concurrent sessions! Obviously these systems are only needed by websites and applications that have enormous quantities of traffic. However, if you do have a website that generates so much traffic it is a good idea to invest in Load Balancing and/or High Availability to seamlessly deliver content to your users without any hiccups.

This is an example diagram of geographically redundant high availability.

This is an example diagram of basic High Availability with multiple web servers

About the author: Alex Burgess works in marketing for Servers Australia, one of the leading web hosting companies in Australia. He manages and is one of the main writers for their blog.

The post Explaining High Availability & Load Balancing appeared first on Colocation America.

Micro-servers have been around for a while, with Intel announcing the idea back in 09. According to Intel, Micro-servers currently make up approximately 1 to 2% of total server sales around the world, hardly jaw dropping. There is hope though, with projected sales closer to 10% by 2015.

What Is A Micro-Server?

So what is a Micro-server then? Pretty much they are what their name suggests. Small servers designed to compute less intensive tasks, such as web hosting. Web hosting benefits the most from this type of server, as micros servers consume less energy. Micro servers are compact, with each Micro-server not much larger than 27 x 20 x 26cm (10.6 x 7.8 x 10.2 inches).

Intel aims to make a clear distinction between Micro-servers and general cheap dedicated servers. Jason Fedder, Intel Asia Pacific’s data center General Manager, defines cheap servers as those being a PC mounted on a blade. Micro-servers on the other hand are used specifically in data centers around the world for low intensive tasks. Due to the fact they are used in data centers, they are required to meet quality control and redundancy requirements.

This not only reduces the space taken up, but also reduces the amount of cabling, power supplies and racks needed. Generally a Micro-server will have a small quad core CPU, four memory slots allowing up to 32GB of RAM and a dual-port Gigabit Ethernet controller. All this on a small motherboard, with a line of 2.5 HDD underneath the chassis connected to each Micro-server providing the storage. Computing powers like this are perfect for data centers on a budget.

Micro-Servers Ideal for Conserving Energy

These small servers are ideal for data centers looking to increase their energy efficiency and decrease their carbon footprint. Will they take over the market? Not just yet. However, in a world continually focused on efficiency and streamlining resources, Micro-Servers might just show up in more data centers around the globe.

About the author: This is a blog post written by Alex Burgess. He is the main blog writer for Servers Australia.

The post Small & Mighty – Can Micro-Servers Corner The Market? appeared first on Colocation America.