Dell's PowerEdge C6320 rack server is part of some of the largest computing arrays in the world and has demonstrated exceptional performance in data center applications. It features loads of storage up front and four server sleds in back. Each compute sled supports a maximum of two Intel Xeon processors with up to 22 cores per processor and 16 DIMM slots. With each compute sled outfitted with two processors, that's eight processors total supporting densely packed memory, and up to 24 hard drives, all in a 2U package! Dell says this platform shattered the leading High-Performance Computing (HPC) benchmark by delivering 999 gigaflops on a single server. By this point you may be asking. “What is a gigaflop?” A gigaflop is a unit of computing speed equal to one billion floating point operations per second—and this platform can deliver 999 per second!
Each of the four compute sleds support two of either the Xeon E5-2600 v3 processors with up to 18 cores, or the Xeon E5-2600 v4 processor with 4 to 22 cores each. Powering the server is a choice of up to two PSUs for redundancy, either a 1400W or 1600W hot plug power supply.
There are 16 memory slots on each server sled. Each of the two processors on each sled supports eight memory modules. With all four server nodes outfitted with 16 x 32GB DDR4 memory modules, that adds up to a very impressive 2TB of memory in a 2U space.
Administrators can choose from either a chassis configuration that supports up to 24 x 2.5-inch SAS or SATA SSDs, SAS or SATA HDDs, or nearline SAS, or a chassis that supports 12 x 3.5-inch SATA HDDs. A maximum of 72TB of storage is supported using 12 x 6TB 3.5-inch drives or up to 48TB using nearline SAS drives. Several HD/RAID controllers are available to support the full range of RAID options for data protection and resiliency. Dynamic drive assignment allows Administrators to share storage between the compute sleds, in unequal distributions to meet business needs.
There are two PCIe 3.0 expansion slots on the chassis, a half-height, half-length 1 x16, and a 1 x8 mezzanine slot. The platform also features an embedded 10GbE dual port SFP+. There are a multitude of other network communications options that support 10GbE, 25GbE, 40GbE, infinBand, and Omni-Path options.
On this latest version, several of Dell's management tools have been re-incorporated and include Dell's OpenManage suite of tools and iDRAC8 Express with lifecycle controller for remote management. For more comprehensive management tools, administrators can purchase an upgrade key for iDRAC enterprise.
The Dell C6320 rack server delivers very impressive performance in an easy to manage and highly scalable platform. Administrators can start out with just two processors and one active compute sled, and add more processors and memory to the other three compute sleds as business needs increase. If more capacity is needed, adding more 2U server chassis are a breeze to integrate with the network for additional processing, memory, and storage. This server is an ideal foundation for high-performance computing and has found a home as the basis for many of the most powerful supercomputers. As a hyper-converged platform, the system is all-in-one with storage, processing, memory, power, and networking housed in a single chassis. This system is ideal for use in high-performance computing workloads like scientific simulations, seismic processing, data analytics, and cloud building.
10GbE/25GbE/40GbE:
10GbE/25GbE/40GbE (continued):
InfiniBand:
Omni-Path:
Systems management:
