Dell R810 - Manual (Page 7)

Servers: Database consolidation on Dell PowerEdge R810 servers
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Among the characteristics to examine on each server are the
following:
 Processor utilization
 Memory requirements of the operating system and
applications
 Disk layout
 Database size
 Expected database growth
 Maximum concurrent users
 Types and rates of transactions against the databases
The server you select for consolidation must do more than match
the combined capacity of all the other current servers today. It also
must have enough excess capacity to still perform well at the end
of its expected life span.
The Dell PowerEdge R810 we tested for this Guide demonstrates
the concept of a high-performance server that can readily support
significant consolidation. It has four Intel Xeon processors L7555
with 8 cores and 128GB of RAM and has been optimized to reduce
both power consumption and heat dissipation. In addition, the two
Dell EqualLogic PS5000XV iSCSI SAN arrays give the server access
to multiple terabytes of enterprise storage.
Running the numbers
Under 12 month payback
Payback period
As we discuss above, consolidating older database servers lets you
reduce energy usage, save data center space, reduce software
license costs, and lower management costs. Tests in PT labs show
that a four-socket Dell PowerEdge R810 server with the new Intel
Xeon Processor L7555, 128GB RAM, and two Dell EqualLogic
PS5000XV storage arrays (which we refer to as the Dell PowerEdge
R810 solution) could consolidate two full racks of older database
servers and storage (24 AMD Opteron 254-based HP ProLiant
DL385 servers with 4 GB of RAM— each pair of which shared one of
12 HP StorageWorks MSA30 storage enclosures [we refer to these
as the 24 HP ProLiant DL385 solutions]). Such consolidation would
deliver rapid return on investment (ROI) and a quick payback.
We used the open-source DVD Store (DS2) benchmark to provide a
workload representative of a real-world database application. With
it, we measured the database performance of an older server-and-
storage solution running Microsoft Windows Server 2003 R2 with