Oracle Launches New SPARC T5 Servers

(ORCL) announced a complete refresh of its midrange and high-end SPARC server lines with new SPARC T5 and M5 servers running Solaris. Building on the SPARC T4 platform, the new servers complete Oracle's SPARC family, spanning entry-level, mid-range and high-end.

The SPARC M5-32 server is designed for large, complex workloads and features massive I/O and memory capacity. It is 10 times faster than previous generations and offers superior hardware domaining and RAS capabilities. The new servers expand Oracle’s SPARC portfolio and enable near linear scalability from 1 to 32 sockets, with one common core, one operating system, and one common set of systems management and virtualization tools, making them ideal platforms for building clouds.

The new T5 servers have set 17 world records in TPC (Transaction Processing Performance Council) and SPEC tests, according to Oracle. A SPARC T5-8 server equipped with eight 3.6 GHz SPARC T5 processors achieved a world record result of 8,552,523 tpmC for a single system on the TPC-C benchmark. Oracle demonstrated this world record database performance running Oracle Database 11g Release 2 Enterprise Edition with Oracle Partitioning. (Note: IBM is challenging Oracle's benchmarking claims).

"Oracle has refreshed its SPARC family with the world’s fastest processor and launched the world’s fastest single server for Database, Java and multi-tier applications," said John Fowler, executive vice president, Systems, Oracle. "The new SPARC T5 and M5 systems leapfrog the competition with up to 10x the performance of the previous generation, offering an unbeatable value for midrange and high-end enterprise computing."

Oracle also announced two new Oracle Optimized Solutions that exploit the performance, reliability and value of SPARC T5 servers, Oracle storage, Oracle Database and Oracle Middleware. These include Oracle Optimized Solution for Oracle Database, and Oracle Optimized Solution for WebLogic Server.

“SAS Business Analytics enables faster, more accurate data-driven decisions. Implementing SAS Business Analytics on SPARC servers with Oracle Solaris solves critical business issues in transformational ways. SPARC and Oracle Solaris have long been a proven platform for SAS applications," said Craig Rubendall, Senior Director of Research and Development at SAS. "We've seen in-house that the technically advanced features and design of the SPARC M5 servers along with processor and throughput enhancements provide a very well-suited platform for enterprise class SAS application deployments."