Lately, Drew has become quite popular with the announcement that ARM is bringing their chips to the server market. In an arena that has been dominated by behemoths, Intel and AMD, it might surprise some to even think of an ARM processor in a server. But it is no surprise to technology experts working in web hosting, especially in data centers.

Power costs money. Energy consumption is an environmental and financial expense that many data centers are trying to significantly cut. As Drew explained,

“While the x86 world focused on pure megahertz, we have focused on the megahertz per milliwatt”

ARM-powered servers will introduce boxes that are powerful enough to still perform well on the Web, while also reducing energy consumption and, as a result, cost. Drew says the ARM advancement into the server realm will not happen overnight. They will begin testing next year and expect to produce market-ready low-power server chips within the next three to five years.

Source: GigaOM http://gigaom.com/2010/07/29/arm-server-foray/
Photo Source: Wikimedia Commons

1. When possible, opt for the quality, server-grade CPUs (i.e. 64-bit Intel Xeon dual or quad core)

2. The more RAM you have, the better. You can never go wrong by adding memory to your system.

3. Get large, fast hard drives, especially if you plan to run virtual private servers (VPS).

4. For large-scale sites, server redundancy is a good thing, if you can afford it.

5. Multi-core processors improve performance, but correlate the amount of processing power you get with your actual needs. In other words, there is no point in having a 64-core processor for a couple of blogs.

6. Find ways to save power, especially if you have to pay for it. Green servers will save you money and save the environment.

7. Remember that technology is constantly evolving. Plan on needing to upgrade in the future.

Photo Source: Flickr

Dubbed Encanto, the Xeon-powered super computer contains some 3,500 quad-core processors. Each one of these CPUs has been hard at work determining where the oil will head next. Although not perfectly accurate, the computer has been able to predict the oil’s destination six months from now.

The first distinction that you should make is between processors designed for servers and those that are not. Generally speaking, Core 2 and Celeron processors are for workstations and not servers. The Xeon processors may, in some cases, even have identical architecture to the Core 2 models but will be packaged and sold for servers. Similarly, there are Core i7 chips with similar architecture to high-end Xeon CPUs, but the former is for desktops, while the latter is for servers.

What you truly want to avoid, however, is getting a server with a Celeron processor. While there may be little difference between a high-powered i7 and a similar Xeon, a Celeron processor of the same clock speed will often have less cache and slower FSB. If a server company is trying to market Celeron servers to you, they are actually selling you an inferior product.

Photo Source: Flickr

Intel is neither confirming nor denying the claims, meaning that they are probably true. Their last Xeon processor, the 7500 had eight cores, and it stands to reason that ten would be the next logical choice. In the past, they have jumped in higher increments (i.e. four cores to eight), but as the amount increases, it will be more difficult to fit more on a chip. Therefore, moving up two increments is still significant.

Xeon processors are popular in many hardware server lines, and it is common to see web hosting dedicated servers powered with two, four, or eight-core Xeon processors. Many run a 64-bit version of Linux, such as CentOS.

Source: Hardware Central
Photo: Flickr

x86 – This dates back to 1978 and Intel’s 8086 processor, which would seem ancient by today’s standards. Servers running 32-bit x86 processors are typically dual-core or quad-core systems.

x86_64 – AMD started the 64-bit movement by releasing AMD64 processors that essentially an extension of the x86 instruction set, allowing for backwards compatibility. Intel now has their own versions of x86_64 processors, including the Xeon, which is often used for web servers.

Itanium(IA-64) – Intel’s attempt at 64-bit server architecture is now losing popularity, although some HP servers still use it. Microsoft recently announced that they will stop supporting it.

PowerPC – Although this architecture is famous on the desktop for powering Apple computers for several years, it is IBM’s server architecture of choice. These processors are still used today.

SPARC – Originally constructed by Sun Microsystems (now a part of Oracle), one could list the future of this server architecture as uncertain. Some large companies, such as Fujitsu, however, are still using it.

ARM – This processor architecture has been traditionally used for mobile devices, but they recently announced that some energy-efficient servers will use them in the future.

Photo Source: Wikimedia Commons

Normally, low power consumption equates to low speed, which is fine for handheld devices but not for servers. Nevertheless, East argued that their multicore ARM processors are now “pushing up to 2GHz”. While this is still a far cry from the speed being delivered by current Intel and AMD server chips, it has potential.

At this point, there is no reason to suspect ARM will even have room to squeeze into the server processor market, even if their chips do start to come close to or match Intel and AMD performance. Still, many companies may have room for ARM-powered servers. Lowering energy consumption in data centers has become a concern, and ARM could offer an alternative, low-power solution.

Source: Tom’s Hardware
Photo: Wikimedia Commons

But the 64-bit processors faced an uphill battle against AMD’s x86_64 processors, which maintained compatibility with 32-bit x86 processors. Intel found itself competing in that market, leaving the Itanium cold and neglected.

While many Unix-like operating systems will most likely continue to support the Itanium at least for a while, Microsoft’s cold shoulder will be viewed by many as the architecture’s last gasp for breath. Microsoft’s support for Windows 2008 R2, which supports the Itanium, will continue until July 9, 2013, and extended support will continue until July 10, 2018, which is plenty of time for server owners to wait until their next upgrade to switch, but for the Itanium, it only means that its days are numbered.

Photo Source: Wikimedia Commons

In an effort to save resources and money, Intel is currently working on consolidating its data centers. The company hopes that instead of the current bloated setup, it move all its computing to 8 highly efficient modularized data centers. Each would house up to 10,000 servers.

Intel hopes doing this will eventually save $650 million a year. I’m sure its stockholders are very happy about this, but as for the employees working in these soon to be closed data centers, they’re probably a bit less enthused.

Photo | Flickr

In short, it isn’t important what brand processor your host chooses. While one particular processor model might be faster than another, the more important factor is how heavily loaded a provider’s servers are. Will you be sharing a server with 10 other customers, 100, or 1,000?

A web host can adjust the number of customers on a server to fit its speed, but if your host is overcrowding to save money, processor speed becomes irreverent. See if past customers have had problems with overloaded servers by searching the web for reviews.

If you plan on renting a VPS or dedicated server, processor brand shouldn’t be an issue as well, but you will want to compare models for differences in speed. For this, I recommend the CPU benchmarks at Tom’s Hardware.