Huawei Works Closely with Intel on System-Level RAS Implementation for servers based the Intel® Xeon® processor E7 family — Huawei RH5885 V2's High Reliability Comparable with the RISC Server

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Beijing, China, May 21, 2013 – Huawei, a leading global information and communications technology (ICT) solutions provider, announced that Huawei and Intel worked closely together to implement Intel Xeon processor E7 family RAS features and deployed this technology on the HUAWEI RH5885 V2 rack server (RH5885 V2 for short). At the recent IDF, Huawei revealed multiple RAS features of the RH5885 V2, including the hot-swappable memory cards and PCIe devices. These features ensure high reliability for customers' critical missions and minimize the unexpected downtime.

Huawei's showcased IT infrastructure at IDF

The hot-swappable mainboard of the RH5885 V2 unveiled at this forum meets various O&M demands especially for application scenarios such as dynamic memory expansion and memory fault recovery. As customers' business grows, IT infrastructure increases, and virtualization technologies become pervasive, the age of large memory is coming. However, every time memory expansion is required on IT devices provided by mainstream vendors, the servers have to be shut down, and services are interrupted. To solve this problem, Huawei RH5885 RAS team worked closely with Intel's Datacenter and Connected Systems Group as well as their Software and Solutions Group to integrate Intel Xeon processor E7 family RAS features and technologies into the RH5885 V2. The hot-swappable memory cards enable dynamic installation and removal of memory cards without interrupting the running services. The RH5885 V2 adopts multiple verification methods such as the ECC to check and verify memory errors, and uses Predictive Failure Analysis (PFA) to monitor the system health status in real time by collecting statistics of errors and generating alarms before failures. With the technology of hot-swappable memory cards, customers can replace the DIMMs that frequently generate errors as required to quickly recover the system and minimize the unexpected downtime.

The hot swap technology for PCIe devices is a common technology used for improving the server maintainability. The RH5885 V2 utilizes the Huawei proprietary technology of hot swap to enable hot swap for PCIe cards without removing the chassis cover. Customers can install or remove PCIe cards without powering off the server and removing the chassis cover, which simplifies the maintenance for customers and improving the server maintainability.

Besides the two RAS features discussed above, the RH5885 V2 supports other RAS features such as memory mirroring, memory backup, and failed DIMM isolation and Intel® QuickPath Interconnect (Intel® QPI) RAS features. The RH5885 V2 not only supports hot-swappable PCIe cards, memory cards but also supports hot-swappable SAS devices and I/O modules. Incorporating the Huawei fault tolerance architecture with 35 RAS features and excellent performance, the RH5885 V2 achieved No.1 in the TPC-E test for 4-socket servers (1 TB memory) and refreshed 13 SPEC records, making it an ideal choice for mission-critical applications such as large databases, business intelligence (BI), and Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP).

General Manager of Huawei Servers Qiu Long remarked that:"Reliability of IT infrastructure is important for stable operating of enterprises' critical missions. Huawei and Intel cooperate on technology integration and innovation and go further on applications for critical missions and 4-socket and 8-socket servers, aiming at building competitive enterprise IT infrastructure."

Director of Intel Data Center Business Group, Goutam Debnath remarked that, "Huawei is a long-term strategic partner of Intel. Innovation based on the Intel Xeon processor E7 family RAS technologies is of our mutual understanding. We are pleased to see that Huawei demonstrating their support of Intel Xeon processor E7 family RAS features at IDF. This is a milestone for our cooperation. Huawei and Intel will continue cooperation in the field of critical missions, bringing more competitive products for customers."

For more information about the RH5885 V2, visit the following website:

http://enterprise.huawei.com/cn/products/itapp/server/rh-series-rack-servers/hw-145451.htm