Oracle is beefing up its SPARC silicon architecture, announcing the new Oracle Exadata SL6 SPARC Linux. The company made the big announcement this week.
The New Oracle Exadata Machine
According to ServerWatch, which got the full story about the Oracle Exadata launch, the Redwood City-based software giant is delivering a new Exadata system with a SPARC Linux on board.
In the official Twitter account of Oracle Exadata, the company shared a message and Oracle PDF links, showing how the new Oracle database Exadata cloud machine works.
Cloud at Customer: Oracle #Exadata Cloud Machine brings the cloud to you - here's how it works https://t.co/fMCz0SENbr pic.twitter.com/YBiF8TIxJ8
— Oracle Exadata (@Exadata) February 10, 2017
The new Oracle Exadata SL6 SPARC Linux is nearly identical to the x86-based Oracle Exadata. It runs the exact same Oracle Linux as the previous X86-based counterpart and uses the same InfiniBand infrastructure and Extreme Flash storage servers.
The only difference is that the new system uses the Oracle-built SPARC T7-2 database servers that are based on the homegrown SPARC M7 processor, making it the first Exadata system that Is not powered by Intel X86.
The Oracle-built SPARC M7, which claims to be as the world's most advanced processor to run on Oracle databases, features a dense chip packing 32 cores on board and a blazing clock speed of up to 4.1 GHz.
The SPARC M7 is the first processor to use a revolutionary microprocessor technology from Oracle. Software in Silicon is a technological breakthrough in microprocessor and server design space, which allows the databases to run faster and with unprecedented security and reliability.
Additionally, the software company has also embedded security features into the M7 design that aim to protect system memory by continuously performing validation checks on memory space usage. Access to the system memory is being done using the groundbreaking Oracle-engineered Security in Silicon, making the Exadata SL6 one of the most secure systems in the world.
As for the clustering performance, the Exadata SL6 system can scale up to 640 CPU cores and 10TB memory per rack of database performance.
In addition to the breakthrough microprocessor technology, the SPARC M7 also features an embedded Data Analytics Accelerator (DAX) engine on board which is specifically designed to deliver analytics queries at silicon speeds. It also utilizes an ultra-fast low latency InfiniBand networking with specialized database aware protocols on board.
New Exadata To Continue To Co-Exist With Older Cousins
As mentioned recently on the Oracle blog post, the new Exadata system could be the best-of-all-worlds database system in terms of storage and processor speed. The new system uses one of the industry's fastest processors - the SPARC M7, along with the industry's fastest storage - the Exadata Storage.
The new system will also broaden the company's portfolio, in which it will offer the same SPARC M7 and Exadata Storage in an Oracle Linux-powered platform.
The new Exadata will continue to co-exist with its older siblings Oracle SuperCluster and Oracle Exadata X6, according to Gurmeet Goindi, group product manager for Oracle Exadata.
Interested parties can check Oracle's official website for additional information about this new Oracle Exadata system.
