2007 December 15 » Who's 4 You

All you wanted to know about blade servers

Saturday, December 15th, 2007

We see these commercials all the time for blade servers, and I get the question all the time: What are blade servers? This is a quick run down on this very interesting technology:

Blade server basics:

Definition: blade servers are part of a computer configuration where power, cooling, storage and connectivity are largely provided by an outer housing or chassis. The chassis contains and services a number of specialised, stripped down motherboard units - the blade servers - each one a complete computer or service device containing only vital processing and storage elements.

Blade server technology was initially developed in the early millennium through a partnership between IBM and Intel. Later, a number of major companies, led by IBM, formed an “industry community” in February 2006, with a website base at blade.org. The mission of the community is to “accelerate the growth and adoption of [blade] technologies in the market.”