IBM 7944E1U User Manual - page 8
Leadership enterprise server with significantly lower cost of ownership in a highly available and
expandable, rack-dense, 1U dual-socket server
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Drive Bays
The x3550 M3 supports up to 8 drive bays. Base models include 4 2.5-inch drive bays and one
5.25-inch bay, for an optional DVD-RW drive. Using an expansion kit, the number of 2.5-inch
bays can be increased to 8; however, this requires the removal of the 5.25-inch bay. The 2.5-inch
bays support a combination of SATA and SAS HDDs, as well as solid-state drives (SSDs)
Hot-swap drives may be inserted or removed through the front of the server without powering off
the system. Simple-swap solid-state drives can be inserted or removed through the front of the
server as well; however, the system power must first be turned off.
For additional storage, a direct-attach, NAS or SAN external expansion option can be added,
using an optional controller.
No diskette drive is supplied with any model; an external USB floppy drive may be used, if
needed.
Flexible Internal Storage
The x3550 M3 offers flexibility with up to 8 2.5” HDD bays, supporting high-performance drives
that provide high density/high reliability and allow you to scale up as your business grows.
2.5-inch Hot-Swap SAS
• 7,200 RPMs — 500GB (8.0TB maximum capacity, with 8 bays)
• 10,000 RPMs — 73.4, 146.8, or 300GB (2.4TB maximum)
• 15,000 RPMs — 73.4 or 146.8GB (1.17TB maximum)
2.5-inch Hot-Swap SATA
• 7,200 RPMs — 160 or 500GB (4.0TB maximum)
• 10,000 RPMs — 300GB (2.4TB maximum)
2.5-inch Hot-Swap or Simple-Swap SSDs
• 50GB High IOPS (400GB maximum)
High I/O Performance
– Offers up to 8X more IOPS than HDDs (67/33% read/write OLTP transaction base mix)
– Optimized for heavy mix of read and write operations, such as transaction processing,
media streaming, surveillance, file copy, logging, backup/recovery, and business
Intelligence
Lower-Cost IOPS Performance
– Yields better $/IOPS: lower capacity (GB) required to achieve higher IOPS
– Uses less energy and generates less heat than a hard disk drive
Superior Uptime
– 3X the availability of mechanical disk drives
– No moving parts to fail
– Enterprise wear-leveling to extend life even further
Full OS Support
– Supports all ServerProven OSes
2-5-inch HDDs not only require less space than 3.5-inch drives, they weigh less, consume half
the power, produce less noise, seek faster, and offer increased reliability.
The hot-swap SAS drives use the Converged Tray for interchangeability with other IBM System
x
®
systems. If you need more storage space, terabyte capacities are possible with external IBM
System Storage direct-attach, NAS and SAN offerings.
Disk Controllers
All x3550 M3 models include a ServeRAID-BR10il v2, ServerRAID-M1015, or ServeRAID-
M5014 SAS/SATA controller standard(model-dependent) to enhance system availability and
data protection without using a PCI slot.
The 3Gbps
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(x4 PCIe) ServeRAID-BR10il v2 controller offers hardware RAID-0/1/1E support (no
cache) for up to 4 HDDs or SSDs.
The 6Gbps (x8 PCIe) ServeRAID-M1015 SAS/SATA controller supports RAID-0/1/10 (no cache)
for up to 8 drives. The IBM ServeRAID M1000 Series Advance Feature Key adds RAID-5 with
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Data transfer rates depend on many factors and are often less than the maximum possible.