Dell: PowerEdge Four-Socket Servers and Precision Optimizer 5.0 Software With AI and Machine Learning

Dell Technologies, Inc. announces a generation PowerEdge four-socket servers and Precision Optimizer 5.0 to further strengthen AI and ML capabilities at Dell Technologies World, Las Vegas, NV.

PowerEdge R940xa

Forges alliance with Intel Corp. in AI and ML for the company’s Ready Solutions to enable customers harness the power of data. New AI and ML solutions and partnerships drive smarter, better business outcomes by turning data into intelligent insights in real time.

According to the recently released of the Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG) 2018 IT Transformation Maturity Curve Index, commissioned by the company, transformed companies are 18X more likely to make better and faster data-driven decisions than their competition. Additionally, transformed companies are 22X as likely to be ahead of the competition with new products and services to market.

“The IoT is driving an onslaught of data and compute at the edge, requiring organizations to embrace an end-to-end IT infrastructure strategy that can effectively, efficiently and quickly mine all that data into business intelligence gold,” said Jeff Clarke, vice chairman, products and operations, Dell. “This is where the power of AI and machine learning becomes real – when organizations can deliver better products, services, solutions and experiences based on data-driven decisions. And that’s he business we’re in – better business outcomes made possible by end-to-end solutions fueled by data – from the PC workstation, to the data center and applications running in the cloud.“

PowerEdge R840

Delivering performance for ML workloads in data center
ML workloads require high performance and considerable capacity to rapidly manage and analyze structured and unstructured data, and then deliver consistent, fast results that enable competitive advantage. As a result, the company unveiled two four-socket servers – the PowerEdge R940xa and PowerEdge R840, part of the 14th generation PowerEdge server portfolio.

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With performance density of Xeon Scalable processors (up to 112 processing cores) and massive memory (up to 6TB of memory and NVDIMM options), these servers deliver performance and allow customers to:

Rapidly transform data insights into business outcomes with the PowerEdge R940xa, which is designed to accelerate databases for business-critical applications without cloud fees and security risks. It improves application performance by combining up to four CPUs with four graphics processing units (GPUs) in a 1:1 ratio, and it enables low-latency with direct-attached NVMe drives.
Drive faster insights to better engage with customers and accelerate innovation with the PowerEdge R840 server, which is designed for in-database analytics. This server minimizes latency with more direct-attached NVMe drives than other market available options ⁽²⁾ and speeds data transfers with an integrated ultra-path interconnect (UPI).

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Unlike competitors’ four-socket offerings, these servers also support field programmable gate arrays (FPGAs) ⁽³⁾, which excel on data-intensive computations. Both servers feature OpenManage Enterprise to monitor and manage the IT infrastructure, as well as agent-free Integrated Dell Remote Access Controller (iDRAC) for automated, management to improve productivity.

PowerMax

The company was also announcing its next generation PowerMax storage solution, built with a machine learning engine which makes autonomous storage a reality. Leveraging predictive analytics and pattern recognition, a single system analyzes and forecasts 40 million data sets in real-time per array⁽⁴⁾, driving six billion decisions per day ⁽⁵⁾ to automatically maximize efficiency and performance of mixed storage workloads. PowerMax’s intelligent self-management capabilities allow organizations to refocus IT resources and personnel on more strategic business outcomes.

Driving critical advancements with Ready Solutions
The company continues to identify and work with innovators to help customers harness the power of the massive amounts of collected data. Integrating partner technologies into the firm’s Ready Solutions provides customers a simple, reliable path to identify and acquire tested and validated solutions so they can innovate more quickly, help reduce risk and help lower TCO.

The Ready Solution for HPC is a comprehensive hardware platform and software solution built on the PowerEdge R740 server, which enables faster deployment and performance through the combination of Xeon Scalable processors and customizable Intel FPGAs. The company will also join the Intel AI Builders program, an ecosystem of enterprise-focused technology partners to develop high-quality solutions on Intel AI products. The firm and Intel have partnered to enable customers to benchmark their Deep Learning and HPC workloads at scale on Xeon Scalable processors and Intel FPGAs in the Dell EMC Innovation Lab and the Dell EMC customer solution centers.

Precision Optimizer
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Driving speed and productivity in workstations through machine learning
The companyrecently announced the Precision Optimizer 5.0 that uses AI to automatically adjust applications running on Precision workstations to maximize performance by:

Custom-optimizing applications: Precision Optimizer learns each application’s behavior in the background and uses that data to employ a trained machine learning model that will automatically adjust the system to optimized settings and deliver up to 394% improvement in application performance ⁽⁶⁾. This results in true custom-optimization of any workflow, including standard ISV applications or custom native executable programs.
Automating systems configuration adjustments: Once activated and a supported application is launched, the software automatically adjusts system configurations such as CPU, memory, storage, graphics and OS settings. This allows workers to improve workstation performance when switching between applications and projects, like moving from detailed CAD design to high fidelity visualization of the design.

Delivering future of support
Dell EMC Services is leveraging AI, machine learning and deep learning to transform support and deployment through technology. Through connected technologies, system issues can be proactively resolved faster than ever before. The result is a better customer experience – deeper customer relationships, actionable insights and more predictive, personalized and effortless services.

Availability:

Precision Optimizer is available.
Ready Solution for HPC is available.
PowerEdge R940xa and R840 will be available globally May 22.

Richard Feyns, CEO, Brytlyt, said: “By using GPUs along with CPUs, Brytlyt is able to provide sub-second response on billions of rows of data that previously would have taken 20 minutes. We are thrilled to see Dell EMC PowerEdge R940xa bring together the very latest server technologies, such as a 1:1 CPU to GPU ratio, integrated security and intelligent automation with large internal storage. The R940xa is a powerhouse server for machine learning and other data-intensive workloads.“

Ulrich Fuchs, service manager, CERN, said: “Our growing business demands require a server that can handle multiple workloads – including the demands of data analytics. We are very excited about the new features that Dell EMC PowerEdge R840 brings to the table with its NVMe drives, GPU support and high capacity. I can’t believe they fit so much in a 2U server. With these PowerEdge servers as the bedrock of our data center, we can consolidate workloads without losing any speed.“

Dugan O’Neil, associate VP, research, Simon Fraser University, said: “Our Cedar high-performance computing system enables thousands of researchers across Canada to collect, analyze, share and store immense volumes of data. Through our work with leading vendors like Dell EMC, Cedar enables our researchers to run compute-intensive scientific simulations, as well as data-intensive workloads, such as machine learning applications to work on projects that advance human progress. A case in point – our Integrated Rapid Infectious Disease Analysis Project uses Cedar’s sophisticated compute power to understand disease outbreaks, including how these diseases are spreading and how to better track them.“

Lisa Spelman, VP and GM, Xeon products and data center marketing, Intel Corp., said: “Today’s enterprises are grappling with a constant deluge of data and evolving workloads that requires high-performance computing and advanced AI capabilities that can scale as needed. Dell EMC’s Ready Bundle for HPC meets these needs through the combination of Intel Xeon Scalable processors and Intel FPGAs, which are part of Intel’s leading portfolio of AI solutions, and help provide a highly optimized combination of power and flexibility required to manage the modern data center.“

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Resources:
Blog Direct2DellEMC – Engines of Innovation by Jason Landry
PowerEdge page
AI and ML page
HPC page

⁽¹⁾ Source: IDC Quarterly Server Tracker, Q4 2017.
⁽²⁾ Based on Dell EMC internal analysis, February 2018
⁽³⁾ Based on Dell EMC internal analysis, February 2018, against industry-available four-socket servers from major vendors.
⁽⁴⁾ Based on Dell EMC internal analysis of installed VMAX3/VMAX all-flash capacity, March 2018.
⁽⁵⁾Based on Dell EMC internal analysis of a single PowerMax 2000 or 8000 array, March 2018.
⁽⁶⁾ Based on Dell internal testing, July 2017, using the SPECapc Creo 3.0 Wireframe Graphics benchmark test comparing a Dell Precision 7920 Rack with Dell Precision Optimizer vs. the same system with factory standard settings. Actual performance will vary based on usage, configuration, and manufacturing variability.