Oracle Exadata

Oracle Exadata is a database appliance with support for both OLTP and OLAP workloads. It was initially designed in collaboration between Oracle Corporation and Hewlett Packard where Oracle designed the database, operating system (based on the Oracle Linux distribution), and storage software whereas HP designed the hardware for it. With Oracle's acquisition of Sun Microsystems, Oracle announced the release of Exadata Version two with improved performance and usage of Sun Microsystems Storage Systems technologies.^[1]

History

Exadata was announced by Larry Ellison at the 2008 Oracle OpenWorld conference in San Francisco for immediate delivery. The main headline was that Oracle was entering the hardware business with a pre-built Database Machine, engineered by Oracle. The hardware at this time was manufactured, delivered and supported by HP. Since the acquisition of Sun Microsystems by Oracle circa January 2010, Exadata hardware utilises Sun based hardware. Oracle claims that it is the fastest database server on the planet.

In August, 2011, Oracle announced that Exadata Database Machines would be orderable with Solaris 11 Express (in addition to Oracle Enterprise Linux).^[2]

Technical details

Database servers X2-2

(Sun Fire X4170 M2) ^[3]

• 2 × Six-Core Intel Xeon X5670 Processors (2.93 GHz)
• 96 GB Memory
• Disk Controller HBA with 512MB Battery Backed Write Cache
• 4 × 300 GB 10,000 RPM SAS Disks
• 2 × QDR (40Gbit/s) Ports
• 2 × 10 Gb Ethernet Ports based on the Intel 82599 10GbE Controller
• 4 × 1 Gb Ethernet Ports
• 1 × ILOM Ethernet Port
• 2 × Redundant Hot-Swappable Power Supplies
• 3 × 36 port QDR (40 Gbit/s) InfiniBand Switches

^[4]

Database servers X2-8

(Sun Fire X4800) ^[3]

• 8 × Eight-Core Intel Xeon X7560 Processors (2.26 GHz)
• 1 TB Memory
• Disk Controller HBA with 512MB Battery Backed Write Cache
• 8 × 300 GB 10,000 RPM SAS Disks
• 2 × QDR (40Gbit/s) Ports
• 8 × 10 Gb Ethernet Ports based on the Intel 82599 10GbE Controller
• 8 × 1 Gb Ethernet Ports
• 1 × ILOM Ethernet Port
• 4 × Redundant Hot-Swappable Power Supplies
• 3 × 36 port QDR (40 Gbit/s) InfiniBand Switches

^[5]

Oracle Exadata Storage Servers X2-2

• 2 × Six-Core Intel Xeon L5640 (2.26 GHz) Processors
• Exadata Smart Flash Cache 384 GB
• System Memory 24 GB
• Disk Controller Disk Controller HBA with 512MB Battery Backed Write Cache
• InfiniBand Connectivity Dual-Port QDR (40Gbit/s) InfiniBand Host Channel Adapter
• Power Supplies Dual-redundant, hot-swappable power supply
• Remote Management Sun Embedded Integrated Lights Out Manager (ILOM)
• Disk Drives 12 × 600 GB 15,000 RPM High Performance SAS or
• 12 × 2 TB 7,200 RPM High Capacity SAS
• Integrated Lights Out Manager (ILOM) Ethernet port

^[6]

Infiniband switches

• Sun Datacenter Infiniband Switch 36
• 36 ports

Source: Pythian ^[7]

Source Oracle Corporation ^[1]

See also

• Oracle
• Exalogic

Reference

External links

• Oracle Exadata Database Machine
• Oracle & Sun Unveil Exadata Version 2 on YouTube - Larry Ellison's Exadata V2 announcement