Server hardware
Servers are the workhorse of every IT infrastructure, and new developments are constantly delivering greater processor power, higher performance, more storage capacity and better energy efficiency. From mainframes to blade servers, we analyse the trends and technologies that matter in server hardware.
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News
18 Dec 2024
Top 10 Kubernetes and storage stories of 2024
In this 2024 review, Computer Weekly looks at Kubernetes’ evolution from stateless application runtime to enterprise-ready environment for cloud-native with persistent storage and data protection Continue Reading
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News
11 Dec 2024
IaaS firm uses Pure Storage as a service for ‘virtual datacentres’
Espresso Gridpoint moved from largely NetApp to Pure Storage FlashBlade file and object for its ‘virtual datacentres’ business model that offers VMware, Hyper-V and ProxMox VMs Continue Reading
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Feature
17 Jun 2020
Vendors investigate chiplets as CPU expansion option
As chipmakers expand the amount of processing power in CPUs, some are considering the use of chiplets. These modular silicon pieces offer a possible option for scalable designs. Continue Reading
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News
03 Jun 2020
Lidl Finland speeds up with new local server racks
Lidl brings server racks to its Finnish stores in a bid to improve connectivity and introduce new services to its customers Continue Reading
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Tip
03 Jun 2020
An in-depth look at calculating server hardware costs for SMBs
Servers can be expensive, but there's more to the purchase than just the price of the hardware. Learn what additional items an SMB must factor into the overall cost. Continue Reading
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Opinion
29 May 2020
The new future of work
We may come to stop talking about ‘remote’ working altogether after the coronavirus pandemic. It could become just ‘working’ – part of the normal mix of how things are done Continue Reading
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E-Zine
19 May 2020
Ocado makes the friendly workplace robot a reality
In this week’s Computer Weekly, we find out how Ocado is making robot-human collaboration a reality with its Armar-6 smart robot. Unified communications has become a must-have lockdown capability – we assess the key technologies. And as contact-tracing apps emerge to help deal with the Covid-19 pandemic, we examine the data privacy challenges. Read the issue now. Continue Reading
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Feature
07 May 2020
Storage 101: Replication vs backup, and synchronous vs asynchronous
Storage 101: Can replication replace backup? What are the pros and cons of synchronous and asynchronous backup? What’s the best way to mix backup and replication? Continue Reading
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Feature
05 May 2020
Storage 101: Crash-consistent vs application-consistent snapshots
We look at crash-consistent and application-consistent snapshots and backup, how they are defined, the pros and cons of each and the benefits and limits of Windows VSS Continue Reading
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News
23 Apr 2020
What comes after flash? Weebit Nano hopes its ReRAM will
Weebit Nano’s ReRAM stores bits by building resistive filaments and promises a 1,000x speed boost over flash in chips that can store data for years and is well-suited to edge uses Continue Reading
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News
22 Apr 2020
How DBS is reaping the dividends of digital transformation
At DBS Bank, the Covid-19 coronavirus outbreak has demonstrated the value of technology and the investments it made over the past decade to modernise its technology stack Continue Reading
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News
15 Apr 2020
Folding@home invites people to share processors to combat coronavirus
In the 1990s, people could donate their spare computing in a distributed project to find aliens. Now distributed simulations are tackling the Covid-19 pandemic Continue Reading
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Podcast
14 Apr 2020
Podcast: Ruthlessly prioritise applications during Covid-19
We talk to Alex McMullan, CTO international at Pure Storage, about scaling up storage and compute for remote working and why that means prioritising applications Continue Reading
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News
03 Apr 2020
Singapore researchers get priority access to HPC resources
Singapore’s National Supercomputing Centre is fast-tracking access to its high-performance computing resources for researchers working on Covid-19-related projects Continue Reading
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Feature
02 Apr 2020
NAS backup: Which suppliers have gone post-NDMP?
NAS backup with NDMP has many drawbacks so some vendors have moved to a data management approach that tracks changes and allows for incremental forever protection Continue Reading
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News
27 Mar 2020
Huawei to boost Kunpeng ecosystem in cloud play
Chinese tech giant will shell out $200m this year to build an ecosystem around its Arm-based processor to bolster its position in the cloud computing market Continue Reading
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News
25 Mar 2020
Smartbox move to Nutanix HCI a catalyst for IT team revamp
Gift supplier reorganises IT team structures as Nutanix hyper-converged infrastructure helps sweep away legacy architecture for hybrid cloud and containerised operations Continue Reading
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Feature
20 Mar 2020
Computational storage: What is it and what are its key use cases?
Computational storage brings the CPU to the storage and so boosts system performance by tackling processing tasks, such as near the edge or in AI/machine learning workloads Continue Reading
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Feature
19 Mar 2020
How Oxeva delivered budget analytics with Pure Storage flash NAS
Web hosting provider Oxeva thought the consultants were mistaken and that what suited the web giants for analytics/big data wasn’t necessarily what was needed for enterprise customers Continue Reading
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News
11 Mar 2020
Microsoft locks down new vulnerability with EternalBlue echoes
Microsoft has moved to get ahead of a serious remote code execution vulnerability in Microsoft Server Message Block 3.1.1, which was accidentally disclosed then missed in its March Patch Tuesday update Continue Reading
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Feature
10 Mar 2020
Molotov.tv streams 24/7 with Dell EMC and Scality object storage
France-based Molotov.tv has offered streaming TV services on digital platforms since 2016, based on Dell EMC servers with GPU acceleration and Scality Ring object storage Continue Reading
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Feature
09 Mar 2020
Upcoming conflict minerals regulation does not cover major technology companies
A forthcoming regulation designed to stem the flow of conflict minerals is unlikely to change the behaviour of technology companies because loopholes in the new rules mean they are not covered Continue Reading
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Feature
05 Mar 2020
Cache vs tier: What’s the difference between cache and storage?
We look at the key distinctions between cache and tiers of storage, and where the line has become blurred with fast flash, 3D Xpoint and storage class memory technologies Continue Reading
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Feature
03 Mar 2020
Flash storage tiers: Performance, cost and use cases
We look at performance, cost and potential use cases for the key flash storage types available, such as Nand flash, 3D Xpoint and Intel Optane, plus SAS, SATA and NVMe connectivity Continue Reading
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Feature
02 Mar 2020
Rook 101: Building software-defined containerised storage in Kubernetes
Rook – think castles, not birds – uses the principles of containerisation and the methods used in Kubernetes to build storage that’s abstracted from the hardware it lives on Continue Reading
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News
18 Feb 2020
China’s tech sector to shrink by 10% in Q1 amid virus outbreak
Hardware makers will be hit more badly than software houses, but the decline in China’s ICT market will be limited to the first quarter Continue Reading
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Feature
17 Feb 2020
From Pixar to GovTech: The inside story of Singapore’s AI whizz
After nearly a decade at Pixar, GovTech’s Chong Jiayi is leading a team of experts to solve hard problems in robotics and artificial intelligence Continue Reading
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Feature
04 Feb 2020
Caribbean island hospital rebuilds after hurricane with DataCore
Hurricane Irma tore the roof off a server room and flooded IT hardware, but that was an opportunity to rebuild redundant IT using DataCore’s SANsymphony software-defined storage Continue Reading
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News
29 Jan 2020
Formulus Black Forsa turns memory into block storage
Forsa allows customers to bring application data into memory, by provisioning DRAM or persistent memory as block access storage with latency several times better than NVMe flash Continue Reading
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News
24 Jan 2020
Cyber gangsters publish staff passwords following ‘Sodinokibi’ attack on car parts group Gedia
Sodinokibi hacking group steps up pressure on German automotive manufacturer by publishing information, including the CEO’s computer password and sensitive details of its IT systems, on the internet Continue Reading
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Feature
16 Jan 2020
Big storage meets cloud in the datacentre 'as-a-service' revolution
Cloud is mainstream but the datacentre’s here to stay. This has resulted in a trend towards as-a-service in the datacentre where big storage array makers and the cloud giants meet Continue Reading
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News
14 Jan 2020
Citrix NetScaler vulnerabilities won’t be patched until end of January
Some vulnerabilities identified in Citrix products will not be fully patched until the end of January 2020 Continue Reading
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News
13 Jan 2020
Secure data erasure is needed to ensure more people recycle their tech
A dedicated team of IT recycling experts offers free data erasure to give people confidence that their old tech can be safely disposed of Continue Reading
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Feature
08 Jan 2020
Five ways that backup has changed since the days of tape
Back in the day, all this was tape, but times have changed, with cloud-to-cloud backup, cloud storage, virtual and physical backup appliances and myriad endpoint hardware Continue Reading
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News
07 Jan 2020
Scale’s HE150 the first of a big push to small edge HCI hardware
Scale Computing aims to scale to micro-sized hyper-converged with a lightweight operating system it claims its competitors can’t match for edge and remote location deployments Continue Reading
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E-Zine
07 Jan 2020
Digital fashion for sustainable consumption
In this week’s Computer Weekly, we look at fashion for online personas, report on a programme to get more young women into cyber security, and examine edge computing as the new data frontier and how cloud-native platforms and AI might transform the datacentre. Read the issue now. Continue Reading
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Feature
02 Jan 2020
Processors re-imagined: Will cloud and AI lead mean all change in the datacentre?
We look at the changes cloud-native platforms and artificial intelligence could bring about in the datacentre. Continue Reading
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Feature
23 Dec 2019
Top 10 storage deployment stories of 2019
Here are ComputerWeekly’s top 10 storage deployment stories for 2019, which see quite a move away from traditional SAN and NAS to hyper-converged, software-defined storage and object storage Continue Reading
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News
15 Dec 2019
Top IT predictions in APAC in 2020
The rise of super apps, Wi-Fi 6 enabled services and cross-functional platform engineering teams are likely to dominate the Asia-Pacific IT landscape in 2020 Continue Reading
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Feature
09 Dec 2019
How to buy hyper-converged infrastructure
Simplicity, high availability, scalability and reduced cost are among the benefits of hyper-converged infrastructure. We survey the benefits, pitfalls and the key suppliers Continue Reading
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News
09 Dec 2019
China bans foreign computing kit from government contracts
All government offices and public institutions must eliminate foreign hardware and software within three years, according to a leaked directive dubbed 3-5-2 Continue Reading
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News
04 Dec 2019
AWS Outposts debuts in Australia
Amazon Web Services rolls out Outposts in Australia, enabling enterprises to run a consistent version of the AWS platform at locations that require low latency Continue Reading
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Opinion
03 Dec 2019
Security Think Tank: In-depth protection is a matter of basic hygiene
The belief that effective perimeter security is the best way to protect data is a fallacy that is being repeatedly exposed. We must recognise the need for a data-centric security model to protect data from both internal and external threats, but what does this mean for security professionals? Continue Reading
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News
25 Nov 2019
University of Leicester dumps SANs and LUNs for Cloudian object storage
One-to-one mapping between Dell SANs and media servers had passed their sell-by date and caused vulnerabilities for the University of Leicester, which fixed the problems by a move to “stateless” object storage on Cloudian Continue Reading
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Feature
22 Nov 2019
Figeac Aero manages growth with DataCore software-defined storage
Global roll-out sees DataCore software-defined storage deployed on Huawei hardware to HQ and 14 worldwide sites as aero parts maker copes with acquisition and expansion Continue Reading
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News
20 Nov 2019
Swedish hospitals suffer IT crashes
Hospitals in Sweden’s West Götaland region have suffered computer problems because of as-yet unexplained hard drive crashes Continue Reading
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News
19 Nov 2019
Businesses failing to wipe data from old endpoints
Organisations are not taking adequate precautions to sanitise data held on endpoints when refreshing their PC or mobile device estates Continue Reading
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News
18 Nov 2019
DataCore adds file and S3 object storage with vFilO
Software-defined storage specialist DataCore has added file storage and S3 object storage access with vFilO, which lets customers create virtual pools from on-site and remote datastores Continue Reading
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Feature
14 Nov 2019
NVMe-over-TCP brings super-fast flash over standard IP networks
TCP is the latest transport protocol that can be used to connect NVMe flash storage. We explain how NVMe-over-TCP works and the key advantages for datacentre customers Continue Reading
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Feature
08 Nov 2019
What is QLC flash and what workloads it is good for?
QLC flash offers low per-gigabyte costs and lots of capacity, but can be limited by endurance and I/O performance. It can be a good disk replacement for several workloads, however Continue Reading
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News
08 Nov 2019
Security pros urged to get ahead of incoming BlueKeep exploits
The BlueKeep RDP vulnerability is beginning to be exploited in the wild, and security teams have no excuse for not trying to get in front of it, says Microsoft Continue Reading
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Feature
05 Nov 2019
Is NVMe flash the right choice for you?
NVMe flash storage boosts performance for I/O-hungry operations, but how does it work, where can organisations best deploy it, and what are the key uses cases where it can make a difference? Continue Reading
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News
29 Oct 2019
NordVPN enlists ethical hackers, launches bug bounty programme
Breached consumer VPN supplier details steps it is taking to shore up its cyber security posture after an unknown actor gained access to one of its servers Continue Reading
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News
24 Oct 2019
Total saves £95,000 a year with Nutanix hyper-converged
Gas and electricity supplier struggled with ageing traditional infrastructure, but moved to hyper-converged for projects that include containers and DevOps deployments Continue Reading
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News
22 Oct 2019
NordVPN blames datacentre provider for server breach
VPN provider insists no user data was compromised in a March 2018 server breach, and says its datacentre provider failed to inform it of the issue Continue Reading
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News
22 Oct 2019
APAC spending on AI systems to hit $6.2bn in 2019
Led by China and organisations in the banking industry, APAC spending on artificial intelligence is set to grow by almost 64% this year, according to IDC Continue Reading
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News
21 Oct 2019
Virtual Instruments is now Virtana and aims at cloud, containers
Searches for “Virtual Instruments” returned too many synthesizers, so storage monitoring pioneer went through a blue sky ordeal. It has new plans for cloud and container capability, too Continue Reading
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News
01 Oct 2019
Intel previews Optane persistent memory, QLC SSD and even PLC
Intel sets out roadmap for second-generation Optane persistent memory – between SSD and DRAM – as well as QLC SSD, with talk of PLC (penta-level cell) after that Continue Reading
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News
30 Sep 2019
HPE refurbishes legacy IT assets to make money for users
HPE Financial Services is giving old IT assets a new lease of life at its tech renewal site in Erskine, near Glasgow, as part of a promotion of the circular economy Continue Reading
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News
27 Sep 2019
How Graphcore is putting AI on steroids
UK chipmaker Graphcore’s intelligence processing unit may just hold the key to unlocking the full potential of artificial intelligence Continue Reading
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News
23 Sep 2019
The perfect storm for silicon photonics
By packaging optics with silicon chips, silicon photonics will enable datacentres to keep up with the exponential growth in demand for bandwidth Continue Reading
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Podcast
17 Sep 2019
Podcast: The Computer Weekly Downtime Upload – Episode 30
The Computer Weekly Downtime Upload podcast team returns from its brief summer hiatus to discuss HPE’s hardware refresh processes, the financial services industry’s changing relationship with cloud and a charity that is helping people with chronic illnesses find work in tech Continue Reading
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News
09 Sep 2019
Commvault buys Hedvig in push for global storage player status
Backup player Commvault aims to bring together datacentre and multi-cloud operations with software-defined storage that can unify access to almost any storage medium, anywhere Continue Reading
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News
03 Sep 2019
At least 47,000 servers vulnerable to remote attack
All organisations using Supermicro servers are being urged to update firmware to block remote attacks exploiting vulnerabilities in baseboard management controllers Continue Reading
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News
22 Aug 2019
Tech firms join forces to boost cloud security
Top tech firms are to collaborate on open source technologies, tools, frameworks and standards that accelerate the adoption of confidential computing to boost security in cloud and edge computing Continue Reading
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Feature
16 Aug 2019
How to deploy NVMe flash storage for artificial intelligence
We run the rule over NVMe flash as a storage choice for AI applications and the key decision points in form factor and hardware specification Continue Reading
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Opinion
13 Aug 2019
Storage: How ‘tail latency’ impacts customer-facing applications
Henry He of Virtual Instruments looks at tail latency, the small percentage of storage I/O that could be causing big and costly problems for business applications Continue Reading
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News
07 Aug 2019
Industry collaborates to patch SwapGS CPU vulnerability
Newly disclosed SwapGS vulnerability in modern processors has been patched in Windows, Linux and ChromeOS, underlining the importance of keeping systems up to date Continue Reading
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News
31 Jul 2019
Cisco pays $8.6m after whistleblower discloses security flaws in video surveillance system
James Glenn, a video surveillance expert working for a Cisco reseller in Denmark, alerted Cisco to security faults and stands to gain a share of a multimillion-dollar settlement with the US government Continue Reading
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News
30 Jul 2019
Australia to upgrade supercomputer in HPC boost
The Gadi supercomputer at the Australian National University will run 10 times faster than its predecessor, giving researchers access to high performance computing resources to solve the toughest research problems Continue Reading
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Podcast
24 Jul 2019
Podcast: The Computer Weekly Downtime Upload – Episode 25
In this week’s episode of the Computer Weekly Downtime Upload podcast, Brian McKenna, and Clare McDonald are joined by Cliff Saran to discuss the 50th anniversary of the Moon landing, including the technology involved, and how it compares with today’s technology Continue Reading
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Feature
23 Jul 2019
The pitfalls of hyper-converged infrastructure and how to avoid them
Hyper-converged infrastructure can be an easy win when it comes to datacentre infrastructure upgrades, but there are pitfalls. We discuss how best you can sidestep them Continue Reading
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News
17 Jul 2019
Vulnerable firmware in enterprise server supply chain
Researchers are warning of vulnerabilities in firmware from a third-party supplier that put some servers from Lenovo, Gigabyte and six other manufacturers at risk Continue Reading
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News
15 Jul 2019
Smartodds bets on Rubrik backup appliance with cloud archive
Betting intelligence analytics firm Smartodds replaced its old tape backup infrastructure with Rubrik appliances to cut management time and database restores from hours to minutes Continue Reading
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Tip
12 Jul 2019
3 ways to deploy hyper-converged infrastructure
An HCI deployment can be done in one of three ways -- full replacement, side-by-side or per application -- each with pluses and minus, depending on requirements and resources. Continue Reading
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Feature
01 Jul 2019
French baby store modernises backup as Veeam handles 150TB a night
France-based maternity, baby and children’s store Orchestra needed to share IT resources between 700 points of sale across multiple time zones, and backup for 100 applications Continue Reading
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News
24 Jun 2019
Steel firm adds steel to resilience with Scale hyper-converged
Carrs Tool Steels had to move on from legacy servers and found hyper-converged infrastructure from Scale Computing the ideal fit for a small business that couldn’t afford downtime Continue Reading
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News
20 Jun 2019
How APAC CIOs are driving AI projects
IT leaders at a Computer Weekly roundtable say they are grappling with compute bottlenecks and explainable artificial intelligence even as chatbots and other AI projects are being rolled out in full swing Continue Reading
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News
11 Jun 2019
Scale targets edge workloads with HE500 hyper-converged nodes
Scale Computing adds hyper-converged infrastructure nodes to provide edge compute and storage that is fully compatible with its datacentre-scale HCI appliances Continue Reading
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Feature
05 Jun 2019
Enterprise HPC: Why HPE is buying Cray
HPE’s decision to acquire supercomputing pioneer Cray for $1.3bn serves to highlight the growing importance of high-performance computing (HPC) deployments in the enterprise market Continue Reading
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Feature
30 May 2019
SAN vs NAS vs hyper-converged for virtual machine storage
The pros and cons of file and block access storage arrays vs the new breed of all-in-one server/storage architecture for storage of virtual machine systems and data Continue Reading
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News
28 May 2019
Excelero and BeeGFS offer next-gen HPC based on NVMe flash
Super-fast solid-state storage in commodity servers ties up with recently-developed parallel file system BeeGFS to target high-performance computing use cases Continue Reading
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News
29 Apr 2019
LightBits Super SSD brings NVMe on vanilla Ethernet
Israeli startup LightBits offers super-fast NVMe flash storage over plain Ethernet networks in a move that some think will bring “iSCSI for the NVMe generation” Continue Reading
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News
26 Apr 2019
NVMe is ‘ready’, say Dell EMC, Virtual Instruments and Cisco
Storage and networks big guns say super-fast NVMe flash is ready for enterprise users, with performance 10x over existing Fibre Channel and ecosystem in place Continue Reading
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Feature
17 Apr 2019
Hyper-converged infrastructure vs NAS and SAN shared storage
Can compute, storage and networks in one box be a better option than shared storage? And which organisations can most benefit from it, and for what scale of deployment? Continue Reading
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News
10 Apr 2019
JetStream DR cloud replication aims to make backup redundant
JetStream’s IO Filter allows for continuous replication to the cloud of VMware virtual machines and virtual disks instead of scheduled snapshots or backups, and with a near-zero RPO Continue Reading
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News
09 Apr 2019
HPE and Nutanix go after hybrid cloud service opportunity
Enterprises are taking a hybrid approach to cloud computing. A new deal with Nutanix is HPE's latest attempt at simplifying hardware as a service Continue Reading
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News
03 Apr 2019
Datrium makes European push as it targets storage ‘big guys’
NVMe pioneer turned hybrid cloud and “data platform” provider makes a push for the enterprise and wants to take scalps from those selling “1990s SAN technology” Continue Reading
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News
02 Apr 2019
Cranfield gets Rubrik backup plus Nutanix in drive to the cloud
Research-led university goes hyper-converged across the board with Rubrik backup appliances and Nutanix in a move to rationalise on-site physical needs and drive to the cloud Continue Reading
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News
01 Apr 2019
Azure Stack HCI: Hyper-converged, but not as Azure as you’d think
Microsoft has re-branded Windows Server Software Defined to put hyper-converged to the fore, but Azure Stack HCI isn’t totally in sync with the Azure Stack on-premise cloud platform Continue Reading
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News
20 Mar 2019
Pivot3 to target Azure, Google clouds and enhance AI/ML
Hyper-converged infrastructure maker Pivot3 plans to extend backup for its appliance clusters to additional public clouds and optimise service levels across storage tiers and cache Continue Reading
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News
18 Mar 2019
Component prices skew server market
Global server revenues jump as increased cost of components is passed on Continue Reading
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News
12 Mar 2019
Singapore invests S$200m to upgrade supercomputing capabilities
The investment will shore up Singapore’s supercomputing prowess to facilitate research collaboration, as well as address national and business challenges Continue Reading
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News
04 Mar 2019
IT Priorities 2019: APAC keeping pace with digital transformation
Digital transformation is well underway among APAC enterprises which are looking to spend more on refreshing their IT infrastructure and technologies that improve employee productivity Continue Reading
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News
20 Feb 2019
MWC 2019: Huawei claims massive lead on 5G readiness
At a pre-Mobile World Congress event in London, Huawei’s Ryan Ding shared details of the firm’s rapidly expanding 5G mobile portfolio, and laid into his competitors Continue Reading
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News
13 Feb 2019
Lenovo offers enterprises access to on-premise datacentre kit on cloud-like pay-as-you-go terms
Chinese PC maker Lenovo wants to make it easier for enterprises to access on-premise datacentre resources without needing to invest huge sums of money in purchasing it Continue Reading
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Feature
13 Feb 2019
NVMe startups’ different routes to flash performance gains
NVMe offers huge flash performance benefits, but no one is quite sure how to overcome the challenges that brings and startups are trying several different approaches Continue Reading
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News
10 Feb 2019
Australia’s defence department keeps old PCs out of landfills
Department has securely wiped data from used devices and kept 1,300 tonnes of e-waste out of landfills Continue Reading
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Feature
07 Feb 2019
Cloud the rising star of storage: Eight years of text analysis
Tracking word frequency in nearly a decade’s worth of storage content shows how cloud has come of age, flash has gone mainstream and how we don’t talk about virtualisation any more Continue Reading
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News
05 Feb 2019
Payday lender cuts troubleshooting by 30% with Virtual Instruments
Curo Financial thought storage was slowing down its websites, but found virtual machine and network issues were to blame. To fix this, it’s going proactive on storage performance issues Continue Reading
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News
31 Jan 2019
Hyper-converged infrastructure gains acceptance in APAC
A top Nutanix executive claims that migrations to hyper-converged infrastructure in the region are under way, fuelled by growing interest in hybrid cloud Continue Reading
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News
28 Jan 2019
Government to pump £70m into ‘designing out’ cyber threats
Industrial Strategy Challenge Fund cash to be used for designing and developing more secure hardware in a bid to eradicate cyber threats Continue Reading