Here is an interesting take on making Cloud Computers. Instead of using commodity, one-size-fits-all-servers, Schooner Technologies make specific ahrdware that accelerates certain functions. Schooner makes servers that specifically accelerate MySQL and memcached. If you have worked at large scale dot com’s, this could be a big win. When Cloud Computing moves to a SaaS architecture you are most likely to use these exact technologies to scale up your Enterprise Cloud.

It wasn’t so long ago that computers have many hardware architectures (MIPS, RISC, PowerPC and even Intel) and different hardware performed better at certain tasks. So the idea isn’t new, but the market wanted one CPU architecture to make it easy to understand and buy. CIO’s couldn’t comprehend the differences and just simplified their decisions to a single hardware platform.

But the scale of today’s Cloud operations means that specialist options could be returning. For example. Cisco UCS could be regarded as a hardware variant on the Intel platform that is highly customised for Cloud Computing type clusters. And HP Virtual Connect is equally a hardware customisation to improve the network performance for virtualised servers.

It’s an interesting idea that hardware customisation might be returning the market.

All about Nehalem’s

On a slightly different note, many recent announcement are based on Intel Nehalem. It would seem that this CPU architecture unlocks a vast array of new features for many new entrants to the market. Certainly, HP & IBM haven’t made much smoke on their Nehalem platforms. I wonder why ?

Credit

Schooner Launches Specialized Servers for Speedy Data Delivery: “GigaOM”