Dawning announces first fully SSI-compliant system

The Server System Infrastructure Forum (SSI) today announced that it has promoted the Blade Specifications that have been in development to Rev. 1.0, with associated Building Blocks available from the SSI ecosystem.  The specifications promoted to Rev 1.0 include: Compute Module and Mezzanine, Chassis Management Module (CMM), Midplane Electrical Specification, along with the Midplane and System Management Design guides.

At the same time, the Dawning Information Industry Company announced the development and release of the TC3600 Blade System – the first fully SSI-compliant system.  The TC3600, which also complies with the HPCSC (High-Performance Computing Standard Committee) standard, was developed in collaboration with Intel and the SSI ecosystem. It includes an Ethernet switch from H3C, an InfiniBand switch from Voltaire, compute blades from both Dawning and Intel, and a CMM from Dawning. Dawning is demonstrating the TC3600 at the Intel Developer Forum (IDF) 2009, Sept. 22-24, at San Francisco’s Moscone Center, booth #413 with general availability expected later this year.

The TC3600 system has the flexibility to serve the HDC market and other blade segments, with features that include:

•    Up to 6.4 TB of throughput capacity

•    Support for I/O extension – up to 4 I/O cards per blade

•    Up to 6 switches and 2 I/O extension cards

•    Support for HDD expansion – up to 8 HDDs per blade

•    Support for shared storage

“By designing to the SSI Specifications, Dawning immediately gained access to the SSI building blocks that are available in the industry,” said Sha Choqun, General Manager of Blade Development, Dawning.  “We will also benefit moving forward as new products and technologies, such as Voltaire’s recently introduced QDR InfiniBand switch, become available in the market.”

By taking advantage of the industry-standard SSI ecosystem and SSI-compliant modules, Dawning dramatically reduced the resources and time required for product development. “Dawning’s development of the TC3600 takes full advantage of the benefits of the SSI EcoSystem and its promise of interoperability,” said Jason Waxman, General Manager of High-Density Computing, Intel Server Platforms Group.  “As a result, Dawning has been able to achieve much faster time to market, while lowering the cost of development.”

“The HPC market in Asia is experiencing explosive growth, and Dawning’s next-generation TC3600 will serve as the key component in our advanced supercomputers,” said Nie Hue, VP of Solution Centers, Dawning.  “The TC3600 will further Dawning’s lead as Asia’s leading supercomputer supplier and a top 10 worldwide supercomputing vendor.”