Bull Bullion S8 Server
The most advanced workspace for fast data

Overview:

By leveraging its unique know-how in mission-critical, highly performant servers design, Bull brings to the market a complete range of x86 servers, bullion™. bullion reaches the highest level of quality of service, performance, availability and scalability, with one goal in mind, be the best answer to meet the 3 big challenges an IT Department is facing: Data Center optimization, IT modernization, Big Data.

Optimize your Data Center

Data Centers have to accompany the rising of Cloud, Big Data and mobility, whilst guaranteeing the right levels of service. bullion is the right answer to consolidate, rationalize and virtualize Data Centers: efficiency generator, designed for the private cloud, targeting next generation Software Defined Data Centers (SDDC), bullion dramatically enhances users’ financial equation, providing more performance and agility.

Modernize your IT

Ensuring the right evolution of application environment is a key success factor for any IT modernization project. It has to be based on highly reliable and performant, open and scalable platforms or servers. With bullion, you have it. New usage trends of the digital world are now at your reach: Cloud, BYOD, mobility, Big Data. Along with bullion, Bull proposes Liber, its unique methodology to industrialize migration of legacy applications.

Make sense of your data

Big Data is now in everyone’s mind. How shall I properly manage the never ending growth of data volume, velocity, variety, and transform them into an asset for my organization? With its unique memory capacity, bullion, the ideal platform for Big Data, provides unmatched features to analyze data in real-time: you are ready for the In-Memory journey.

A powerful and modular range

The bullion server range consists of 4 complementary models, sharing the same innovative technology, embarking from 2 to 16 Intel® Xeon® E7 v2 processors, with a maximum memory capacity of 24 TB, unmatched on the market. Depending on the needs, the users simply add 3U computing modules, connected via the Connecting Box, developed by Bull engineers to get rid of cabling. For more agility in configuring, bullion servers propose innovative design with hot plug memory and I/O blades.

Bullion S8 in brief

The bullion S8 server, with up to four 3U modules, perfectly fits in with the range dynamics – best in class reliability & availability features, thanks to its capacity of up to 8 processors and 12 TB of memory. It provides up to 120 cores and 240 threads to host VM clusters, critical database or In- Memory applications.

Dedicated Bull services

Coming with the bullion range, Bull proposes a full range of added value services, such as Service Assurance, to optimize operations, and Liber, to modernize the application environment. Our best experts provide specific offers, including power audits or architecture consulting. Bull’s briefing Centers are open to share field experience on real case studies with dedicated workshops and hands-on sessions.

Solutions:

Optimize your Data Center

Your Organization Is Turning Extensively To Digital And The Data Center Is The Cornerstone Of This Change. Is It Ready For The Challenge?

Service Quality.The more the business relies on digital, the more the business expects, because their effectiveness depends directly on your service levels. And your data center is in the front line when it comes to meeting your SLAs. Your priority? To optimize so it keeps pace with business objectives: availability, performance, flexibility, cost reduction.

Optimization. Consolidation, rationalization and, above all, virtualization are the means to ensure this all-round optimization. A process that includes every aspect of operation, from energy management to system supervision and maintenance. The Cloud, Big Data, mobility will make unprecedented demands on your infrastructure. So be prepared.

The Bullion Solution

Designed For Private Cloud

The world’s fastest x86 enterprise server, bullion was born for virtualization and private Cloud. With its dynamic reconfiguration capabilities, it combines exceptional performance with unparalleled agility.

Generating Efficiencies

Simplified connectivity, hot-swappable components, integrated diagnostic and monitoring tools, intelligent cooling: bullion generates efficiencies at every level of production.

Towards Tomorrow’s Data Center

By limiting the number of objects to manage, simplify their use, and delivering efficiencies and savings, bullion is the cornerstone of future Software Defined Data Centers (SDDCs).

Modernize your information systems

To Develop And Deploy New Applications, Your I.t. Has To Be Agile. Are Your Infrastructure Really Compatible With Innovation?

Constraints. They may be reliable and efficient, but older applications are a double barrier to innovation: technically, because they lack scalability; and financially, because they’re more expensive to run. Your goal? To find more room for manoeuvre, without abandoning your investments.

Openness. Migrating legacy applications securely to open but robust platforms is becoming a major challenge. By modernizing your legacy applications, you create the conditions for openness and agility you need to accommodate the new practices and technologies of the digital enterprise: the Cloud, mobility, BYOD, Big Data...

The Bullion Solution

Reliability And Performance

bullion feeds on Bull’s extensive experience in mainframes and the world’s most powerful supercomputers.

Scalability And Cost Savings

Easily reconfigurable from 2 to 16 processors, with 48 GB to 24 TB of memory, bullion offers unrivalled scalability. Its density, ease of operation and energy performance all help to slash licensing, maintenance and energy costs.

Modernization And Openness

Around bullion, Bull offers a range of services to support information systems modernization, including Liber, its unique approach to industrial-scale migration of legacy applications.

Make sense of your data

Opening Up Unprecedented New Options For Data Analysis, Big Data Is Turning The Relationship Between The Organization And Its Information Upside Down. So Many New Challenges For Your Infrastructure To Deal With!

Opportunity.The data explosion is a fantastic opportunity for enterprises that know how to transform it into useful information. Your challenge? To effectively gather, organize and process that data, so you can understand it better and act faster.

Speed. Massive amounts of data, heterogeneity, more complex queries… your Business Intelligence systems are under pressure. For Big Data, the speed is becoming the fundamental underlying challenge. The ability to collect and manage data flows in real time, and speed up processing, is all about forgetting the ‘big’ so you can focus on what really matters: the data.

The Bullion Solution

The Real-time Age

Benefiting from Bull’s experience in High-Performance Computing, bullion not only delivers computing performance, but also high-speed I/O, so it can respond reliably to the extreme requirements of real-time flows.

Ready For In-memory

The world’s fastest x86 server, bullion has exceptional memory capacity. Offering up to 24TB, it is the ideal platform for In-Memory Analytics, which significantly boosts the performance of BI systems. Bull has established many partnerships with ISVs to optimize theirs solutions on the bullion platform.

Technical Specifications:

 

Technical specifications
Design
Form Factor	19” 12U
Processors
Number	From 2 to 8 sockets, max 120 cores and 240 threads
Type	Intel® Xeon® E7 v2 Family Supports 6, 8, 10, 12 or 15 cores
L3 Cache	Up to 37.5MB shared cache
Architecture
Chipset	Intel® C602J
Quick Path Interconnect	Chipset Max 8GT/s
Scalability	From 2 to 8 sockets, via BCS2 (Bull Coherence Switch 2)
Hardware Partitioning	Yes
Memory Blades
Min/max	Min: 48GB, max config: 12TB
Type	DDR3, RDIMM, LR-DIMM
Memory blades capacity	48GB, 96GB, 192GB, 384GB
Memory blade	Up to 32 blades, 6 slots/blade
Memory availability	Hot plug memory blades
Blades
BUS	PCIe Gen3 x8
I/O blades	Up to 28, hot swap
I/O availability	Hot plug blades
I/O Blade Types
NIC I/O blade	1GbE: 2 or 4 ports per I/O blade 10GbE: 2 ports per I/O blade
HBA I/O blade	8Gb/s: 2 ports per I/O blade 16Gb/s: 2 ports per I/O blade
Flash I/O blade	SSD Flash 1TB
SAS I/O blade	6Gb/s: 2 ext. ports per I/O blade
Storage
Drive bays	Up to 8x HDDs, hot plug
Hard drives	300GB, 600GB 2.5" SAS 10Krpm, 146GB, 300GB 2.5" SAS 15Krpm 400GB, 800GB 2.5" SSD SAS
Storage Controller (Optional)	I/O blade with RAID 0,1(12Gb/s)
SAN	EMC, NetApp, Bull Optima
Embedded I/O Ports
NIC	Up to 8x 1GbE ports
Management ports	Up to 4x Ethernet ports for System Management
PS/2port (mouse, keyboard)	USB or iBMC
USB	16 max
Video
Video Controller	Via iBMC
Memory	8 MB
Security
2-level password	Yes
Power Supply
Hot-plug PSU	1+1
Power supply number	Up to 8, redundant Active/passive power-supply solution with ultra-capacitor (UCM)
Power type	Label 80+ Platinum, 94% efficient
Power consumption	750watt or 1600watt w/PFC
Auto-sensing	220V 60/50Hz
Cooling
FAN specifications	Up to 24x Hot plug, n+1 redundant
Physical Specifications
Size (HxLxP)	520 (12U) x445mm (19") x820mm (max). Recommended to use Bull racks
Weight	Up to 180kg
Operating constraints	10°C to 35°C, gradient 20°C/h, 20% to 60%, gradient 5%/h
OS & Software
Management Software	Bull System Manager, Bull iCare, Bull Platform Manager
Operating System	Red Hat® Enterprise Linux®, VMware® vSphere® ESXi, Microsoft® Windows Server
System Management
BMC	IPMI 2.0
Remote Management	Standard via on-board iBMC
Availability & RAS Features
Memory RAS features	ECC, Enhanced SDDC, Enhanced DDDC, Memory Sparing, MCA recovery, hot-add memory blade
Hot plug devices	Memory blades, I/O blades, disk drives, power supplies, fans, UCM.
Redundancy	Power supplies, fans, QPI paths, BCS2 connection (XQPI paths)
Serviceability	Hot add memory blades
Warranty & Services
Standard warranty	1 year warranty
Warranty extension	Bull Global Care
Other services	IT infrastructures Advisory, energy audits Service Assurance HA, capacity & performance management Installation & integration services
Regulatory & Safety
Regulatory compliance	CE (FCC, UL), RoHS

Documentation:

Download the Bull Bullion Server Brochure (PDF).

Download the Bull Bullion S8 Server Brochure (PDF).