Setting a new standard for modern IT architectures?

Lenovo Data Center Group (DCG) has introduced ThinkSystem and ThinkAgile hyperconverged infrastructure (HCI) solutions to support edge-to-cloud computing. These new and enhanced hybrid cloud solutions are designed to help organisations of all sizes, modernise, better secure their IT infrastructure, and deliver faster data insights – all powered by the new AMD EPYC™ 7003 Series processors. Specifically optimised to run demanding cloud computing workloads such as VDI, database and analytics, artificial intelligence and more, these solutions have built-in security features to help protect against data integrity and firmware threats.

“Organizations are accelerating their IT infrastructure transformation and shifting investments to focus on more agile edge-to-cloud solutions,” said Kamran Amini, Vice President and General Manager of Server, Storage and Software Defined Infrastructure, Lenovo Data Center Group. “Customers have the advantage of partnering with Lenovo and our consulting services team to take advantage of the latest technologies that drive IT modernisation and gain faster insights with Lenovo’s new top performing ThinkSystem and ThinkAgile portfolio powered on AMD EPYC™ 7003 Series processors.”

Cloud Service Provider Hetzner Online GmbH, Offers Customers Excellent Performance and Value

Hetzner Online GmbH, one of the largest cloud service providers in Europe, recently turned to Lenovo to build out their cloud infrastructure expansion with Lenovo ThinkSystem SR635 and SR645 servers equipped with AMD EPYC^™ processors. The ThinkSystem servers increased Hetzner Online’s performance by up to 100% at the same energy costs and reduced their energy costs by 35-50% compared to other CPU vendors in their data center.

“Our partnership with Lenovo and AMD enables us to create customisable servers that meet our customers’ requirements: high-performance, energy-efficient cloud services at affordable prices,” said Markus Schade, Head of Cloud Services, Hetzner Online GmbH. “Our AMD powered systems are in high demand, as customers rush to take advantage of enhanced CPU performance—particularly those using their servers for virtualization, AI, and big data storage. We believe that AMD EPYC™ processors and their good price-performance ratio are the ideal choice for our needs.”

University of Florida Provides Researchers with Latest Innovative IT Architectures 

The University of Florida is also working with Lenovo’s ThinkSystem servers to infuse AMD EPYC^™ processors into their supercomputer, HiPerGator 3.0 environment. The HiPerGator supercomputer supports more than 3,000 users, across 400 research groups, running 1,400 different applications from gene sequencing, engineering designs and research, physics, materials engineering, social science, natural language processing and more.

“The Lenovo team was very knowledgeable and responsive to our business needs and requirements. It’s important our researchers have the latest technology. Lenovo’s AMD based ThinkSystem servers have more RAM per core, which is critical to our researchers’ data intensive applications that require more memory,” said Dr. Erik Deumens, IT Research Computing Director, University of Florida.

Lenovo ThinkSystem Servers Deliver Breakthrough Performance and Economics

To help customers maximise their IT investments, Lenovo extends the ThinkSystem server portfolio to include the new 2-socket Lenovo ThinkSystem SR645 and SR665 and new Lenovo ThinkSystem 1-socket SR635 and SR655 servers, powered by AMD EPYC™ 7003 Series processors. These solutions can take advantage of the AMD EPYC 7003 series processors’ ~25% more generational performance in its 16 core category^2*. The combination of Lenovo’s industry leading server reliability and performance enhancements are ideal for customers building their edge-to-cloud infrastructure. Beneficial for research and development, financial services, retail and manufacturing, these new platforms are designed to accelerate computational power to deliver business insights:

• Organisations running their systems with accelerators and GPUs, can expect to see up to 25% improvement in system performance and greater VDI density when using heart-of-the-market 16 core AMD EPYC 7003 series processor, compared to the previous generation
• Businesses running compute-intensive workloads such as HPC and AI can achieve up to 15% faster computational (floating point) results from the top of the stack AMD EPYC 7003 series processors, compared to the previous generation³
• Customers running scientific research or engineering applications can expect to see up to 15% better performance using 48 to 64 core AMD EPYC 7003 series processors for improvement in-time-to-results supporting efforts to solve humanity’s greatest challenges
• The third-generation AMD based 2-socket ThinkSystem SR645 and SR665 servers will be available this month; the 1-socket ThinkSystem SR635 and SR655 servers will be available in June

“Moving the bar once more for workload performance, EPYC™ 7003 Series processors provide the performance needed in the heart of the enterprise to help IT professionals drive faster time to results,” said Ram Peddibhotla, Corporate Vice President, EPYC product management, AMD.

New ThinkAgile HCI Solutions with VMware & Nutanix

Lenovo launches new ThinkAgile VX Series hyperconverged platforms combined with third-generation AMD EPYC™ processors. These solutions are tightly integrated with VMware vSAN to enable public cloud-like simplicity, in a private or hybrid cloud environment including:

• ThinkAgile VX3575-G: Designed for compute-heavy applications such as VDI and AI workloads with the ability to support up to eight NVIDIA GPUs

• ThinkAgile VX5575: Offers a storage-dense 2U solution for fast, high-capacity storage applications including email management, data, and analytics
• ThinkAgile VX7575 and ThinkAgile VX7576: Optimised 2U for high-performance workloads such as analytics and databases
• Third-generation AMD-based Lenovo ThinkAgile VX solutions will be available in the second quarter of 2021

Additionally, Lenovo is updating the Lenovo ThinkAgile HX series HCI solutions, with Nutanix, to take advantage of the third-generation AMD EPYC™ processors. ThinkAgile HX3375 and ThinkAgile HX3376 provides simplified operations, increased workload density, stronger data protection and seamless application across clouds to enable a true hybrid architecture. Customers will be able to run their virtual desktop workloads with increased performance. The third-generation AMD based ThinkAgile HX solutions will be available in the third quarter of 2021. 

Comprehensive Approach to Security

Lenovo’s ThinkSystem and ThinkAgile portfolio includes enterprise-class security features, leveraging Lenovo ThinkShield standards. Lenovo ThinkShield is a comprehensive approach to enhancing security in all products from end-to-end, including supply chain and manufacturing processes. This enables customers to be confident that they have a strong security foundation. As part of the solutions announced today, Lenovo enhances ThinkShield security capabilities including:

• New standards-compliant NIST SP800-193 Platform Firmware Resiliency (PFR) with Root of Trust (RoT) Hardware to provide key platform subsystem protection against cyberattacks, unauthorized firmware updates and corruption
• Discrete security processor testing validated by leading third-party security firms – available for customer review, providing unprecedented transparency and assurance