Up until recently I thought ARM in the server room was more of a “so crazy it might actually work” idea but with Microsoft’s announcement of support for ARM SoCs it sounds perfectly reasonable. The equivalent of a full rack of x86 servers (480 cores!) in 2U sounds pretty cool too.
“Calxeda’s SoC (system on a chip), being built on ARM’s Cortex-A9 design, will enable OEMs to build servers that will offer 120 quad-core ARM nodes -- or 480 cores -- in a 2U (3.5-inch) form factor, with an average power consumption of about five Watts per node, Freund said. Such a system, which will consume about 600 Watts, will offer the same performance as a full rack of x86-based servers that consume about 4,000 Watts, he added.” More from the Linux for Devices article here
