SUN SPARC® ENTERPRISE T5120 AND T5220 SERVER ARCHITECTURE Unleashing the UltraSPARC® T2 Processor with CoolThreads™ Technology White Paper October 2007
Sun Microsystems, Inc. Table of Contents Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Business Challenges for Web 2.0 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Rule-Changing Chip Multithreading (CMT) Technology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Executive Summary Sun Microsystems, Inc. Executive Summary Use of the Web is changing in fundamental ways, driven by Web 2.0 applications and the thousands of people who join the global Internet every day through a proliferation of new interactive devices. The character of applications and services is changing too. Increasingly, user's don't need to install anything, upgrade anything, license anything, subscribe to anything, or even buy anything in order to participate and transact.
2 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) Sun Microsystems, Inc. Chapter 1 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) By any measure, Sun’s first-generation CMT processors were an unprecedented success. Sun Fire™ / Sun SPARC Enterprise T1000 and T2000 servers based on the UltraSPARC T1 processor with CoolThreads technology won enthusiastic praise, and generated the fastest product ramp in Sun’s history.
3 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) Sun Microsystems, Inc. • Driving Datacenter Virtualization and Eco-Efficiency Coincident with the need to scale services, many datacenters are recognizing the advantages of deploying fewer standard platforms to run a mixture of commercial and technical workloads.
4 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) Sun Microsystems, Inc. estate to build increasingly complex processors, with instruction-level parallelism (ILP) as a goal.
5 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) Sun Microsystems, Inc. a result, while these designs provide some additional throughput and scalability, they can consume considerable power and generate significant heat — without a commensurate increase in overall performance. Chip Multithreading (CMT) with CoolThreads™ Technology Sun engineers were early to recognize the disparity between processor speeds and memory access rates.
6 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) Sun Microsystems, Inc. Chip multithreading provides real value since it increases the ability of the execution pipeline to do actual work on any given clock cycle. Utilization of the processor pipeline is greatly enhanced since a number of execution threads now share its resources. The negative effects of memory latency are effectively masked, since the processor and memory subsystems remain active in parallel to the processor execution pipeline.
7 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) Sun Microsystems, Inc. predecessors, while leading competitors in terms of performance, performance per watt, and SWaP performance (as evaluated by the Space, Watts, and Performance metric detailed later in this section). These systems also extend the benefits of CMT from multithreaded commercial workloads into technical workloads rich in floating point operations.
8 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) Sun Microsystems, Inc. Designed to complement each other, as well as the rest of Sun’s server product line, the Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers address the dynamic needs of the modern datacenter.
9 The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) Sun Microsystems, Inc. • A Tradition of Leading Eco Efficiency Sun Fire / Sun SPARC Enterprise T1000 and T2000 servers were the industry's first eco-responsible servers. Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers continue this tradition by offering the best performance and performance-per-watt across a wide range of commercial and technical workloads.
The Evolution of Chip Multithreading (CMT) 10 Sun Microsystems, Inc.
11 The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology Sun Microsystems, Inc. Chapter 2 The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology The UltraSPARC T2 processor is the industry’s first system on a chip (SoC), supplying the most cores and threads of any general-purpose processor available, and integrating all key system functions.
12 The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology Sun Microsystems, Inc. Table 2 provides a comparison between the UltraSPARC T2 and the UltraSPARC T1 processor. Table 2.
13 The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology Sun Microsystems, Inc. simply increasing the number of cores would have gained additional throughput, but would have resulted in consuming extra die area, leaving no room for integrated components such as floating point processors. The final UltraSPARC T2 processor design recognizes that memory latency is truly the bottleneck to improving performance.
14 The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology Sun Microsystems, Inc. UltraSPARC T2 Processor Architecture The UltraSPARC T2 processor extends Sun’s Throughput Computing initiative with an elegant and robust architecture that delivers real performance to applications. A highlevel block diagram of the UltraSPARC T2 processor is shown in Figure 5.
15 The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology Sun Microsystems, Inc. 3DES, AES, RC4, SHA-1, SHA-256, MD5, RSA to 2048 key, ECC, and CRC32. Embedding hardware cryptographic acceleration for these ciphers allows end-to-end encryption with no penalty in either performance or cost. UltraSPARC T2 Core Architecture and Pipelines Figure 6 provides a block-level diagram representing a single UltraSPARC cores on the UltraSPARC T2 processor (up to eight are supported per processor).
The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology 16 Sun Microsystems, Inc. An eight-stage integer pipeline and a 12-stage floating-point pipeline are provided by each UltraSPARC processor core (Figure 7). A new “pick” pipeline stage has been added to choose two threads (out of the eight possible per core) to execute each cycle.
17 The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology Sun Microsystems, Inc. Integrated Networking By providing integrated on-chip networking, the UltraSPARC T2 processor is able to provide better networking performance. All network data is supplied directly from and to main memory. Placing networking so close to memory reduces latency, provides higher memory bandwidth, and eliminates inherent inefficiencies of I/O protocol translation.
18 The UltraSPARC T2 Processor with CoolThreads Technology Sun Microsystems, Inc. Power Management Beyond the inherent efficiencies of CMT design, the UltraSPARC T2 is the first processor to incorporate unique power management features at both the core and memory levels of the processor. These features include reduced instruction rates, parking of idle threads and cores, and ability to turn off clocks in both cores and memory to reduce power consumption.
Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture 19 Sun Microsystems, Inc. Chapter 3 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 servers have been designed to provide breakthrough performance while maximizing reliability and minimizing power consumption and complexity. This section details the physical and architectural aspects of these systems.
20 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun Microsystems, Inc. The motherboard interconnect for these systems has been greatly simplified. 12-volt power is distributed to the motherboard through a pair of metal bus bars, connected to a Power Distribution Board (PDB). A single flex-circuit connector routes all critical power control and DVD drive signaling over to the PDB.
21 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun Microsystems, Inc. • Fan boards provide connections for power and control for both the primary and secondary fans in the front of the chassis. No cables are required since every dual fan module plugs directly into one of these PCBs which, in turn, plugs into the Connector Board. • PCI Express riser cards plug directly into the motherboard, allowing PCI Express cards to be installed.
22 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun Microsystems, Inc. The Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 server includes the following major components: • An UltraSPARC T2 processor with four, six, or eight cores at speeds of 1.2 or 1.
23 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun Microsystems, Inc. • A DB-9 TTYA serial port is provided for serial devices (not connected to the ILOM system controller serial port). • A total of three PCI Express card slots are provided, two of which can alternately support XAUI cards connected to the UltraSPARC T2 10 Gb Ethernet interfaces. • Two management ports are provided for use with the ILOM system controller.
24 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun Microsystems, Inc. Front and Rear Perspectives Figure 11 illustrates the front and back panels of the Sun SPARC Enterprise T5220 server. System status indicators DVD Drive Disk drives Redundant (N+1) Power supply units PCI Express or XAUI slots System status indicators USB ports Component status indicators PCI Express slots Serial and network Management ports 10/100/1000 Ethernet ports USB ports Serial port (ttya) Figure 11.
25 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun Microsystems, Inc. System Management Technology As the number of systems grow in any organization, the complexities of managing the infrastructure throughout its lifecycle becomes increasingly difficult. Effective system management requires both integrated hardware that can sense and modify the behavior of key system elements, as well as advanced tools that can automate key administrative tasks.
26 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun Microsystems, Inc. Sun Management Center Software Sun Management Center software is an element management system for monitoring and managing the Sun environment. Sun Management Center software integrates with the leading enterprise management systems to provide customers with a unified management infrastructure. The base package is free and provides hardware monitoring.
27 Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture Sun Microsystems, Inc. • Monitor When systems are up and running, administrators can use Sun N1 System Manager to monitor system health, helping to ensure that everything is running at the optimal levels. The software provides detailed hardware monitoring for attributes such as fans, temperature, disk, and voltage usage, including bare metal systems.
28 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc. Chapter 4 Enterprise-Class Software New technology often requires time for tools and applications to arrive, and delivering agile and highly-available services that take advantage of available resources requires stable development tools, operating systems, middleware and management software.
29 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc. • Support for Virtualized Networking and I/O, and Accelerated Cryptography The Solaris OS contains technology to support and virtualize components and subsystems on the UltraSPARC T2 processor, including support for the on-chip 10 Gb Ethernet ports and PCI Express interface.
30 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc. single core, a task that would require additional software and considerable overhead in competing architecture. LDOM LDOM Container Container Container Container Container Container Applications LDOM Multithreading at all layers Storage: ZFS Virtualization Multi-threaded Networking Hypervisor: Multi-threaded Chip Multithreading: Multi-core/Multi-thread Figure 12.
Enterprise-Class Software 31 Sun Microsystems, Inc. By taking advantage of Logical Domains, organizations gain the flexibility to deploy multiple operating systems simultaneously on a single platform. In addition, administrators can leverage virtual device capabilities to transport an entire software stack hosted on a Logical Domain from one physical machine to another. Logical Domains can also host Solaris Containers to capture the isolation, flexibility, and manageability features of both technologies.
32 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc. Solaris™ Containers Providing virtualization at the OS level, Solaris Containers consist of a group of technologies that work together to efficiently manage system resources, virtualize the environment, and provide a complete, isolated, and secure runtime environment for applications.
33 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc. the activities of the diagnostic system. With Solaris Fault Manager, the overall time from a fault condition, to automated diagnosis, to any necessary human intervention is greatly reduced, increasing application uptime. • Solaris Service Manager The Solaris Service Manager facility creates a standardized control mechanism for application services by turning them into first-class objects that administrators can observe and manage in a uniform way.
34 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc. Application Selection Application selection helps identify those applications that stand to benefit from CoolThreads technology. The CoolThreads Selection Tool (coolst) helps determine application suitability for both the UltraSPARC T1 and ULtraSPARC T2 architectures, accelerating the understanding of application execution and helping to take the risk out of investment decisions.
35 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc. • Corestat — Corestat provides an on-line monitoring tool for core utilization of the UltraSPARC T2 processor, providing a more accurate measure of processor and system utilization than tools that only measure the utilization of individual threads.
36 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc. administration utilities and it doesn’t make sense for them to assemble and integrate traditional middleware this way either. The Sun Java Enterprise System 5 (Java JES 5) provides a complete set of infrastructure software that is integrated to work as a whole, and that offers shared components, common technologies, a consistent architecture and user experience.
37 Enterprise-Class Software Sun Microsystems, Inc.
38 Conclusion Sun Microsystems, Inc. Chapter 5 Conclusion Delivering on the demands of Web 2.0 applications and virtualized, eco-efficient data centers requires a comprehensive approach that includes innovative processors, system platforms, and operating systems, along with leading application, middleware, and management technology. With its strong technology positions and R&D investments in all of these areas, Sun is in a unique position to deliver on this vision.
39 Conclusion Sun Microsystems, Inc. Table 5. Related Websites Web Site URL Description sun.com/coolthreads Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Servers sun.com/processors/UltraSPARC-T2 Sun UltraSPARC T2 Processor opensparc.net/opensparc-t2 OpenSPARC T2 sun.com/processors/throughput Throughput Computing sun.com/servers/coolthreads/overview Sun Servers with CoolThreads Technology sun.com/servers/coolthreads/ldoms Sun Logical Domains sun.com/solaris The Solaris Operating System sun.
Sun SPARC Enterprise T5120 and T5220 Server Architecture On the Web sun.com/coolthreads Sun Microsystems, Inc. 4150 Network Circle, Santa Clara, CA 95054 USA Phone 1-650-960-1300 or 1-800-555-9SUN (9786) Web sun.com © 2007 Sun Microsystems, Inc. All rights reserved. Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun logo, CoolThreads, Java, J2EE, N1, Solaris, and Sun Fire are trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the United States and other countries.
