Fujitsu Siemens Primergy RX200 S4 review

The latest Primergy RX200 S4 from Fujitsu Siemens has a keen focus on continuous operations and reduced operational costs. This 1U low-profile rack server targets a wide range of applications with web services high on its agenda and it also introduces some new and improved remote management facilities.

The RX200 S4 supports dual processors and the review system came equipped with a single 2.83GHz Xeon E5440. This particular module is proving a popular choice in rack servers as it offers a good combination of performance and reduced power consumption as it has a reasonably low TDP of 80W. Fujitsu Siemens is very serious about energy efficiency and also issued a company-wide green initiative earlier this year which includes a used IT product take-back service that includes servers and storage. If you do decide to swap out to the RX200 you’ll find it delivers on its power promises as we measured the system drawing a very reasonable 29W in standby, 173W with Windows Server 2003 OS in idle and 218W with the processor under extreme load from SiSoft Sandra.

Remote server management gets a boost as the server has an integrated iRMC2 chip and the latest ServerView suite of tools. The controller offers a dedicated management port at the rear and delivers a smart web interface from where you can view the status of critical components, keep an eye on environmental values and control power functions. You also have processor power management options where can choose between the best performance or minimum power settings and schedule each one for different times of the day. Full KVM over IP remote control is a possibility but as with HP’s servers this is offered only as an option and requires an additional activation key.

The main ServerView software sees some big improvements making it even easier to use as all components can now be accessed from one interface. The ServerList option allows you to view servers with the relevant agent installed and place them in different collections for easier management. Selecting one takes you to a complete listing of all hardware components where you can check on hardware status and current power consumption, pull up hardware inventories and link errors or failures with alarms and alerts.

System configuration data can be stored in an archive and the Inventory Manager allows users to perform scheduled collections, quick searches and custom queries on the store. The RAID Manager is another browser interface specifically for monitoring and managing the storage and controllers. It presents an equally tidy interface and a key feature is it’s designed to manage multiple RAID cards from the same interface regardless of the manufacturer.

The server is up to the usual high standard of build quality we’ve come to expect from Fujitsu Siemens and it can easily rival equivalent rack systems from HP and IBM in this department. The front panel has room for four 2.5in. SFF hard disks and the price included a quartet of 146GB Seagate Savvio SAS models loaded in solid hot-swap carriers. RAID is handled by an LSI SAS1078 PCI-e card which is cabled through to the hard disk backplane and delivers support for stripes, mirrors, RAID-5 and dual drive redundant RAID-6. Fujitsu Siemens has been quite canny with its placement as the riser card at the back of the motherboard has a separate PCI-e slot at its front specifically for the RAID controller. This arrangement leaves the two PCI-e slots on the main riser card completely free allowing the server to offer above average expansion potential.