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• Reduced power consumption By consolidating power supplies into the blade
chassis, you reduce the power supplies needed and you benefit from an overall
reduction of power use.
• Lower management cost When you consolidate your servers, deployment,
management, and administration are simplified and improved. This, of course,
also manifests itself in cost savings and less headache for the IT staff.
• Simplified cabling Rack-mounted servers were a good way to consolidate hardware
in fewer locations than tower servers. However, they also had a lot of cabling involved.
Blade servers reduce cabling requirements by 70 percent. Why is this a big deal? Fewer
cables means better airflow, which means lower cooling costs.

Features
When choosing a blade server, you have to think about what you’re going to use it for. For
instance, if you are going to be performing complex calculations with a lot of data, you’ll
need a server that’s pretty powerful.
Unfortunately, some companies buy bigger servers than they need, so they’re spending
money on processing power they’re not using. The benefit of a blade system is that you can
easily update the system if you discover you need more power. It’s better to plan for future
growth than to pay up front for power you don’t need.
Table 8-4 lists some types of servers, what they do, and some sample uses. PART III
Features, expansion, build quality, and processing density are all factors to consider
when choosing a blade server.

Consolidation
For some functions, you may not even need to purchase new servers—you can just
repurpose existing machines to serve those needs in your organization. Most organizations
have several small servers that each perform the function of a single legacy application that
cannot be removed because it is still used by some processes. These servers are excellent
candidates for consolidation.

Server Type Functionality Usage
Single-function Bare-bones CPUs, sometimes with Ideal for academic or office
blade server onboard storage or porting, and they environments where blades can be
run single applications. assigned individual tasks, including web
hosting, e-mail, and scheduling software.
Blade PCs The central core of a thin-client setup. General office applications.
This server provides the processing
and storage capacity for clients, which
is then accessed by thin clients.
Enterprise-level Maximum power set in a small space. These are most often used by
blade server These systems generally use multiple digital production studios, high-level
racks and require compatibility with stockbrokers, and financial corporations.
legacy systems, networks, and software.

TABLE 8-4 Different Types of Blade Servers