SUN’s UltraSparc T1 - the Next Generation Server CPUs
by Johan De Gelas on December 29, 2005 10:03 AM EST- Posted in
- CPUs
Virtualization
Virtualization is an important trend in the server world. Our own experiences with it (for example, VMWare ESX server and MS Virtual Server) show that it is not completely ready for prime time. As an example, we experienced a crash of the Console OS, the linux based OS that controls the Virtual Layer. There is also no support for a 64-bit Guest OS, the OS needs to be binary translated and so on. All this will change with the introduction of hardware supported Virtualization.
The UltraSparc T1 has support for a Hypervisor, which is IBM talk for Virtual Monitor or the virtual layer that runs under the Guest OS. Solaris has excellent support for containers or zones. These are software based partitions[4] in Solaris, and the objective is similar to virtualization: high isolation. Each zone can be individually re-booted, dynamically created and errors in one zone won't affect other zones. This makes the T1 even more suited as a host for multiple tens of websites supporting different clients, as each web server can run in a separate zone on the Solaris OS.
However, when it comes to running different OS, Intel has the advantage. VMWare is going to introduce several server products that make use of Intel's VT technology, and Vmware workstation, Xen and MS Virtual Server can already use Intel's VT technology. (It must be noted that MS Virtual Server is not really a Virtual Machine Monitor as Xen and VMWare ESX server: it needs Windows 2003 or XP to run). So, Intel has the advantage in this arena, while SUN is apparently working hard to get Xen and Linux support for the T1.
Niagara 2
Right now, SUN is definitely a few steps ahead of the competition and it is not sitting still. The 65 nm Niagara 2 is due in 2007 and will feature a slightly higher clock speed (1.4 GHz and higher) and two pipelines [3] per core instead of one. Combined with 8 threads per core, this should allow the new CPU to achieve nearly twice as high IPC per core. The integration will go one step further: X8 PCI Express, a multi-port Gbit Ethernet switch, and more encryption hardware support will be integrated in Niagara-2. The integrated memory controller will also support fully buffered DIMMs.
Based on the technology in the current T1, SUN seems to be on schedule, and they are creating some very compelling designs. There are certainly many ways to tackle computing problems, and it's good to see some new approaches other than the standard "more cache" and "higher clock speeds" that are so common.
References
[1] NIAGARA: A 32-WAY MULTITHREADED SPARC PROCESSOR
- Poonacha Kongetira,Kathirgamar Aingaran, Kunle Olukotun, Sun Microsystems
[2] SUN T1 benchmarks
http://www.sun.com/servers/coolthreads/t1000/benchmarks.jsp [3] Maximizing CMP Throughput with Mediocre Cores - John D. Davis, James Laudon†, Kunle Olukotun
[4] Solaris 10 - What's coming in 2004- Chris Rijk
http://www.aceshardware.com/read_news.jsp?id=75000449 [5] Niagara, a Torrent of threads- Chris Rijk
http://www.aceshardware.com/read.jsp?id=65000292 [6] APPLICATIONS ON ULTRASPARC T1 CHIP MULTITHREADING SYSTEMS
Denis Sheahan, UltraSPARC T1 Architecture Group
Virtualization is an important trend in the server world. Our own experiences with it (for example, VMWare ESX server and MS Virtual Server) show that it is not completely ready for prime time. As an example, we experienced a crash of the Console OS, the linux based OS that controls the Virtual Layer. There is also no support for a 64-bit Guest OS, the OS needs to be binary translated and so on. All this will change with the introduction of hardware supported Virtualization.
The UltraSparc T1 has support for a Hypervisor, which is IBM talk for Virtual Monitor or the virtual layer that runs under the Guest OS. Solaris has excellent support for containers or zones. These are software based partitions[4] in Solaris, and the objective is similar to virtualization: high isolation. Each zone can be individually re-booted, dynamically created and errors in one zone won't affect other zones. This makes the T1 even more suited as a host for multiple tens of websites supporting different clients, as each web server can run in a separate zone on the Solaris OS.
However, when it comes to running different OS, Intel has the advantage. VMWare is going to introduce several server products that make use of Intel's VT technology, and Vmware workstation, Xen and MS Virtual Server can already use Intel's VT technology. (It must be noted that MS Virtual Server is not really a Virtual Machine Monitor as Xen and VMWare ESX server: it needs Windows 2003 or XP to run). So, Intel has the advantage in this arena, while SUN is apparently working hard to get Xen and Linux support for the T1.
Niagara 2
Right now, SUN is definitely a few steps ahead of the competition and it is not sitting still. The 65 nm Niagara 2 is due in 2007 and will feature a slightly higher clock speed (1.4 GHz and higher) and two pipelines [3] per core instead of one. Combined with 8 threads per core, this should allow the new CPU to achieve nearly twice as high IPC per core. The integration will go one step further: X8 PCI Express, a multi-port Gbit Ethernet switch, and more encryption hardware support will be integrated in Niagara-2. The integrated memory controller will also support fully buffered DIMMs.
Based on the technology in the current T1, SUN seems to be on schedule, and they are creating some very compelling designs. There are certainly many ways to tackle computing problems, and it's good to see some new approaches other than the standard "more cache" and "higher clock speeds" that are so common.
References
[1] NIAGARA: A 32-WAY MULTITHREADED SPARC PROCESSOR
- Poonacha Kongetira,Kathirgamar Aingaran, Kunle Olukotun, Sun Microsystems
[2] SUN T1 benchmarks
http://www.sun.com/servers/coolthreads/t1000/benchmarks.jsp [3] Maximizing CMP Throughput with Mediocre Cores - John D. Davis, James Laudon†, Kunle Olukotun
[4] Solaris 10 - What's coming in 2004- Chris Rijk
http://www.aceshardware.com/read_news.jsp?id=75000449 [5] Niagara, a Torrent of threads- Chris Rijk
http://www.aceshardware.com/read.jsp?id=65000292 [6] APPLICATIONS ON ULTRASPARC T1 CHIP MULTITHREADING SYSTEMS
Denis Sheahan, UltraSPARC T1 Architecture Group
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Brian23 - Saturday, December 31, 2005 - link
While it's true that HT helps fight this issue, it's not the complete solution. Sun's approach is much better.Betwon - Thursday, December 29, 2005 - link
How terrible!The single issue pipeline/core!
Poeple always complains that: we fails to find the enough threads(2 or 4 threads) in the most apps for the multi-thread CPU.
Now, it is very difficult to find a app(8X4=32 threads parallel well).
Calin - Tuesday, January 3, 2006 - link
It is hard to find parallelism in one application so you could run it well on two cores. However, if you use 32 applications, you can run it very well on 32 cores.JarredWalton - Thursday, December 29, 2005 - link
Most servers don't run a lot of single-threaded apps, or if they do they run many instances of the single-threaded app/process at the same time. This is clearly not a chip designed for all markets, but it is instead focused on doing very well in a niche market.thesix - Thursday, December 29, 2005 - link
Johan,Nice article!
A small point: I don't think it's correct to refer Sun Microsystems Inc. as 'SUN', it should be 'Sun'.
Even though it originally stands for Standford University Network, 'SUN' is no longer the semi-official name, AFAIK.
When T1 based system is announced, I was hoping to see some independent benchmarks from Anandtech, especially the MySQL one you guys used to benchmark the server performance.
I know it's not scientific, and SPEC is as good as it gets, still I am curious :-)
Have you guys considered using T1000/T2000 to power Anandtech, given it's so cheap and designed for webserver type of workload?
That would be a good win-back story for Sun, I remembered you guys migraded from Sun Ultra boxes to PC server several years ago :-)
steveha - Thursday, December 29, 2005 - link
Why drop the opteron from the Specweb2005 results? Did it destroy the T1?stephenbrooks - Monday, January 2, 2006 - link
We think we should be told.NullSubroutine - Thursday, December 29, 2005 - link
How do these price? It seems the performance per watt is very good, but what if the cpu and the platform costs more?I might have missed it, but what was the die size?
icarus4586 - Thursday, December 29, 2005 - link
I'm assuming that should read,
I wouldn't guess Sun is using IBM technology or marketing terms.
JohanAnandtech - Thursday, December 29, 2005 - link
As thesix already commented (thanks :-), hypervisor is indeed IBM talk. AFAIK, IBM was first.