

A newer Article is now available to read: IBM POWER8 vs. POWER9 - A Comparative Analysis for 2020 POWER9 is here, and with it comes loads of new hardware. With the second batch of released hardware there are several new systems that are focused on small and mid-range applications. These include Power9 models S922, S914, and S924 as well as Linux and SAP Hana specialized variants, the L922, L924, H922, and H924. The new systems are utilizing POWER9 processors, a new memory standard, and POWERVM standard on all units. Once again, with a new systems series comes new Power benchmarks as well. Increased CPW speeds and I/O bandwidth, increased memory capacity. With the entry and mid-range systems released so far the increases can be as high as 70% over previous comparable hardware options. Memory:

The most noticeable change from the move to POWER9 is the transition away from the larger, and more expensive, buffered memory to industry standard DDR4 DIMMs. Due to the increasing costs of memory, this has been seen as a welcome change by many, as industry standard memory is substantially cheaper (20-40% in most cases).



(Image: POWER8 Buffered Memory 16GB DIMM vs Industry Standard 16GB DIMM) This change also brings with it substantially increased memory capacity per socket compared with previous generation servers with up to 4TB (2TB per socket) on the 2 socket S922 & S924 servers and up to 1TB on the single socket S914. In addition, as of July 10th, IBM has also released a brand new 8GB memory feature and is the new smallest single unit of memory available. The introduction of the 8GB feature allows a user to get the most memory bandwidth out of their machine for a lower price. (For a more in depth look at these changes check out this article.) CPU:

Although the memory change is important, the biggest change is the name sake of the product line; the POWER9 Processor. The new processor comes with some new features such as dynamic performance mode being enabled by default, a 90%+ increase in fabric bandwidth, CAPI 2.0 & PCIe Gen4 compatibility, and offers up to 24 cores per socket.

