IBM System x3850 X5 review

Remote management features are present and correct as all current IBM servers sport an embedded IMM. This presents a dedicated network port at the rear and provides remote browser access to the server regardless of its condition.

The IMM allows you to monitor critical components, remotely control power and run unattended firmware upgrades. You also get full KVM-over-IP remote control, virtual boot media and an OS failure blue screen capture function.

IBM’s Systems Director handles general systems management and is accessed via a tidy web interface packed with plenty of wizards. You can run network discoveries, collect and store hardware and software inventories and use its problem alerting system.

The results of the network discoveries are viewed from the Systems Director home page and options are provided for deploying agents to IBM and non-IBM systems. These allow you to collect inventory data, execute tasks such as file transfers and run remote control sessions using RDP or RealVNC.

All power management features are handled by the Active Energy Manager plug-in. This interacts with the server’s IMM and provides power capping functions along with trend graphs of power consumption and system temperatures over time.

The x3850 X5 is an impressive rack server offering a lot of classy features in a compact chassis. IBM’s unique expansion options are not all available yet but, even without FlexNode support, the x3850 X5 still offers an unprecedented potential that is unmatched by any other Xeon 7500 server currently available.