Lenovo Beefs Up Servers With Latest Intel, AMD Chips

The PC giant will add Intel’s Sapphire Rapids and AMD’s EPYC processors to its arsenal for the data center along with other solutions, including a new cloud-based management platform and cooling system.

Lenovo announced the launch of new servers and storage with the latest processors from AMD, Intel, and Arm-based systems along with its new unified cloud-based software management platform.

The company used its 30th anniversary of its ThinkSystem infrastructure to announce new solutions for the data center, including the next generation of ThinkSystem, ThinkAgile and ThinkEdge server products. Announced at Lenovo’s ThinkInnovation event this week, the new servers will carry Intel’s latest Sapphire Rapids Xeon Scalable processors, AMD’s new EPYC Genoa platforms, along with Arm-based servers for Chinese market-only servers. The products are part of Lenovo’s Infrastructure Solutions V3 portfolio.

In an email to CRN, Lenovo’s Kamran Amini, vice president and general manager of Infrastructure Solutions Platforms, said channel partners can look forward to a wide range of options with the new servers.

“Our new V3 generation proves our continued commitment as a channel-first company,” he wrote. “All solutions will continue the ThinkSystem value by offering choice and flexibility of configurations to deliver different price points and capability to address any channel partner end customer needs. … With our time to market with both Intel and AMD, our general availability is for both our direct customers and our channel partner community globally.”

Robert Hall, president of Horizon Systems in Lewis Center, Ohio, is most excited for the AMD EPYC-powered servers. “The EPYC I think is a phenomenal chip set and it’s a wonderful way to optimize spend and still have plenty of compute,” he said. He said he’ll be more excited when he sees what availability looks like with ongoing supply chain issues plaguing the data center. “Honestly, I’m excited about anyone who can actually ship us product.”

Michael Goldstein, president at LAN Infotech in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. said in an email the new products are welcome solutions. “Lenovo has always been a thought leader in the industry. This new broad portfolio really leads the way to innovation for 2022.”

Lenovo said it has shipped more than 24 million servers since 1992, a statistic that includes IBM’s x86 business before being acquired by Lenovo in 2014.

“Lenovo has pioneered infrastructure solutions that have transformed entire industries for more than 30 years,” Kirk Skaugen, Lenovo Group’s executive vice president and president of the infrastructure solutions group, said in a statement. “Building on this legacy, we are now delivering the broadest portfolio advancement in our history, with industry-leading performance, reliability and sustainability all based on an open architecture that will help customers more easily harness data to solve humanity’s greatest challenges.”

The company also unveiled its new open cloud software management platform, XClarity One, which combines Truscale Infrastructure-as-a-Service (Iaas), Management-as-a-service and Smarter Support analytics into a unified customer portal. Lenovo says the new platform will offer customers a pay-as-you-go model that allows customers to customize where management data resides – both public and private – across hybrid multi-cloud environments.

The fifth generation of Lenovo’s direct water-cooling system, Lenovo Neptune, was also unveiled. The company says the updated cooling system will boost data center efficiency by recycling loops of warm water to cool systems. Lenovo Neptune enables customers to reduce power consumption up to 40 percent, according to the company.

“Water cooling is a nice feature,” Horizon Systems’ Hall said. “As you add more voltage, you’ve got to deal with more heat, so the water cooling is a wonderful option to have.”