New Dell Servers, Storage, UPS: All With SMBs In Mind

The new products include four, 11th generation Dell PowerEdge servers, the PowerVault NX300 NAS device and Dell-branded UPSes that were developed with storage and systems management capability for SMBs, according to Dell.

"Normally, SMBs have to spend money to try to manage systems and networks. We want to make sure customers focus on their real business, not on IT. We're bringing products to market that bring that efficiency and are simple to deploy, simple to manage," said Antonio Julio, director of enterprise product management at Dell.

The systems management features embedded on the motherboard were introduced on Dell enterprise-level servers earlier this year. The new products bring that functionality to SMBs, said Sally Stevens, vice president of platform marketing at Dell.

"Our Lifecycle Controller includes all the drivers needed to deploy the server. In the past, you used to get tons of different CDs, which were specified for this specific server. We've reduced all that complexity and put it on this Lifecycle Controller [1.2]. Technically, with a push of a button, you can deploy the server."

The new servers include the PowerEdge R210 and R510 rack servers and the PowerEdge T110 and T310 tower servers. They are equipped to run Intel's new Xeon 3400 series processors with Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2, according to Dell.

The R210 is 88 percent more energy-efficient than the previous generation and the T310 is 65 percent more efficient than its predecessor, Dell said, adding that the other models offer energy savings as well.

"The T110 is like a 'My First Server' for a very small business. It's very office-friendly. SMBs can put them in closets, on top of desks. The T310 is nice for growing small businesses and for remote offices and retail," Stevens said. "Meanwhile, the R510 is like the Swiss Army Knife of servers. There are three different configurations as your SMB grows."

The NX300 NAS device was also designed for simple SMB use, with deployment time running around 15 minutes, said Larry Hart, senior manager of storage and networking at Dell.

"It has intuitive interfaces and wizards to walk through. It has up to 4 terabytes of memory and we expect 2-TB SATA drives in the market, so you can move up to 8 TB raw," Hart said. "The other new products are our 28 Dell UPS models, all of which have ratings of 95 percent efficiency."