The SPARC T-series family of

RISC In electronics and computer science, a reduced instruction set computer (RISC) is a computer architecture designed to simplify the individual instructions given to the computer to accomplish tasks. Compared to the instructions given to a comp ...

processors and

server computer A server is a computer that provides information to other computers called " clients" on a computer network. This architecture is called the client–server model. Servers can provide various functionalities, often called "services", such as sh ...

s, based on the SPARC V9 architecture, was originally developed by

Sun Microsystems Sun Microsystems, Inc., often known as Sun for short, was an American technology company that existed from 1982 to 2010 which developed and sold computers, computer components, software, and information technology services. Sun contributed sig ...

, and later by

Oracle Corporation Oracle Corporation is an American Multinational corporation, multinational computer technology company headquartered in Austin, Texas. Co-founded in 1977 in Santa Clara, California, by Larry Ellison, who remains executive chairman, Oracle was ...

after its acquisition of Sun. Its distinguishing feature from earlier SPARC iterations is the introduction of chip multithreading (CMT) technology, a multithreading,

multicore A multi-core processor (MCP) is a microprocessor on a single integrated circuit (IC) with two or more separate central processing units (CPUs), called ''cores'' to emphasize their multiplicity (for example, ''dual-core'' or ''quad-core''). Ea ...

design intended to drive greater processor utilization at lower power consumption. The first generation T-series processor, the

UltraSPARC T1 The UltraSPARC T1 (codenamed "Niagara") is a Multithreading (computer architecture), multithreading, Multi-core processor, multicore central processing unit, CPU released by Sun Microsystems in 2005. Designed to lower the energy consumption of s ...

, and servers based on it, were announced in December 2005. As later generations were introduced, the term "T series" was used to refer to the entire family of processors.

Pre-Oracle era

Sun Microsystems'

Sun Fire Sun Fire is a series of server (computing), server computers introduced in 2001 by Sun Microsystems (since 2010, part of Oracle Corporation). The Sun Fire branding coincided with the introduction of the UltraSPARC III processor, superseding ...

and

SPARC Enterprise The SPARC Enterprise series is a range of UNIX server computers based on the SPARC V9 architecture. It was co-developed by Sun Microsystems and Fujitsu, announced on June 1, 2004, and introduced in 2007. They were marketed and sold by Sun Microsy ...

product lines were based on early generations of CMT technology. The UltraSPARC T1 based Sun Fire T2000 and T1000 servers were launched in December 2005 and early 2006, respectively. They were later rebranded to match the name of the UltraSPARC T2 and T2 Plus based Sun SPARC Enterprise T5**0 servers.

SPARC T3

In September 2010, Oracle announced a range of

SPARC T3 The SPARC T3 microprocessor (previously known as UltraSPARC T3, codenamed ''Rainbow Falls'', and also known as UltraSPARC KT or ''Niagara-3'' during development) is a Multithreading (computer hardware), multithreading, Multi-core (computing), multi ...

processor based servers. These are branded as the "SPARC T3" series, the "SPARC Enterprise" brand being dropped. The SPARC T3-series servers include the T3-1B, a

blade server A blade server is a stripped-down server computer with a modular design optimized to minimize the use of physical space and energy. Blade servers have many components removed to save space, minimize power consumption and other considerations, wh ...

module that fits into the

Sun Blade Sun Blade is a line of blade server computer systems sold by Sun Microsystems from 2006 onwards. In June 2006, Sun announced the AMD Opteron-based Sun Blade 8000 modular blade server system. The Sun Blade 8000 chassis can hold up to 10 Sun Blade ...

6000 system. All other T3 based servers are rack mounted systems. Subsequent T-series server generations also include a blade server in the same Sun Blade 6000 form factor.

SPARC T4

On September 26, 2011, Oracle announced a range of

SPARC T4 The SPARC T4 is a SPARC multicore microprocessor introduced in 2011 by Oracle Corporation. The processor is designed to offer high multithreaded performance (8 threads per core, with 8 cores per chip), as well as high single threaded performan ...

-based servers. These systems use the same chassis as the earlier T3 based systems. Their main features are very similar, with the exception of: * T4 CPU instead of T3 CPU, with complete core redesign * doubled RAM capacity * small changes in mass storage capacity

SPARC T5

On March 26, 2013, Oracle announced refreshed SPARC servers based on the new

SPARC T5 SPARC T5 is the fifth generation multicore microprocessor of Oracle's SPARC T series family. It was first presented at Hot Chips 24 in August 2012, and was officially introduced with the Oracle SPARC T5 servers in March 2013. The processor i ...

microprocessor, which the company claims is "the world's fastest". In the T5 range of servers, the single socket rackmount server design was deprecated, while a new eight-socket rackmount server was introduced.

SPARC M7

On October 26, 2015, Oracle announced a family of systems built on the 32-core, 256-thread SPARC M7 microprocessor. Unlike prior generations, both T- and M-series systems were introduced using the same processor. The M7 included the first generation of the Data Analytics Accelerator (DAX) engines. DAX engines offloaded in-memory query processing and performed real-time data decompression.

SPARC M8

On September 18, 2017, Oracle announced a family of systems built on the 32-core, 256-thread SPARC M8 microprocessor at 5.0 GHz. It also included the second generation of Data Analytics Accelerator (DAX) engines.

Partitioning and virtualization

SPARC T-series servers can be partitioned using Oracle's

Logical Domains Logical Domains (LDoms or LDOM) is the server virtualization and partitioning technology for SPARC V9 processors. It was first released by Sun Microsystems in April 2007. After the Oracle acquisition of Sun in January 2010, the product has be ...

technology. Additional virtualization is provided by Oracle Solaris Zones (aka

Solaris Containers Solaris Containers (including Solaris Zones) is an implementation of operating system-level virtualization technology for x86 and SPARC systems, first released publicly in February 2004 in build 51 beta of Solaris 10, and subsequently in the f ...

) to create isolated virtual servers within a single operating system instance. Logical Domains and Solaris Zones can be used together to increase server utilization.

Servers

References

External links

All current Oracle SPARC serversSPARC M8-8 About page
{{Oracle SPARC microprocessor products Oracle hardware Sun servers Computer-related introductions in 2005