T3 Mezzanine Card Enables Fabric Convergence, Power Savings, and High Performance on HP BladeSystem Platform: Chelsio Communications today announced the general availability of its T3-based Unified Wire Accelerators, which enable server networking, storage networking and clustering on a single platform, for HP BladeSystem c-Class. Chelsio's S320EM-BS 10GbE Unified Wire expansion card solution has been qualified by HP for use by BladeSystem customers. Working with the HP 10Gb Ethernet BL-c Switch, the new expansion card from Chelsio, an active HP BladeSystem Solution Builder Program member, is a dual-port 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE) adapter with PCI Express interface. It offloads TCP/IP, iSCSI iWARP, classification, virtualization, and traffic management processing from the host system, freeing up host CPU cycles for other applications. Chelsio's 10Gb iWARP implementation is the only one in the industry accepted into the Linux Open Fabrics Enterprise Distribution (OFED). As such, this card can transparently run InfiniBand applications on 10 Gigabit Ethernet. Further, when combined with Chelsio's commercial grade iSCSI target stack, it can run Fibre Channel applications on Ethernet concurrently. The adapter enables the fastest implementation of VMware virtualization with line rate performance with a single virtual machine (VM). Finally, the sockets acceleration capability of S320EM-BS allows for acceleration of legacy applications without modification. Supporting HP's power and cooling leadership, the adapter consumes 14.5W, under line rate full duplex traffic using standard frames, making it the lowest power solution of its type in the market. HP has worked with Chelsio to validate reliability, integration, and signal integrity. Chelsio has also completed full reliability and agency testing. Advantages of Chelsio's 10GbE Unified Wire card on HP BladeSystem include:

• Highest return on investment (ROI) for networks transitioning from Gigabit to 10 Gigabit Ethernet
• Reduced network complexity, cable management and troubleshooting caused by the use of disparate and proprietary network technologies for cluster and storage communications
• Ideal way to equip blade servers for increased I/O using virtualization solutions
• Ideal for applications requiring high uplink bandwidth such as iSCSI/IP NAS storage, high-performance computing, remote backup, and disaster recovery
• Ability to run unmodified storage and clustering applications at zero incremental cost relative to the base 10GbE connectivity
• Seamless integration with HP BladeSystem c-class

"Bringing 10 Gigabit Ethernet unified wire connectivity to HP BladeSystem simplifies the network and reduces cost-of-ownership, while improving overall system performance," said Kianoosh Naghshineh, CEO and president of Chelsio Communications. "We are pleased that our solution met the exacting criteria to attain the HP BladeSystem c-Class Compatible designation." "Customers are proving that HP BladeSystem c-Class is the platform of choice for an expanding range of IT workloads," said Mark Potter, vice president, BladeSystem Division, HP. "In collaboration with Chelsio Communications, a valued member of the HP BladeSystem Solution Builder Program, HP is helping customers meet the demanding performance requirements of mission-critical business applications and well as further reducing infrastructure costs by laying the 10 GbE foundation of network consolidation." "The next generation data center is putting tremendous demands on the network, which has to provide unparalleled support for distributed applications and ubiquitous data access," said Vikram Mehta, President and CEO of BLADE Network Technologies. "The combination of our Layer 2/3 switch and Chelsio's new unified wire adapter will enable HP BladeSystem customers to deploy optimized end-to-end 10GbE networking with excellent price and performance." The Chelsio S320EM-BS 10GbE mezzanine card for HP BladeSystem c-Class is available from Chelsio or Bell Microproducts now, priced at $895.