IBM Brings Dynamic Scaling to DB2 on Power Servers

Dubbed DB2 pureScale, this implementation of DB2 borrows virtualization concepts originally developed on IBM’s mainframe operating system and deploys them on a lower-cost Unix server platform.

The concept that IBM is trying to introduce to the market as an alternative to dedicated database appliances is that there should be no need to over-provision hardware to support temporary spikes in processing power requirements. With DB2 pureScale, customers can dynamically add servers as needed.

IBM is also building in a high-availability option into the DB2 pureScale offering that effectively eliminate the need to buy duplicate hardware that is deployed in a standby mode. All in all, IBM claims to have significantly better hardware utilization rates, which contributes greatly to reduced infrastructure costs in terms of power and cooling.

For IBM, DB2 pureScale is a prime example of the benefits of tightly coupling a hardware and software company, which many argue that Oracle is now trying to emulate with the acquisition of Sun.