Rackable Systems, Inc., a leading provider of servers and storage products for large-scale data centers, today announced availability of high-performance servers based on VMware’s infrastructure virtualization capabilities. As a result of the relationship, VMware Infrastructure 3 software (VI3) is now available on Rackable Systems rack-mount server lines with full platform certification from VMware. Rackable Systems will also resell and distribute VMware products and provide Level 1 and Level 2 support for the software suite.

Rackable Systems’ innovative x86 server designs—which feature superior cooling technologies and DC Power options—enable data centers to deploy high density, high performance server configurations while significantly decreasing energy consumption and reducing overall total cost of ownership. By harnessing the virtualization capabilities of VMware ESX server—the foundation of the VMware Infrastructure 3—Rackable Systems customers will now be able to achieve higher server utilization and even better efficiency rates while managing systems in mission-critical environments.

“The VMware relationship enables Rackable Systems to extend our build-to-order model to support rack and data center-level virtualized environments,” said Mark J. Barrenechea, President and Chief Executive Officer of Rackable Systems. “Now enterprise data centers can leverage our high performance, ultra-dense virtualized systems to support development, test and production application workloads as well as mission-critical business continuity solutions.”

Data centers will now be able to leverage the key advantages of Rackable Systems rack-mount servers—including its award-winning DC Power technology, hallmark back-to-back mounting and easier serviceability—while enabling higher rates of utilization on each system.

Higher server utilization rates as a result of virtualization ultimately enable a data center to consolidate and streamline operations to achieve better price performance ratios; per square foot, per virtual instance, per watt. IT administrators deploying Rackable Systems’ new virtualized servers will also benefit from VMware Infrastructure 3 suite services, including VMware High Availability (HA), VMware DRS and VMware Consolidated Backup.

“Since the launch of VMware Infrastructure 3, we have seen customers experience unprecedented gains in efficiency and performance through the implementation of green IT initiatives within datacenters,” said Brian Byun, Vice President, Global Partners and Solutions for VMware. “We are pleased to expand our collaboration with Rackable Systems, and to help customers to further optimize operational savings through the deployment of VMware Infrastructure 3 on Rackable Systems' line of Eco-Logical™ servers.”

The VMware Infrastructure 3 is available immediately on Rackable Systems’ x86 servers.