HP BL465C Blade Server Teardown

Overview / Main Features

AMD Opteron processor-based (dual or quad-core) 1U ''double-density'' blade server (supports 2 processors) from HP. The BL465c supports up to 32GB of PC2-5300 DDR2 Registered DIMMs. The server supports two HDDs (hot pluggable) SFF SAS or SFF SATA. There are 2 expansion slots, and the blade also features a Smart Array E200i controller. The BL465c also provides Fibre Channel SAN Support.

Per HP: "HP offers powerful, reliable server blades with the same trusted features as award-winning HP rack and tower servers. With features equal to standard 1U rack mount servers, the two-processor, dual-core BL465c combines energy efficient compute power and high density with expanded memory and I/O for maximum performance. A balanced architecture featuring Next-Generation AMD Opteron™ processors with DDR2 memory, hot plug serial hard-drives, support for Multifunction Gigabit networking and multiple I/O cards provides a performance system ideal for the full range of scale out applications. In this small form factor, the BL465c includes features to ensure high availability such as hot-plug hard drives, memory interleaving, embedded RAID capability, and enhanced remote Lights-Out management.

HP BL465C Blade Server Main Image

Target Market

Enterprise users.

ProLiant servers featuring AMD Opteron solutions announced in August 2006 - two months after the press release for the competing Intel Xeon-based BL460c.

Pricing and Availability

Pricing - Will vary based on configuration, however, the configuration we received (with no drives included) sells for as low as $2000 from various e-tailors at the time of writing (July 2008).

Availability - Assumed to have global availability.

HP BL465C Blade Server - Motherboard Top

For the purposes of this teardown analysis, we have assumed a lifetime production volume of 150K units.

As a reminder, teardown volume production assumptions are primarily used for our cost analysis in terms of amortized NRE and tooling costs, especially for custom components specific to the model being analyzed (mechanical components especially). Unless assumed volumes are different by an order of magnitude, minor changes in volume (say 1 million vs. 2) rarely have a large net effect on our final analysis because of this.

Market / Sector Performance

iSuppli expects strong unit shipment growth overall in the server area for the foreseeable future according to a recent topical report, with combined worldwide sales approaching 8.6 million units in 2007 (growing 8.4% to roughly 9.3 million in 2008, or a CAGR of 7.4% from 2006 to 2011 for the whole server market). Specifically for blade servers, iSuppli projects that this category will grow at a significantly faster CAGR of 31.5% from 2006 to 2011 spurn on by the popularity of server virtualization technologies as well as the overall form factor efficiencies of the blade server format.

HP BL465C Blade Server - Motherboard Bottom

Major Cost Drivers (Representing ~84% of Total Direct Materials Costs)

AMD - OSP2210GAA6CQ - CPU - AMD Opteron 2210 HE Santa Rosa, Socket F, 1.80GHz, 1000MHz Bus 2 x 1MB L2 68W, 90nm, Dual-Core Processor

Gold Circuit Electronics - 16-Layer - FR4

Nanya - NT512T72U89A0BV-3C - DIMM DDR2 - Registered, 512MB, 64Mx72, 667MHz

Broadcom - BCM5706SKFB - Ethernet Controller - 10/100/1000Base-T, Integrated TCP Processing Engine, RDMA, iSCSI (Qty:2)

Broadcom - HT-2100 - System I/O / Bus Controller - HyperTransport-to-PCIe Bridge, 2x1GHz, 2-16xHyperTransport Bus, 5-PCIe Masters, 24 Serial I/O Links, Configurable

Broadcom - BCM8603KPB - I/O Controller - 8-Port SAS/SATA II, PCI Express/PCI-X Interface, Integrated Raid-On-Chip Technology

CPU Cooler / Heatsink Assembly - Extruded / Machined Copper Block, Plated, w/ Copper Heat Pipe, Aluminum Fins, 4 Captive Screws, & Thermal Transfer Material

Broadcom - HT-1000 - Southbridge - System I/O Hub

AMD - ES1000 - GPU - 2D, 200MHz Core, 32-Bit 33/66MHz PCI 2.2, 16-Bit 256MB DDR-II SDRAM Support, Dual CRT Support

HP - 353821-004 - Lights-Out Management Processor

Xilinx - XC95288XL-10FG256C - CPLD - 288 macrocells, 192 User I/O, 3.3V, 0.35micron CMOS (Qty:2)

FCI - 10054783-001 - Mezzanine Board to Board Header - Vertical, High Profile

FCI - 55737-001 - Mezzanine Board to Board Header - Vertical

SMD Flat Chip

SMD Flat Chip - Array, 4-Element (Qty:11)

Point of Load Module - DC-DC Converter, Input: 4.5V-13.2V, Output: 0.7V-5.0V, 50W Max (Qty:3)

Molex - 75360-0018 - Backplane Connector

Foxconn - PE1207xx-3751-01 - CPU Socket - Socket F, LGA1207, w/ Shepherd Hook Lever (Qty:2)

Point of Load Module - DC-DC Converter, Input: 12V

Point of Load Module - DC-DC Converter, Input: 12V

Point of Load Module - DC-DC Converter, Input: 12V

International Rectifier - IR3086AM - Power Controller - XPhase Phase IC, w/ OVP, Fault and Overtemp Detect (Qty:10)

Point of Load Module - DC-DC Converter, Input: 3V-13.8V (Qty:2)

Micron Technology - MT46V16M16P-5B - SDRAM - DDR, 256Mb (16Mx16), 2.5V (Qty:3)

Vishay - Dale - CSM3637 - Precision SMD - Current Sense, 3mOhms, 3W, 1% (Qty:3)

International Rectifier - IRF6620 - MOSFET - DirectFET, N-Channel, 20V, 150A (Qty:10)

Backplane Power Socket - w/ 2 Discrete 10AWG Wires

Enclosure / Cage Top Cover - Stamped / Formed Paint-Loc Steel, w/ 2 Pressed-In Studs

Tantalum Conductive Polymer - Encapsulated, 6V, 150uF (Qty:18)

Insulator - Lexan Polycarbonate, Die-Cut, w/ PSA

SMSC - SCH4307-NS - I/O Controller - Super I/O Device, w/ LPC Interface

International Rectifier - IRF6621 - MOSFET - DirectFET, N-Channel, 30V, 55A (Qty:10)

Materials and Manufacturing $506.06

HP BL465C Blade Server Cost Analysis

What Is Not Included in our Cost Analysis

The total materials and manufacturing costs reported in this analysis reflect ONLY the direct materials cost (from component vendors and assorted EMS providers), AND manufacturing with basic test. Not included in this analysis are costs above and beyond the material manufacture of the core device itself - cost of intellectual property, royalties and licensing fees (those not already included into the per component price), software, software loading and test, shipping, logistics marketing and other channel costs including not only EMS provider and the OEM's margin, but that of other resellers. Our cost analysis is meant to focus on those costs incurred in the manufacture of the core device and exceptionally in some circumstances the packaging and literature as well.

Manufacturing Notes

OEM/ODM/EMS Relationships / Manufacturing

Per iSuppli's own Global OEM Manufacturing and Design Analysis (GOMDA) report (Q2, 2008) HP outsources nearly 80% of servers to EMS providers and ODMs (the latter representing nearly 60% of the HP server business overall). Most of HP servers outsourced to ODMs are to Inventec with over 40% of overall share of servers shipped. This unit claims, per it's labeling to be made in the US of foreign components - so this may still encompass the motherboard itself, which we are assuming is made in China for this analysis.

Country of Origin / Volume Assumptions

Based on markings, it is assumed the unit was assembled in the USA. Furthermore, we have assumed that custom mechanicals (plastics, metals, etc. were sourced in China. Other subsystems or modules found in this analysis (DIMM modules, for example) are listed in the overview section with their corresponding countries of origin, however, keep in mind that in such cases, it is only the country in which the high level integration occurs (USA in this case), that will be accounted for in terms of assembly costs.

Country of origin assumptions relate directly to the associated cost of manufacturing, where calculated by iSuppli. In the cases of 'finished' sub-assemblies (such as DIMM modules), we do not calculate internal manufacturing costs, but rather assess the market price of the finished product in which case country of origin assumptions may or may not have a direct effect on pricing.

Remember also that labor rates are applied directly only to hand inserted components and systems in our bill of materials, and although regional assumptions do, these new rates do not have a direct effect on our modeled calculations of placement costs for automated SMD assembly lines. ""Auto" inserted components (such as SMT components) placement costs are calculated by an iSuppli algorithm which allocates a cost per component based on the size and pincount of the device. This calculation is affected by country or region of origin as well.

HP BL465C Blade Server - Block Diagram

Design for Manufacturing / Device Complexity

The HP ProLiant BL465c blade server has a component count of 4122 excluding box contents (204 of which are mechanical in nature). Component counts have a direct bearing on the overall manufacturing cycle times and costs, and also can increase or decrease overall yields and re-work. Our calculations of manufacturing costs factor counts and more qualitative complexities in the design.

Note that manual labor has a much smaller effect on auto-insertion assembly lines (for the Main PCB, for example), where manufacturing costs are much more capital equipment intensive and driven by these investment costs.

Design Notes

Here is a summary of the major subsystems and components in the HP ProLiant BL465c blade sever:

Motherboard

CPU

CPU - AMD Opteron 2210 HE Santa Rosa, Socket F, 1.80GHz, 1000MHz Bus 2 x 1MB L2 68W, 90nm, Dual-Core Processor - AMD - OSP2210GAA6CQ

Chipset

System I/O Controller - Broadcom - BCM21000KPB

System I/O Hub - Broadcom - SWCHT1000S05

Memory (Mobo on board)

SDRAM - 128Mb(1M x 32 Bit x 4 Banks), 143MHz, 3.3V - ESMT - M12L128324A-7TG

SDRAM - DDR, 256Mb (16Mx16), 2.5V, 200MHz@CL3 - Hynix - HY5DU561622ETP-D43

Flash - NOR, 32Mb, 3V, Pb Free - Spansion - S29GL032A90TFIR3 (Qty: 2)

DIMM

Nanya - NT512T72U89A0BV-3C - DDR2 - Registered, 512MB, 64Mx72, 667MHz

I/O

Controller - 8-Port SAS/SATA II to PCI-X/Express, Integrated RAID-on-Chip Technology - Broadcom - BCM8603KPB

Ethernet Controller - Single Chip Solution, 10/100/1000BASE-T Tranceiver, w/ TCP Off Load Engine, RDMA, ISCSI/ISER Controller - Broadcom - BCM5706SKFB

I/O Controller - SMSC - SCH4307-NS

Ethernet Transceiver - 10/100Base-TX, PHY, Single Channel - Broadcom - BCM5241

Other

CPLD - 288 macrocells, 192 User I/O, 3.3V, 0.35micron CMOS - Xilinx - XC95288XL-10FG256C (Qty: 2)

Clock Generator - K8 Chip for Serverworks HT2100 Servers - IDT - ICS932S805CGLF

Remote Management IC - HP - iLO 2 353821-004

Hard Drives / Optical Drives

None included with this server

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HP BL465C Blade Server - Box Contents