Lenovo targets midrange with new servers, services lineup

Focused on price point, energy-efficiency compute for midsized enterprise

Lenovo is rolling out customized infrastructure bundles for midsize organizations that include new servers and a range of new services, mostly focused on bolstering security.

The package features new single-socket ThinkSystem V2 servers and tweaks to existing Lenovo TruScale Infinite Storage

Lenovo said that small and mid-sized organizations face issues with IT staffing, skills, and funding. The bundle approach targets these problems this by providing pre-configured hardware.

Those new single-socket servers comprise the ThinkSystem ST50 V2, ST250 V2, and the SR250 V2, with the first two in a tower chassis and the third a 1U rack-mount system. All three are based on Intel Xeon E-2300 processors, which are designed for entry-level servers and feature up to 8 cores. All three also support up to 128GB memory.

Lenovo claims all three provide affordable compute power in a small footprint, and may be deployed inside or outside the data center.

The ST250 V2 is the most flexible, with space for 16 2.5in drives or eight 3.5in drives and optional Nvidia T1000 and A2000 GPUs. The ST50 V2 can fit two 3.5in drives, one 2.5in drive bay, an NVMe M.2 SSD Module, and space for a single Nvidia T1000. The rackmount SR250 V2 can go up to four simple-swap/hot-swap 3.5in or 10 2.5 drives and an optional T1000/T400 GPU.

Lenovo's TruScale Infinite Storage is part of its IT-as-a-service product, and provides on-premises file, block and object storage, with lifecycle management by Lenovo engineers. As with similar products from HPE and Dell, this is claimed to offer customers a pay-for-what-you-use approach to IT, with extra capacity delivered when customers need it.

The firm highlights the ThinkSystem DM5100F storage system as an ideal choice to work with its new servers. This is an all-flash storage array that can fit up to 48 hot-swap NVMe drives, for a maximum capacity of 737TB with 15.36TB SSDs. It is available as block-only storage, but can be upgraded to add file and object (S3) access to make it a unified storage platform supporting NAS, SAN, and Object workloads, as detailed by Blocks & Files last year.

On the services side, Lenovo is pointing customers at its new ThinkSystem V2 servers available with ThinkShield Security, while its ThinkSystem storage solutions have built-in automatic ransomware protection. Lenovo also has a backup and recovery product for businesses looking for protection from security risks, data loss and unforeseen disruptions.

Also part of the services side are Lenovo Professional Services Tokens, which are a way for customers to purchase IT technical and service support, but in hourly increments instead of signing a contract.

Meanwhile, Lenovo's XClarity management is embedded in its servers and storage systems, which the company said provides companies with a management dashboard intended to simplify and automate IT admin tasks.

"Lenovo's new IT infrastructure solutions and TruScale services for midsize businesses are optimized to help organizations improve customer service, accelerate sales and roll out next-generation applications so they can grow their business now and well into the future," said Kamran Amini, VP and general manager of Server and Storage for Lenovo's Infrastructure Solutions Group.

That Infrastructure Solutions Group finally turned a profit in Q3 of its fiscal 2021/2022 ended December 31, as reported last month. Its turnover of $1.9bn represented 19 percent year-on-year growth but only produced $17m of profit. However, sales to businesses of all sizes improved, especially in high-margin server, software, and services. ®