10 Hot Dell Technologies Infrastructure And PC Products

These 10 products are paving the way for digital transformation and the new work-at-home workforce.

The innovation engine at Dell Technologies is roaring.

The $92 billion Round Rock, Texas-based infrastructure giant has been unleashing its new Power-branded product lines which are revamping Dell’s massive portfolio of servers, storage, networking, data protection and converged infrastructure. Additionally, the company has been gaining significant traction in the PC market through next-generation products that are helping remote workforces stay productive and efficient during the coronavirus pandemic.

“Our portfolio has never been stronger,” said Dell Technologies CEO Michael Dell in an interview with CRN. “The entire portfolio is being refreshed under the Power brands. Markets are consolidating. We have very ambitious goals.”

Here are 10 Dell Technologies infrastructure and PC products that are paving the way for digital transformation and the new work-at-home workforce.

PowerOne Autonomous Infrastructure

Dell Technologies is taking converged infrastructure to the next level with its PowerOne autonomous infrastructure, combining all of Dell’s flagship infrastructure products together with VMware vSphere in a single architecture wrapped in a new built-in, outcome-oriented automation engine. The special sauce in the autonomous infrastructure is its built-in intelligent PowerOne Controller automation engine, which can automate thousands of tasks with the ability to have vSphere clusters available for workloads in just a few clicks. The PowerOne Controller uses a Kubernetes microservices architecture and Ansible workflows to automate the conﬁguration, provisioning and life-cycle management of the components to create a customer-managed Data Center as a Service. PowerOne contains the company’s infrastructure product lines including PowerEdge MX modular servers, Dell’s open networking switches, PowerMax storage and PowerProtect data protection along with VMware’s vSphere, NSX and vCenter, which are all deployed, managed and maintained holistically. The architecture provides a single system-level API to give users the control to create business-objective pools of resources. The API can be tied into existing tools such as service portals to deliver programmable—versus manual—operations. This type of infrastructure as code is designed to eliminate the need to log into individual component management systems.

PowerMax 8000 Storage Array

Dubbed the world’s fastest storage array, the PowerMax 8000 provides end-to-end NVMe, storage-class memory and massive consolidation for mission-critical workloads. The future-proof storage array scales to up to 4 PB of effective capacity with global deduplication and compression. The PowerMax delivers enterprise performance density with up to 7.5 million IOPS per rack and 187,000 IOPS per rack unit, as well as up to 350-GBps bandwidth. With PowerMax, customers can consolidate block, file and mainframe workloads and real-time analytics apps on a single array. The product has a plugin for VMware’s vRealize Orchestrator to automate workflows.

PowerSwitch Z9332F-ON Switch

The PowerSwitch Z9332F-ON is a 400GbE open networking switch designed for high-performance workloads. The switch was purpose-built for data center networks with intensive compute and storage traﬃc, such as high-performance computing, artificial intelligence and streaming video. The compact PowerSwitch Z9332F-ON provides density of either 32 ports of 400 GbE or 128 ports of 100 GbE in a 1RU design. The product can come with third-party software or the company’s OS10 Enterprise Edition networking operating system that enables Layer 2 and 3 switching and routing protocols with integrated IP services, quality of service and automation features.

PowerEdge R940xa Rack Server

The global server market-share leader’s powerful four-socket PowerEdge R940xa server is designed to accelerate applications to deliver real-time decisions for GPU database workloads. It combines up to four CPUs with four GPUs in a 1:1 ratio and enables low latency with direct-attached NVMe drives. The R940xa has mixand-match capacity and performance options with up to 32 drives as well as RESTful API for developers. The server tackles performance bottlenecks with improved response times and reduces statistical errors. It is optimized for workloads that are compute-layer-heavy and leverages CPU RAM to move data into GPU RAM for faster computation.

PowerProtect X400 Data Management Appliance

To protect, manage and recover data at scale in on-premises, virtualized and public cloud environments comes the PowerProtect X400 multidimensional appliance with PowerProtect software. The software delivers data protection, replication and reuse as well as Software-as-a-Service-based management and self-service capabilities that give data owners the autonomy to control backup and recovery operations. Available as a hybrid or all-ﬂ ash data management appliance, the PowerProtect X400 can scale up with grow-in-place capacity expansion and scale-out compute power and capacity.

OptiPlex 7070 Ultra

Dell Technologies’ new breed of all-in-one PCs for the workplace was launched last year with the OptiPlex 7070 Ultra, oﬀering a form factor small enough to fit entirely inside the back of a monitor to provide a zero-footprint desktop. Dubbed the world’s most flexible commercial desktop offering, the OptiPlex 7070 Ultra enables customers to upgrade their display and PC separately while supporting up to three displays. Dell’s OptiPlex 7070 Ultra is just 0.78 of an inch thick with a width of 3.8 inches and a height of 10 inches—for a total volume of only 26.6 cubic inches.

That small size enables the desktop to essentially disappear into the back of a display stand. Processor options consist of eighth-generation Intel Whiskey Lake processors, topping out at the Core i7-8665U (quad-core, clock speed of up to 4.8GHz). The Core i7-8665U and one other available processor for the Ultra, the Core i5-8365U, also include Intel vPro. For memory, the product offers a range of options, starting at 4 GB of RAM and reaching up to a massive 64 GB of RAM. On storage, up to 1 TB of NVMe SSD and 2 TB HDD are available on the OptiPlex 7070 Ultra.

XPS 13

Dell introduced its new XPS 13 this year, redesigned to provide smaller bezels around the InfinityEdge display that allow for an impressive screen-to-body ratio of 91.5 percent. The display size is 13.4 inches in an 11-inch form factor, while the aspect ratio was changed to 16:10 for a larger workspace area on the screen. The display is now 25 percent brighter with deeper keys and a 17 percent larger touchpad. The XPS 13 offers 10th-generation Intel Core processors for enhanced performance and longer battery life. The body is made from a combination of machined aluminum, carbon ﬁ ber, woven-glass fiber and hardened Corning Gorilla Glass.

Latitude 5300 2-in-1

The Latitude 5300 2-in-1 Chromebook Enterprise features a 13.3-inch touch screen with up to 255 nits of brightness and durable Corning Gorilla Glass. The device maintains portability with a starting weight of 3 pounds and a thickness of 0.76 of an inch. On performance, processor choices go up to a quad-core, eighth-generation Intel Core i7 and the notebook supports up to 32 GB of RAM. Battery life reaches up to 14 hours on a charge. The convertible laptop offers capabilities aimed at simplified deployment and IT management within businesses including Chrome Enterprise for multilayered security and support along with an enhanced Google Admin console for Chrome OS.

5G-Ready Latitude 9510

At CES this year, Dell Technologies unveiled its new Latitude 9510 notebook with a 5G-ready design, built-in artificial intelligence and what Dell says is the longest battery life of any 15-inch business PC. The Latitude 9510 offers advanced connectivity with support for both Wi-Fi 6 and high-speed 5G mobile broadband. Key AI-powered features include ExpressResponse, which assesses user preferences and taps machine learning to more quickly launch frequently used applications while also boosting application performance. The 0.67-inch-thick Latitude 9510 stands out with up to 30 hours of battery life on a charge. Available both as a 2-in-1 or a clamshell model, the notebook includes a 15-inch display with FHD resolution and slim bezels around the InﬁnityEdge screen.

Latitude 7220 Rugged Extreme Tablet

Dubbed the lightest and most powerful 12-inch fully rugged tablet on the market, Dell’s Latitude 7220 Rugged Extreme was built to keep users connected in the most extreme environments. Configuration options include the latest eighth-generation Intel Core processors with up to 2 TB of performance and reliable PCIe solid- state drives. Features include a 1,000-nit FHD display with anti-glare coating with glove-responsive and multi-touch capabilities. The Latitude 7220 Rugged Extreme has integrated security such as a built-in infrared camera with Windows Hello facial recognition with optional ﬁngerprint, contactless and contacted smart-card readers.