Summary of:
http://ibmsystemsmag.blogs.com/aixchange/2010/02/power7-is-here.html
OS Requirements:
* AIX 5.3 with the 5300-11 Technology Level SP2 or later.
* AIX 6.1 with the 6100-04 Technology Level SP3 or later.
* IBM i 6.1 with 6.1.1 machine code or later.
* VIOS 2.1.2.12 with Fix Pack 22.1 and Service Pack 2 or later.
* Emulates POWER6 and POWER6+ for support on older AIX levels
* AIX 6 TL5 will include additional POWER7 performance enhancements with improved memory affinity.
HMC Requirements:
* HMC V7 R710 is the minimum level for POWER7 support.
* Requires CR3 or C05 hardware.
* Requires 3GB CR3 or C06 if over 254 LPARs.
Active Memory Expansion:
* Compressed RAM
* Not the same as Active Memory Sharing (VIO = Pagefile)
Hardware:
* Power 750 – Feb 19 – 4U 4, 6 or 8 cores at 3.0 or 3.55Ghz per CEC (4 CECs) up to 512GB RAM
* Power 770 – Mar 16 – 4U 12 or 16 cores at 3.1 or 3.5GHz per CEC (4 CECs) up to 2TB RAM
* Power 780 – Mar 16 – Same as 770, but 3.86 or 4.14Ghz, with TurboCore*
* 4-Way SMT per core = ~20% performance improvement
* TurboCore = Turns of 4 of 8 cores and doubles the L3 cache. Rated at 2x the perf per core vs POWER6.
(I’d rather turn off SMT than kill 4 cores).
