Customer Feedback Drove the Design of the New Dell EMC PowerEdge XR2 High Performance Chassis

Is it possible to improve on perfection? Rarely but if you’re lucky, it can sometimes happen. Take the Dell EMC OEM PowerEdge XR2, first announced in December 2017.

Small but mighty

Built for harsh OEM environments, the PowerEdge XR2 packs a huge punch in terms of performance, despite its compact size. Thanks to long-life and extensive customization capabilities plus certifications in shock, vibration, dust, humidity, EMI and maritime, this little beauty can comfortably deal with any challenge thrown its way.

Nothing can rattle its cage

While 20 percent less deep than a standard server, the PowerEdge XR2 can operate continuously while withstanding heat 10°C hotter than non-rugged offerings. You can read what I previously wrote about the product here.

Your data center anywhere

Whether you’re providing compute at the edge in a busy factory, installing satellite communications, conducting military operations in the desert, rigging offshore, working underwater or doing remote field work that requires your vital data and hardware to travel with you, this is the server you can absolutely depend on to keep your operations up and running.

Now delivering even higher performance

Over the last year and a half, customer feedback about this product has been phenomenal. While you told us that you loved the product, you started telling us recently that you needed even higher performance, better graphics support and faster storage for challenging environments, particularly in response to the huge shift to computing at the edge.

You needed even faster response times

You explained that as you were now processing ever-growing volumes of data being produced by edge-connected sensors, you needed even faster response times to glean business insights from data generated at source. Some of you said that you anticipate increasing application, workload or environmental complexities either for you or your customers.

You needed server mobility

Some customers needed server mobility compute to increase business growth and drive market penetration. Others said they needed to understand what appliances were doing at the edge or felt that it was becoming too costly to transfer all the data to the cloud for processing.

Even more powerful and flexible

We listened to all your requirements and are delighted to now unveil the PowerEdge XR2 High Performance Chassis. While, we all know that it’s tough to improve on perfection, I hope you agree that my team in the Dell Technologies OEM | Embedded & Edge Solutions Product Group has done just that.

Building on all the successful features you love, we have delivered even more powerful and flexible options in a short-depth server to increase flexibility and performance at the edge. You can now leverage performance from the latest Intel® Cascade Lake processors and extract peak processor performance with 8 x 2.5” chassis with support for up to four NVMe drives.

Easy to deploy & manage

And that’s not all! The XR2 High Performance Chassis is also GPU-ready for further increasing compute power as you need it. It goes without saying that it continues to be certified for Military and Marine applications, surpassing historical server threshold parameters for performance in harsh environments. It also comes OpenManage and iDRAC-ready to support optimum deployment and off-site management capabilities.

No beating about the bush

What else can I say? The PowerEdge XR2 High Performance Chassis doesn’t beat about the bush. This product more than delivers what it says on the tin. If you need extraordinarily high levels of compute outside the data center, you won’t find better. Wherever you go, you can take rugged with you.

This little beauty is now available globally.