Oracle Exadata X5 is the latest generation of Engineered Systems which can be compared to a BMW X5. The “equivalent” integrated systems of competitors fall into the category of a mid class sedan except for the price. You must be willing to pay less in order to get the double and triple performance of Exadata.
To get more details on the topic, it is worth reading CIO Angle’s Oracle declares war on EMC, VCE: “Oracle will sell its latest generation X5 Engineered Systems hardware, which is Oracle’s term for converged systems, separately from Oracle applications on Linux or Windows at a significantly lower price than market leader VCE’s comparable systems. Ellison announced list prices that are half of VCE’s discounted prices. And he said “We will negotiate. We will discount.”
Ellison also announce an all-flash array that’s part of X5 but sold as a stand-alone unit. Again, the list price is one-third of the price of what Oracle said is a comparable EMC XtremeIO array. Significantly, he did not announce a stand-alone server or network switch, although these are also X5 components. This seems to indicate that Oracle is not going after Cisco Systems, at this time.”
What is worth rather watching than reading is the following presentation by Larry Ellison: The Next Generation of Oracle Engineered Systems.
And here are some useful links:
1. Juan Loaiza – Oracle Next Generation Engineered Systems Launch – theCUBE
2. Gartner: New X5 Generation Will Bring Pricing Improvements to Oracle Exadata
3. Oracle aims to undercut competition with X5 generation of engineered systems
4. Oracle Debuting FS1 Series Flash Storage System
5. Oracle Introduces New Generation of Engineered Systems and New Pricing Strategy
6. Oracle Exadata X5 Data Sheet
7. Oracle Serer X5-2 System Architeture
Exadata X5 with the In-Memory option enabled would be M6 Gran Coupe, if it were to be car.
Julian Dontcheff's Database Blog 