IBM has added a new option to its SoftLayer cloud computing service: bare metal servers. The bare metal option can offer exceptional performance but isn’t as flexible as virtualized environments.
According to IBM, enterprises can get a bare metal SoftLayer instance up and running in just thirty minutes. It charges by the hour, with prices starting at $0.464 for a single-processor 3.4GHz Xeon 1270 server with four cores, 8GB of RAM and 2TB of SATA storage. Rackspace also offers a bare-metal option for its cloud computing service, but it has monthly minimums.
In related news, IBM also announced that it is opening a new data center in Melbourne, Australia, to support its cloud computing services.