| [News] Genesi selects IBM PowerPC for Performance-intensive Pegasos Release | ANN.lu |
| Posted on 04-Dec-2003 17:14 GMT by Nathaniel Downes | 98 comments
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Genesi today announced a new, PowerPC®-based, modular MicroATX mainboard release that brings flexibility and efficient processing power to performance-intensive applications, including desktops, workstations, servers, and communications products
This latest MicroATX board is the most powerful and cost-effective hardware foundation for Genesi’s popular Pegasos platform, with over 1,000 users in 34 countries around the world.
The new motherboard features an IBM PowerPC 750CXe microprocessor and supports industry standards software such as Open Firmware, and multiple operating systems including distributions of Linux and BSD.
"Genesi's new PowerPC-based computer brings effective and flexible processing power to the desktop, low-end server, firewall and pervasive space at an affordable price," said Bill Buck, CEO of Genesi.
Looking forward, Mr Buck also revealed that Genesi would be working closely with IBM to release a 64-bit Pegasos workstation in 2004, based on the new IBM PowerPC 970 microprocessor.
“Today’s Pegasos release is a starting point that will enable all the operating systems developed for the PowerPC environment to begin to move in this direction with confidence and purpose," he explained.
The new Pegasos Platform is also the core for Genesi’s first commercial product designed to support the increasingly-important security infrastructure requirements of Fortune 1000 companies and large institutions.
The Pegasos Guardian provides: border protection of networks; proactive protection of network assets; and logging and auditing of suspicious network traffic.
“IT Managers must know exactly what is happening on their networks, and why,” said Buck. “The Guardian gives you a very high level of control and the new MicroATX board provides the performance platform for them to achieve this.”
Choice of the PowerPC environment enhances the security that Guardian offers: “Much of the office and network IT infrastructure in use today is x86-based,” explained Buck. “The Guardian runs on a different processor platform and is not as susceptible to the common buffer overflows that are the main entry point for security breaches.” Any element of security begins with people, procedure and enforcement, but with tools such as the Guardian IT Managers can audit and build their own code. Customers need a total security posture, and this is one component of a total security system.
Genesi developed the Guardian with partners ShopIP (www.shopip.com) and Diginexus (www.diginexus.com). The interface design and border-level protection is based on the acclaimed ShopIP Crunchbox.
Proactive protection is based on the security scanning features of Nessus (www.nessus.org) and the internal invisible IDS scanning features were developed and contributed by Diginexus.
Buck added, “this collaborative effort is an example of the partnerships we expect to develop in the months ahead and indicative of the many and varied potential uses for an open, powerful and efficient hardware platform.”
“IBM has worked closely with Genesi and its partners to ensure that the Pegasos platform can be configured to cover the rich variety of applications over multiple operating systems that Genesi and its partners are developing,” said Ray Bryant, Director PowerPC Products at IBM Microelectronics. “The integration of the IBM PowerPC 750CXe offers developers further opportunities to extend Pegasos’ use into the evolutionary path we have chartered for the PowerPC.”
Based on industry standards, such as Open Firmware, the Pegasos supports multiple operating systems including varieties of Linux and BSD. The Pegasos platform also comes with Genesi’s own non-UNIX, Quark-based MorphOS. Recent releases supported on the Pegasos include OpenBSD 3.4 and Debian-Installer Beta 1.
Buck added, "in the meanwhile, the strategic value of moving to a Linux Desktop is becoming increasing clear and a migration to Linux has begun. Every major commercial or non-commercial version/distribution of Linux on the market today runs on the Pegasos, including SuSE and the Novell® Nterprise Linux Service package. Getting on the network with the Pegasos Guardian and on the desktop with the Pegasos, now and in the future with the PowerPC 970, places Genesi at the forefront of these major market developments."
Genesi has served the computer hobbyist since the first Beta release of the Pegasos in 2002. Trialed and tested by over 1000 users in 34 countries, enthusiasts have configured the Pegasos in variety of fashions with over a dozen different operating systems. The Pegasos was awarded the Amiga Award 2002 by Falke Media Verlag and recently, the Pegasos was acclaimed as the future home of the Linux desktop by German Linux site PPCNUX.
The Pegasos-Guardian will make its public debut with ShopIP and Diginexus at Infosecurity 2003, at the Jacob K. Javits Convention Center in New York, December 8-11, Booth 126 and be distributed by Pegasos Resellers worldwide through the IBM Global Solutions Directory.
Genesi's "Ready for IBM Technology"-validated Pegasos systems signal the advancement of the IBM 750CXe PowerPC microprocessor family into the broader global marketplace for embedded industrial controls, military, multimedia, consumer electronic appliances, blade servers, thin client systems, storage, networking, firewalls, and communication applications. With leading edge CPU bus speed capabilities and enhanced AGP, PCI-X, SDRAM and DDR support, the combination of the Marvell Discovery II chipset and IBM PowerPC 750CXe processors offers a most desirable solution to the performance-intensive applications marketplace.
Genesi is an IBM Business Partner and carries the Ready for IBM Technology mark on five of its products, the Pegasos Guardian, Pegasos, PegXLin, MorphOS, and OpenBSD for Pegasos. The basic Pegasos featuring the IBM PowerPC processor can be purchased online for 299 Euros at http://www.pegasosppc.com while the Pegasos-Guardian is priced between 5000 and 15000 Euros depending on the configuration and the associated service contract. Genesi is based in Luxembourg and can be found on the web at http://www.genesi.lu. Details on the Pegasos Guardian are presented at http://www.pegasosppc.com/guardian.php
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| Genesi selects IBM PowerPC for Performance-intensive Pegasos Release : Comment 57 of 98 | ANN.lu |
| Posted by bbrv on 05-Dec-2003 13:58 GMT | In reply to Comment 54 (Neko):
Neko...:-)
I. What this Press Release is and is not.
II. The Pegasos Guardian
There are some who will read this and will find fault in as many issues as possible. This message is for the rest of the readers. :-)
The Press Release is for a market of potential Pegasos owners outside of this community. It is found on our site and it will age there as a historical reference to those potential owners, and later to those who may have an investment interest in the Company. This release was fully vetted through both the management, legal and PR staff of IBM in Europe and the USA.
1. The Pegasos is a step in the evolution of a platform and a CPU. IBM supplies the CPU; Genesi the platform. The 970 is next. Genesi is on the early release schedule. IBM will supports Genesi's effort to have a 970 Pegasos on the market in 2004. Marvell will too by the way. This should provide confidence to Developers and existing application suppliers that the Pegasos has an expanding opportunity.
2. Read this sentence:
“IBM has worked closely with Genesi and its partners to ensure that the Pegasos platform can be configured to cover the rich variety of applications over multiple operating systems that Genesi and its partners are developing,” said Ray Bryant, Director PowerPC Products at IBM Microelectronics."
Multiple operating systems! The Linux Desktop is the current rage. Why would IBM have an interest in anything else? Could there be a bigger plan here? Please read up on this part of IBM: E&TS System Solution Business
About the Guardian...
As we see it a good portion of buffer overflow exploits are targeted toward the x86 processor instruction set. There still are ones for other processor platforms, and PowerPC is one of them, as is SPARC. However, the best way to examine buffer overflow exploits and do so with minimal chance of harm is to provide inspection from a non-x86 platform. Using PowerPC does not completely mitigate the risk of a buffer overflow. Rather, it provides a platform on which a good portion of exploit code cannot run, since the amount of crackers targeting PowerPC platforms is much smaller than the set trying x86. Nevertheless, PowerPC uses a machine code (instruction-set architecture) that is very different from x86 machine code, there is very little chance (zero chance, for all practical purpose) that an x86 exploit would do anything but crash whatever program absorbed it, even if the PowerPC was running the "same" OS and software: they are just different.
There was a further issue that the operating system might mix instruction and data spaces. In the PowerPC architecture code and data are in different memory spaces and there are separate instruction and data caches. Thus, it is much easier to isolate changes to data from changes to code. In other words, due to the separate (effective) address spaces, it is much easier to make code immutable, while allowing for full access to the full data space. The Guardian team has come up with a way to avoid the confusion of instruction and data spaces interfering with each other.
As a nearly any system administrator will tell you, there is no magic bullet for security solutions. You have to have an interlocking platform of policy, procedures, and enforcement (of policy and procedures). This has spurred the use of Open Source in security over the years in systems, since it allows a way to audit the systems via the code they run. We realize there are many system administrators that are that paranoid. Providing the customer with the source code to the system does two things:
1. This allows the customer to audit the code.
2. It also allows the customer to build on the code.
However, there is also a learning curve for these products that is very high, and even experienced system administrators can get easily confused with these products. This product provides a way of reducing the time needed to set up and configure a firewall for a network that provides more than just the basic features. This product also provides for detection and filtering of malicious traffic, and can be custom-configured for the network.
The use of Open Source tools also provides multiple integration paths through both the Open Source and commercial channels, meaning that with customization, it should be possible to include this as part of a total security system/posture.
The choice of OpenBSD also allows for a platform that has been specifically audited for buffer overflows and race conditions, out in the open. Code from this product and its offshoot projects such as OpenSSH are used in multiple commercial products. Mitigation cannot take place in one place, it has to occur at multiple levels, and we consider this to be one level.
There is no way to eliminate buffer overflows. However, there are steps as part of a total security plan that can be taken to include this as part of a security process. This is only one part of the total security solution and posture that a company can adopt. Firewalls and IDSs are only one part of your total protection measure. PowerPC is not just a one-step band aid. It is a starting point. Customers need a total security posture, and this is one component of it, providing border-level or internal protection as a component of a security system, not the system itself.
In terms of competitive products in the market (in the USA), the Guardian's pricing and offering levels are VERY competitive. Any discussion to the contrary is a indication of market ignorance.
No more time for this today!
:-)
R&B |
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