HP ProLiant DL380 Gen9 2U rack server 2x Xeon E5-2670v3 12C 2.3GHz 96GB DDR4 2x 146GB SAS H240ar

ProLiant DL380 Gen9 2U rack server

The HP ProLiant DL380 Gen9 is a 2U rack server built for data-centre workloads that need dual-processor performance in a compact chassis. It ships with two Xeon E5-2670v3 twelve-core processors running at 2.3 GHz and 96 GB of DDR4 memory across 24 DIMM slots. The system includes redundant hot-swap 500 W power supplies and a Smart HBA H240ar controller driving two 146 GB 15K SAS drives. This configuration suits virtualisation hosts, database nodes and general-purpose compute clusters that prioritise density and reliability.

SAS H240ar controller with eight SFF bays

The onboard H240ar provides 12 Gb SAS and 6 Gb SATA connectivity with support for RAID 0, 1, 5, 6, 10, 50 and 60 across eight 2.5-inch drive bays. Maximum installed memory is capped at 96 GB on this unit, so larger memory footprints would require a different configuration. The eight-bay limit restricts local storage expansion unless additional drive cages are sourced separately. NVMe devices are not supported by this controller, so high-speed flash tiers need a separate add-in card.

Dual E5-2670v3 upgrade from single-socket

Moving from a single-socket server or an E5 v2 platform adds 24 physical cores and 48 threads, doubling parallel throughput for multi-threaded applications. The jump is worthwhile when licensing costs scale per socket and the workload can saturate both CPUs. Buyers who need more than 96 GB of RAM, more than eight drive bays or native NVMe support should evaluate Gen10 or later platforms instead.