Dell will release its new M1000e blade server chassis "in the next few weeks," according to information obtained by The Register.

The Texas-based hardware maker has long threatened to reenter the blade server game with a more competitive product. And now we learn that it's already reaching out to customers with the M1000e – a 10U chassis that will hold 16 blade servers. While the system appears near identical to HP's C-class chassis, Dell has been telling customers that the M1000e will crush rivals on scale and power management.

Dell has been at work on the blade system for quite some time, as we first revealed specs on the box way back in March. Did it really take the marketing drones seven months to craft the M1000e name?

One real show stopper with the M1000e could come in the form of a liquid cooling option, although that's just a nasty rumor at this point.

Dell, like Sun, has tried and flailed at the blade server game. To date, it has relied on a system designed by Fujitsu and dropped way behind HP and IBM in blade sales.

Now Dell, again like Sun, seems to have put some more in-house effort into its blade redesign – or at least to have borrowed well from HP's in-house effort. ®

Related stories

• Analysis Dell unleashes blades of fury (28 January 2008)
• Dell's Soviet style two-year plan results in fresh blade servers (21 January 2008)
• Dell does four-core Xeons and Opterons with new blade box (8 January 2008)
• Dell welcomes new Xeons with something old and new (12 November 2007)
• It's time to pay attention to Sun's x86 server biz (26 September 2007)
• HP shrinks BladeSystem for mid-market (12 September 2007)
• Meat Cast Virtualization and the Art of Patience with HP, IBM, Sun and Dell (7 September 2007)
• Dell makes headway in server market (23 August 2007)
• IBM embraces - wtf - Sun's Solaris across x86 server line (16 August 2007)
• Dell paddles 'blade everything' HP (19 July 2007)
• Meat Cast Blade servers as told by the master (10 July 2007)
• Project Hybrid: Dell's transformation begins (18 May 2007)
• Exclusive Dell perfects HP blade copy for Fall performance (20 March 2007)