z14 ZR1 / LinuxONE Rockhopper II

IBM has announced the new z14 ZR1 / LinuxONE Rockhopper II on April 10, 2018. The key new feature for me of this box is the form factor. Instead of the decades old 24″ rack a standard 19″ rack is being used. So this box now fits into standard data centers. No special place needed. Besides being the “small” Z box, nothing changed from a hardware perspective. So most of the general topics from z14 do apply.

Resources:

• Announcement letters (pdf): z14 ZR1 / LinuxONE Rockhopper II
• IBM tested kernel / distro levels according to IBM tested platforms page as of 5/23/2019 (minimal versions):
  • Canonical: Ubuntu 16.04.3 LTS: LTS kernel 4.4.0-116; Crypto libs: TKE9.0, csulcca-5.2.23-12, libep11_1.3.2-1, libep11-dev_1.3.2-1
  • Red Hat:
    • RHEL 7.6: 3.10.0-957.el7; Crypto libs: TKE 9.0, csulcca-6.0.13-08.s390x.rpm, ep11-host-2.0.0-8, ep11-host-devel-2.0.0-8
    • RHEL 7.4: 3.10.0-693.21.1.el7; Crypto libs: TKE9.0, csulcca-5.2.23-12, ep11-host-1.3.2-0, ep11-host-devel-1.3.2-0
    • RHEL 6.9: 2.6.32-696.23.1.el6; Crypto libs: TKE9.0, csulcca-5.2.23-12, ep11-host-1.3.2-0, ep11-host-devel-1.3.2-0
  • SUSE:
    • SLES 12 SP4: kernel-default-4.12.14-94.41; Crypto libs: TKE9.0, csulcca-6.0.13-08, ep11-host-2.0.0-8, ep11-host-devel-2.0.0-8
    • SLES 12 SP3: kernel 4.4.120-94.17; Crypto libs: TKE9.0, csulcca-5.2.23-12, ep11-host-1.3.2-0, ep11-host-devel-1.3.2-0
    • SLES 11 SP4: kernel 3.0.101-108.35; Crypto libs: TKE9.0, csulcca-5.2.23-12, ep11-host-1.3.2-0, ep11-host-devel-1.3.2-0
• Hardware certifications of distribution partners:
  • Canonical:
    • Ubuntu 18.04 LTS (z14 ZR1 / Rockhopper II)
    • Ubuntu 16.04 LTS (z14 ZR1 / Rockhopper II)
  • Red Hat:
    • RHEL 7.3 / RHEL 6.9
  • SUSE:
    
    • SLES 11 SP4
    • SLES 12 SP2
    • SLES 15
• z14 ZR 1 announcement letter and press release
• LinuxONE Rockhopper II announcement letter and press release
• z14 ZR1 data sheet / LinuxONE Roeckhopper II data sheet
• Large Systems Performance Reference for IBM Z 
• z/Architecture Principles of Operation SA22-7832-11
• Redbooks:
  • IBM z14 Model ZR1 Technical Introduction (SG24-8550)
  • IBM z14 ZR1 Technical Guide (SG24-8651)
  • IBM z14 Model ZR1 Configuration Setup (SG24-8560)