Oracle’s latest Exadata hardware system for database applications needs 30% less power and cooling than its predecessor, reducing its toll on data center resources while substantially increasing performance.

Much of Monday’s keynote session at this year’s Oracle OpenWorld conference in San Francisco revolved around Exadata X3 – latest version of the company’s all-in-one hardware solution designed to run databases.

The keynote delved into more detail on the product, first announced by Oracle CEO Larry Ellison during his opening presentation on Sunday.

Perhaps the biggest change in X3 is that it is designed with a focus on memory-based storage rather than disk. Its full name is actually Exadata X3 In-Memory Machine.

Exadata “is really now primarily a memory-based platform that uses disk for extra capacity,” Juan Loaiza, Oracle’s senior VP of systems technology, said. This is a departure from previous versions, which were primarily disk-based, using memory to speed up performance.

The X3 has three storage tiers – DRAM for hottest data (2TB or 4TB), PCI Flash for data that is active but not the hottest (22TB) and disk for cold data (500TB). It automatically moves all active data from disk to memory.

Another addition to the portfolio is an entry-level Eighth-Rack Exadata configuration for smaller workloads, testing, development and disaster-recovery systems.

Thousands of Exadata systems have been deployed since Oracle first introduced the product in 2010, Loaiza said. The customers include Facebook, BT, Orbitz, Allstate, SingTel, Samsung, Monsanto and Huawei among others.

Oracle itself is also an Exadata customer. The infrastructure running its cloud services - it now offers Software- , Platform- and Infrastructure-as-a-Service - includes its database machines.

Oracle announced its SaaS and PaaS offerings in June. Ellison announced Oracle's entry into the IaaS business in September during the company's fiscal Q1 earnings call.

While overall hardware revenue during that quarter was down 24% for the company, the engineered-systems category, which includes Exadata, did well, Oracle said.