Integrate, virtualise and automate everything
| Blades occupy a small – but robustly growing – segment in data centres. Packing powerful performance in a pizza-box size, they offer flexible server deployment and high densities at low cost. Now, with the launch of a new blade generation, HP extends the benefits across the entire IT infrastructure – from desktop to data centre. |
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On the surface, it may appear to be just another announcement. After all, no corporation lets the launch of a new range of hardware pass without fanfare. However, does the release of the HP BladeSystem c-Class amount to anything more than the promotion of a new, albeit impressive, generation of blade servers? HP firmly believes so.
For HP, the launch (two blades based on ProLiant technology, an enclosure and an associated HP StorageWorks expansion model) is about infrastructure, not servers. While the modular, 17-inch blade box consolidates essential elements – power, cooling, connectivity, redundancy, security, compute and storage – into one self-optimising unit, it is only part of the story. The new blades are really only bite-sized building blocks of infrastructure.
What is contained within these blocks – services, software, interconnects, storage, servers and solutions – depends on the solution required by the customer. This consolidation of all resources into a single, shared infrastructure provides customers with unlimited compute possibilities. It also offers an opportunity to capitalise on unprecedented flexibility and the significant cost benefits of blade deployment, as well as simplified, dynamic and automated management technologies.
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Steve Hamm of BusinessWeek Online in December 2005 described blades as the “Swiss Army Knife of modern computing.” The analogy is apt. Originally designed to be a niche product for huge data centres, blades have proved to be extremely versatile. They are deployed now by enterprises and SMBs alike as customers replace expensive servers with racks of inexpensive, slim, commodity blades.
Today, blades fill a staggering diversity of roles. These include providing front-end services (such as web servers), remote caching, proxy servers, firewall or DNS servers, as well as for mid-tier transaction processing and small database applications. They are also found in highperformance clustering and processing environments, and are increasingly part of server consolidation projects.
According to an IDC server market review in April 2006, blade servers comprise 5.7% of the volume server market. “In 2005, worldwide shipments increased 63.6%. Customer spending on blades grew 80.5%,” the report states. IDC has predicted that up until 2009, worldwide shipments in the blade server market will grow at a compound annual growth rate of 57%.
Given this potential, and the way blades have been a platform for innovation in the last few years, it is no wonder that vendors have increasingly sought ways to foster the technology. The focus has been on designing blades, their enclosures and other blade-like components for special purpose applications and new, innovative uses.
However, two critical issues have prevented a more rapid uptake of blade technology: cooling and thermal management; and comprehensive, quality management tools. In this regard, the c-Class sets itself apart. Not only does the package provide leading blade hardware technology and extreme versatility, it also presents solutions to both of these issues.
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With the c-Class, someone has stepped back and asked the simple question, “Why stop at servers? Why not apply the commoditised benefits offered by blades across the entire IT infrastructure?” The result is that the c-Class offers out-of-the-box functionality that includes:
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- Flexible, interconnected architecture that supports the latest fabrics and standards. Plus a technology called HP Virtual Connect that easily connects to LANs and SANs for greater administrator convenience.
- Tremendous power that adapts and optimises itself to the most energy-efficient level for any solution – regardless of workload.
- Midplane that provides over five terabits of aggregate bandwidth to 16 server slots and 80 gigabits per seconds to each bay.
- Cooling capacity for a 50KW load. And the ability to adapt cooling so more air goes where it’s needed, while using less power to do it.
- Complete redundancy for every component, without a single point of failure across connection, power and cooling, even the management interface.
- Simple interface called the HP Onboard Administrator that provides all information quickly for greater control.
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This represents a significant advancement in blade technology. For example, the new BladeSystem c7000 enclosure automatically tunes itself to the needs of 1 to 16 blades – storage blades as well as servers. This allows an enclosure to hold StorageWorks Blades to create a variety of solutions or a series of server blades to combine even larger servers – allowing the data centre to scale out and scale up its infrastructure.
With this new blade range, HP aims to realise standardsbased, modular computing. These are summed up in the tag, “Integrate everything. Virtualise everything. Automate everything.” The intention is to create a new generation data centre infrastructure that is cost-savvy, changeready, energy-thrifty and time-smart, while having innovation built in – “out of the box.” All of this is on offer in the c-Class. |
Save with a cost-savvy infrastructure
The cost of a BladeSystem c-Class provides dramatic upfront savings, not to mention long-term benefits in terms of lower power and cooling. On a direct comparison between 320 servers and 320 c-Class blades, the HP BladeSystem can save over $1.4 million on upfront costs alone. |
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