Reality Check: Server Insights : Integrity

9.9.99 to 9.9.09: the meaning of 9s

Kristie Popp — Mon, 14 Sep 2009 21:04:00 GMT

In 10 years the definition of "mission critical" has evolved and along with it the demand for continuous uptime has increased. What does "mission critical" mean these days? For me, I expect to be able to do what ever I want - banking, shopping, taking a red-eye, or writing my blog posts at what ever time I feel tickled to do so. Nothing critical about these things, but it's expected. Mission critical capabilities are even more important. In these past 10 years, the expectations have soared, putting more pressure on businesses to deliver services around-the-clock, without interruption. Predictable availability of services is a significant differentiator for businesses today. Lorraine Bartlett, VP of Marketing and Strategy for HP's Business Critical Systems pulls together her thoughts and is looking for yours at her blog on this topic here. Check it out & add your thoughts.

Sun customers – What are you going to do now

Kristie Popp — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 19:56:00 GMT

written by HP's Peter Johnson

New economic pressures and big changes, like new entries and consolidations in the computer industry, have been coming at warp speed, forcing a lot of customers to rethink their investment priorities. Adding to the impact of those market shifts is the very real uncertainty about SPARC futures – what with events like the impending Oracle acquisition of Sun, chip development talent brain drain from Sun and now rumored cancellations of a key enterprise CMT SPARC project.

So, have you thought about where things are headed and what you will do?

Nobody likes change - but sometimes change can be a good thing – especially if that change results in a better future. Being forced to reconsider new options might actually be the best thing that ever happened. New options might result in better answers.

Ever consider alternatives to replace your SPARC servers? HP has been promoting industry standard servers as the right choice for a very long time. Why? Have you taken a look at the performance, price/performance and TCO advantages that industry standard ProLiant servers can offer vs. staying with SPARC? It’s worth checking out our Sun TCO Challenge.

Also, with industry standard servers you don’t have to worry about making choices that may not pan out in the future. If there is anything you can rely on it’s the future of industry standard servers – that’s just one of the many attributes that makes them so attractive. Everyone everywhere is using more and more of them everyday. You would be in good company.

And with industry standard x86 servers comes the flexibility to run whatever you like - Windows, or Linux or VMware, or even Solaris, if that’s where you want to stay. Or not, it’s your choice. And to meet the needs of Sun customers who require and demand systems with mission critical virtualization capabilities as well as the high availability servers that can scale to hundreds of cores and terabytes of physical memory we offer industry standard Integrity systems. Here too, industry standards offer customers choice – choice to run enterprise UNIX with HP-UX as well as options to run Windows, Linux and OpenVMS as well as our Integrity NonStop systems. That’s what our industry standard servers give you – choice.

HP distinguishes itself as being the leader in industry standard solutions. We can offer all those solutions on ProLiant and Integrity, including Solaris on ProLiant, with full support for both the hardware and software. And moving your environment over from SPARC to x86 or Itanium. We can help with that too.

So, might this be the right time to choose a new partner?

HP TCO challenge tool from the Tech Forum floor

Kristie Popp — Mon, 22 Jun 2009 18:14:00 GMT

Question: So what's the HP TCO challenge tool?

Answer: The TCO challenge tool, provided by independent analyst Alinean, Inc., lets you input your IBM mainframe configuration and receive a customized report. It will summarize your three-year total cost of ownership compared with a recommended HP platform. See how you can support the same services, yet reduce operational costs.

At HP Tech Forum 2009, I had the opportunity to meet with HP's Brian Cox and Alvina Nishimoto from the Integrity team. The TCO challenge tool was featured right at the front of the HP area in Tech Forum display area, with huge number savings displaying on the brightest , biggest and boldest screen. With the biggest baddest numbers.

Brian & Alvina also shared a cool, fun quick reference in a spinning wheel with me.

I asked Brian & Alvina what the tool was really about. They replied with it being "an easy to use tool, informative, a great place to start a conversation on what HP can provide for mission-critical servers ". The "numbers in the tool are pre-populated so that you can easily just start playing around with the figures". They also mentioned this tool is great to spark ideas the customers may not have had, cost-savings initiatives and other technology not in place. Gaining knowledge from this tool is good to do before setting up to meet with HP experts, as it can lead you to different choices you may not have thought of before.

Want to try it yourself? Of course you do...

» Bring on the challenge

» Download the widget

Then let us know below, comment on
your challenge outcomes!

What were folks saying at the HPTF show? From the Twitter feeds:

HPTechForum2009: NonStop kickoff Randy Meyer: Blades drive breakthru TCO and HP will not stop driving costs down #hptf

HPIntegrity: NonStop in center of HPs strategy. you hear diff? “RUBBISH!” Steve Saltwick. Anyone say diff Steve wants 2 talk 2 you. #hptf