HP DL360 ProLiant High Availability: The IT Imperative - Page 2

SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION many factors combine to influence server availability. HP and Intel are developing sophisticated technologies like redundant Ethernet connections and network adapter teaming that enhance server availability and enable IT organizations to satisfy today's business requirements. redundant Ethernet connections Server adapters act as an interface between the server and the network. Therefore, they play a critical role in determining server availability and performance. Some server adapter features are based on industry standards. These include flow control (IEEE 802.3x*), VLAN tagging (IEEE 802.1Q*) and link aggregation (IEEE 802.3ad*). Other influences are vendor specific, such as the amount of onboard memory and the operating systems supported. To address slot-constrained environments, server adapters offer multiple ports. Multiple port server adapters allow IT organizations to meet current demands like segmenting the LAN to reduce network bottlenecks. In addition, multiple port server adapters enable fault tolerance to maintain server availability by rerouting traffic to another port if a problem develops on the network. Multiple port server adapters enable IT organizations to respond to industry trends, such as server consolidation and virtualization, that are driving the need for more network ports. These are also required to accommodate virtual servers while supporting segmentation and fault tolerance. figure 1. dual port server adapter ProLiant servers support multiple port server adapters. The HP NC6170 and NC7170 Gigabit Ethernet server adapters with Intel technology offer 128 KB of onboard memory, which leads to enhanced performance. Flexibility is increased because these adapters support copper and fiber optic interfaces, as well as Ethernet, Fast Ethernet and Gigabit Ethernet connections. The HP NC6170 and NC7170 improve scalability by doubling the number of ports that a given server can support. ProLiant Essentials Intelligent Networking Pack The ProLiant Essentials Intelligent Networking Pack (INP) enhances basic network adapter teaming by providing additional redundancy and load balancing. Teaming is taking two to eight NIC ports and configuring them to function as if they were a single NIC in order to provide network fault tolerance and to increase bandwidth. Basic network adapter teaming detects server downtime and network bottlenecks up to the first switch connection. INP resides at server nodes and enables the server to detect the network infrastructure from the first tier of switches and beyond. As network conditions change, the INP monitors and analyzes the network conditions, and redirects traffic to the optimum path. Additionally, INP helps slow down the spread of viruses by monitoring the behavior of all outbound connection requests. INP offers three key advanced networking features-active path failover, fast path failover, and dual channel teaming -plus the business protection feature of virus throttle. Active path failover allows a ProLiant server to maintain connectivity with the core network even if the link between the intermediate switch and the core network has failed. When active path failover is configured, the ports in a team continually 64-bit Intel® Xeon™ processors: high availability building blocks today's business requirements demand IT organizations deploy servers that are designed to be powerful, reliable and highly available. Leading technologies like redundant Ethernet connections, network adapter teaming, memory management and Smart Array controllers enable improved flexibility and broad software compatibility. These innovations offer IT professionals the tools to effectively address high-availability platform challenges, both now and in the future. high availability, power savings and higher performance 64-bit Intel® Xeon™ processor-based platforms are highly available because they incorporate technologies such as redundant DIMMs (dual inline memory modules), memory scrubbing and RAID controllers on the motherboard. Enhanced Intel SpeedStep® technology and DDR2-400 memory support help reduce power and cooling costs by using advanced power-management techniques. Server performance is improved by technologies such as Intel® EM64T, Enhanced Intel SpeedStep technology, Hyper-Threading Technology, PCI Express* and Intel NetBurst® microarchitecture. With a history of technology innovation and a broad base of hardware, software and integration leaders, Intel consistently delivers enterprise-class performance, quality and availability. This approach helps you to build for the future with confidence on a platform that evolves as your business grows. 2a