IBM 8687 Installation Guide - Page 72

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IBM

^

xSeries 440 Planning and Installation Guide

A single point of control allows enterprises to:

–

Reduce or eliminate department operational costs

–

Reduce some software licenses

–

Reduce number of systems, disk storage costs

–

Reduce maintenance charges

–

Avoid multiple copies of the same application on distributed systems

–

Reduce owner operational costs

–

Offer better availability of service

–

Improve systems management

–

Have better version control management

–

Have better software distribution

–

Reduce risk and increase security

±

Giving users better services

With a consolidated infrastructure, end users can count on round-the-clock

service, seven days a week. The response time is much better than with an

overly distributed environment, and the data is more easily accessible while

being highly protected. The control procedures are simpler, while security

becomes even higher. And information sharing is improved, giving end users

increased data consistency. The availability of service is improved mainly due

to a reduction in the time needed to communicate between clients and

servers in a single location.

±

Regaining flexibility

The standardization of procedures, releases, and servers also makes it easier

to install new application software, for example, Internet and intranet,

electronic commerce, and so on. In today

’

s fast moving environment,

computing resource consolidation enables a trouble-free upgrade of the

information system and less costly adaptation to organization or environment

changes. Enterprises can react more quickly to market changes, since

storage is readily available and can easily be reallocated.

±

Avoid floor space constraints

While a small server may be easily fit into a closet, as compute demands

increase, enterprises find that suitable floor space is hard to find for

proliferating small servers. The solution is a central site outfitted with

appropriate power, cooling, access to communications links, and so on, and

populated with more powerful systems, each giving more performance in the

same footprint.

±

Reduction of the Total Cost of Ownership (TCO)

There are several costs associated with server consolidation, including:

–

Hardware costs

—

new servers and infrastructure, upgrades

–

Software costs

—

fewer software licenses are required with fewer servers

–

Disruption costs

—

migration, change management

Section	Page
Front cover	1
Contents	5
Notices	9
Trademarks	10
Preface	11
The team that wrote this redbook	11
Become a published author	14
Comments welcome	14
Chapter 1. Technical description	15
1.1 The x440 product line	16
1.2 System partitioning	20
1.3 IBM XA-32 chipset	21
1.4 Processors	26
1.4.1 Intel Xeon Processor MP	27
1.4.2 Intel Xeon Processor DP	30
1.5 SMP Expansion Module	31
1.6 IBM XceL4 Server Accelerator Cache	33
1.7 System memory	33
1.8 PCI subsystem	37
1.9 Redundancy	38
1.10 Light Path Diagnostics	39
1.11 Remote Supervisor Adapter	41
1.12 Operating system support	42
1.13 IBM Director	44
Chapter 2. Positioning	49
2.1 xSeries 440 application solutions	50
2.1.1 Server consolidation	50
2.1.2 Enterprise applications	52
2.1.3 Infrastructure applications	54
2.1.4 Clustering	55
2.2 Why choose the x440	57
2.2.1 IBM XA-32 chipset	57
2.2.2 Intel Xeon MP and DP processors	58
2.2.3 XceL4 Server Accelerator Cache	60
2.2.4 High-performance memory subsystem	60
2.2.5 Active PCI-X	61
2.2.6 XpandOnDemand scalability	61
2.2.7 System Partition Manager	62
2.3 The benefits of system partitioning	63
2.4 Server consolidation	65
2.4.1 Types of server consolidation	65
2.4.2 Why consolidate servers	71
2.4.3 Benefits from server consolidation	71
Chapter 3. Planning	77
3.1 System hardware	78
3.1.1 Processors	78
3.1.2 Memory	79
3.1.3 PCI slot configuration	82
3.1.4 Broadcom Gigabit Ethernet controller	86
3.2 Cabling and connectivity	88
3.2.1 SMP Expansion Module connectivity	88
3.2.2 Remote Supervisor Adapter connectivity	91
3.2.3 Remote Expansion Enclosure	92
3.2.4 Serial connections	97
3.3 Storage considerations	97
3.3.1 xSeries storage solutions	98
3.3.2 Disk subsystem performance	102
3.3.3 Tape backup	103
3.4 Server partitioning and consolidation	104
3.5 Operating system considerations	104
3.5.1 Windows 2000 Datacenter Server	106
3.5.2 Microsoft Windows NT 4.0 Enterprise Edition	109
3.5.3 Microsoft Windows 2000 Server	110
3.5.4 Microsoft Windows .NET Server	111
3.5.5 Novell NetWare	111
3.5.6 Red Hat/SuSE Linux	111
3.5.7 VMware ESX Server	112
3.6 Application considerations	114
3.6.1 Scalability and performance considerations	114
3.6.2 SMP and server types	115
3.7 Rack installation	116
3.8 Power considerations	117
3.9 Solution Assurance Review	118
Chapter 4. Installation	121
4.1 System BIOS settings	122
4.1.1 Updating BIOS and firmware	122
4.1.2 Enabling memory mirroring	122
4.1.3 Enabling Hyper-Threading	123
4.2 Device drivers	125
4.3 Operating system installation	125
4.3.1 Microsoft Windows 2000 Server and Advanced Server	126
4.3.2 Red Hat Linux installation	133
4.3.3 NetWare installation	135
4.3.4 VMware ESX Server	142
4.4 Additional Information	142
Chapter 5. Management	143
5.1 Active PCI Manager	144
5.1.1 Using Active PCI Manager	146
5.1.2 Adding adapters to the system	150
5.1.3 Analyzing an existing configuration	158
5.2 System Partition Manager	164
5.3 Process Control	169
5.3.1 Process alias rules	170
5.3.2 Process execution rules	174
5.3.3 Group process execution rules	175
Abbreviations and acronyms	187
Related publications	189
IBM Redbooks	189
Referenced Web sites	189
How to get IBM Redbooks	192
IBM Redbooks collections	192
Index	193

IBM 8687 Installation Guide - Page 72

Giving users better services, Regaining flexibility, Avoid floor space constraints

Page 72 highlights