Comments on blog.aarondelp.com: Cisco UCS vs IBM and HP - Where are the Brains?

I agree with the extended memory comment. Actuall...

2010-05-21T13:44:48.207-04:00

I agree with the extended memory comment. Actually using the extended memory for VDI has come up a lot lately. Users are more comfortable with a memory dense blade fro VDI that servers in my experience right now.

How about UCS feature like expendable memory. Seem...

2010-05-20T08:23:20.217-04:00

How about UCS feature like expendable memory. Seems like one of the use cases for UCS is VDI. Thank you.

Jeff - Great information! Thank you for the comme...

2010-03-14T12:09:30.839-04:00

Jeff - Great information! Thank you for the comment!

Full Disclosure: I worked at HP for 8 years as an ...

2010-03-14T10:31:45.990-04:00

Full Disclosure: I worked at HP for 8 years as an Infrastructure Architect specializing in Bladesystem and Virtual Connect and I now work at Cisco as a UCS Architect.

Casper 42 said: "The OAs do NOT have to have 2 separate IP Addresses. With a decent firmware level (its been available for at least a year)"

When I last saw this feature, the 2 modules do have

Casper - Great comments! Thank you for your insig...

2010-02-27T11:05:25.172-05:00

Casper - Great comments! Thank you for your insight!!

PS: Virtual Connect domains, the aggregate for the...

2010-02-26T20:41:24.087-05:00

PS: Virtual Connect domains, the aggregate for the I/O Layer you mentioned, ARE in fact limited to 4 chassis though. So while you can single pane of glass 8 chassis for server/chassis details, you would need 2 separate VC Domains to manage those 8 chassis when it comes to network and SAN.

On the flip side, if you loaded up those same Chassis with Cisco 3120X switches for the network

2 quick notes on the HP c7000. 1) The OAs do NOT ...

2010-02-26T20:32:11.136-05:00

2 quick notes on the HP c7000.

1) The OAs do NOT have to have 2 separate IP Addresses. With a decent firmware level (its been available for at least a year) you can set the OA to "Enclosure IP mode" and it will take the IP on the Active OA and automatically fail that IP over to the passive OA when there is a change in role.
Look under Enclosure Settings \ TCPIP Settings

The one thing that has not been discussed is the s...

2010-02-01T02:44:44.998-05:00

The one thing that has not been discussed is the standards-based, open XML API that comes with UCS. I've been writing applications that interact with it, and it's a very straightforward process to manage and configure multiple UCS pods using just about any programming language. Yes, it's build your own, but it's free, and you can do whatever you want.

Hey Kevin - Yes, I am making the "Network bra...

2010-01-28T13:35:06.275-05:00

Hey Kevin - Yes, I am making the "Network brains" different from the "management brains". What I mean by management brains is the power state, remote control, and virtual I/O (presenting a virtual MAC and WWPN) to the outside world.

I did an article on the 4001i (terrible name BTW) a ways back and I linked to your articles.

"Sometime" in the

While you discussed IBM's offering using Open ...

2010-01-28T12:46:39.940-05:00

While you discussed IBM's offering using Open Fabric Manager, you didn't discuss IBM's ability to connect to a Cisco Nexus 5000. I posted a few months ago (http://bladesmadesimple.com/2009/10/how-ibms-bladecenter-works-with-cisco-nexus-5000/) how a user could have a "pass-thru" module to connect into the Nexus 5000, where the Nexus would be the brains - at least for the I/O

Kelvin - Thanks for your comments. You are obviou...

2010-01-27T17:33:05.621-05:00

Kelvin - Thanks for your comments. You are obviously an HP fan, I get that. I'm not looking to change anybody's viewpoint and I'm not looking to take sides here, just presenting facts.

I will ask you this about the advanced Insight products. Are you or do have any customers that are actually running them in production are happy?

The reason I ask is because I

Aaron, your post is getting very interesting! UCS...

2010-01-27T11:14:20.211-05:00

Aaron, your post is getting very interesting!

UCS + BMC solution architecture and "brains" look very much like IBM's and HP's. What's difference - BMC is not Cisco's, someone else's Bigger Brain is controlling UCS brains; while Director and SIM are both IBM and HP products respectively. That should have some impact on deep integration.

I fail to

Brad - Awesome comments! Thank you very much! I ...

2010-01-27T09:58:14.476-05:00

Brad - Awesome comments! Thank you very much! I agree completely but I wanted to keep the scope of this post for the brains to just be the management of the blade state and the virtual I/O. I will get into the "other brains" with FC and network in future posts.

I didn't know that about the HP software. I will update that as well shortly.

Thank you!

Aaron, You should also depict the Network switch t...

2010-01-26T23:43:57.101-05:00

Aaron,
You should also depict the Network switch the blade chassis connect to, as well as FC switch.
For IBM & HP you need to depict a separate brain for these elements.
For Cisco UCS, the same brain that controls the server configuration is the same brain that controls the Network & FC SAN, which is extremely powerful for automating total service provisioning.

UCS supports 5 chassis per pair of 6120's toda...

2010-01-26T12:51:00.590-05:00

UCS supports 5 chassis per pair of 6120's today. I hear this will be increased in the near future to a greater number and eventually a limit of 40 is the Cisco goal.

I don't know the answer of what happens once that limit is reached but I will reach out to Cisco folks right now to find out. Very good question!

Good stuff. You can see more re BMC and Cisco UCS...

2010-01-26T12:32:45.931-05:00

Good stuff. You can see more re BMC and Cisco UCS here http://tinyurl.com/ye9pr2j

Nice summary. What happens when UCS needs another...

2010-01-26T12:19:57.473-05:00

Nice summary.

What happens when UCS needs another pair of 6120/6140, because of bandwidth ? (with 20ports in 6120, how many UCS 5108 can it support in real world?)

does UCS have a "central management server" for multiple pairs of 6120/6140? can service profiles fail over from blades controlled by different pairs of 6120/6140?

The post in now up to date with information based ...

2010-01-26T10:38:27.455-05:00

The post in now up to date with information based on user comments including new diagrams to better reflect the IBM and HP solutions. Thank you very much to everyone for filling in the gaps!!!

Thank you everyone for the comments. Working on a...

2010-01-26T09:14:55.620-05:00

Thank you everyone for the comments. Working on an update to the HP information right now.

Hp allows up to four C level chassis's to be i...

2010-01-26T09:11:54.029-05:00

Hp allows up to four C level chassis's to be interconnected and viewed through Insight Manager in a single pane. At some point in the future they may allow more. VSE may allow more, but we currently don't use/own it so Kevin would probably know more on it.

With HP Virtual Connect Enterprise Manager you hav...

2010-01-26T04:10:04.028-05:00

With HP Virtual Connect Enterprise Manager you have a central Virtual Connect (V) management solution, up to 250 VC domains, up 1000 C7000 blade enclsoures and up to 160000 blade servcers. :)

Kind regards
Tschokko

A couple thoughts... First, HP can link chassis ...

2010-01-25T23:58:34.537-05:00

A couple thoughts...

First, HP can link chassis in a single rack, which extends the managment of a single chassis (OA) to cover all the chassis in a rack, from a single view.

Likewise, a virtual connect domain can include 4 chassis, and manages as a single unit inclusive of all the servers.

The OA provides a portal link into the VC Domain, but it it a

Hey Aaron, as usual a really great summary and I l...

2010-01-25T23:20:24.060-05:00

Hey Aaron, as usual a really great summary and I look forward to your more in depth analysis. At my company, MSI, we also sell all three product lines (HP, IBM, and Cisco UCS) and recently got a couple of UCS chassis which I plan to dig into in the months ahead. Also I recently went through HP's Matrix trainng, which is basically their response to Cisco's UCS. It is a single SKU

@Ken - Excellent article! Thank you for sharing t...

2010-01-25T21:33:58.285-05:00

@Ken - Excellent article! Thank you for sharing the information!

@Kevin - Thank you for the information! So, are you saying that I could/should put in a picture of a Insight Dynamics Server to manage the blades like I did for the Director server? I would be happy to do that if that is the correct architecture. Please confirm when you can.

I'm sorry but I can't

Aaron - good post. HP does have software that man...

2010-01-25T19:15:28.101-05:00

Aaron - good post. HP does have software that manages the physical, virtual and virtual connect infrastructure. It is called "Insight Dynamics – VSE Suite". Basically it's a suite of products that includes a capacity advisor, ypervisor integration, Insight Control suite, Server Migration software and integration with Virtual Connect Manager and Insight Orchestration. While it