Stefanie Hansel is the responsible product manager at HP for Rack & Power Solutions, covering HP Europe, Middle East & Africa.
In this Coffee Coaching session, she tells us how to optimize management of the data center by using HP KVM and HP iLO – integrated lights out.
Both products have long track records as solution for remote management of servers in the data center but are often seen as competitive. Today you will learn how each solution has its own specific strengths, and how together, they offer a comprehensive solution for local and remote management of not only servers but also other devices in the data center.
For many years HP has been developing industry leading products, services and solutions for the Data center. HP Data Center solutions have been used to modernize data center facilities, infrastructure and the hosting of applications. We help IT organizations to reduce cost and complexity of managing the Data Center while growing capacity for new applications and services.
iLO ships with most ProLiant Servers and simplifies initial server setup, server health monitoring, power and thermal optimization as well as remote administration.
iLO interacts with embedded configuration utilities that facilitate setup of the server hardware, BIOS settings, and network connectivity and can be used in conjunction with SmartStart to perform an assisted remote installation of the server operating system.
It also delivers embedded health information that enables administrators to identify problem hardware components even if the OS has gone offline and host agents are no longer available.
iLO also enables precise power measurement and control. With G6 and G7 servers, Dynamic Power Capping is enabled across all ProLiant servers containing the iLO2 and iLO3 management processor.
It also enables functionality such as power supply high-efficiency mode and power efficient fan control driven by more than 30 temperature sensors within the chassis.
Finally, iLO Remote Administration enables secure server control from anywhere. Customers can upgrade to iLO Advanced for the ultimate remote administration experience including integrated remote console, virtual media, video record and replay.
The net effect… your customers spend less time configuring their servers, they spend less time traveling to fix problems, and they make more efficient use of data staff and IT assets.
As HP is your one stop source for managing data center systems, we also offer a full range of KVM switches that provide full management functionality for other servers, storage, PDU and Networking equipment in the data center.
For remote locations or smaller server rooms, HP offers a simple and low-cost 4-port Server Console switch.
Customers are looking to get the most out of their data center assets. HP's second generation of KVM and KVM over IP switches can now manage almost any device in the data center, regardless of manufacturer, operating system or connection type, including those requiring a serial connection for management.
By offering centralized and convenient access and management on both - the local rack level and remote over IP- HP digital KVM switches offer customers the benefits of both analog KVM and digital KVM in one appliance.
For IP console switches we offer three different switch configurations to connect 8, 16 or 32 servers or devices, have 1 local user and up to 4 remote users simultaneously. All IP Console switches support the use of Virtual Media.
Next to the IP switches we also offer the analog console switches that can be used for local KVM connections and local access of the connected devices via a console device.
HP KVM switches uniquely offer the following benefits:
Why do you need both HP iLO and HP KVM capabilities?
The most important reason is, they work together to handle any data center management remote access requirement. In an environment that has only HP ProLiant servers, Integrated Light-Out (iLO) provides remote management while KVM switches can add local access and centralized management.
In a heterogeneous environment of iLO and non-iLO systems whether all from HP or multiple manufacturers, HP can offer iLO-like management functionality to all equipment in the data center such as systems with a serial management port including network switches, storage, firewalls, and PDU's.
The iLO system has priority when both are in operation, so there are no contention issues. But, local console access is achievable if the remote iLO sessions are terminated.
Also, some data centers do not have the luxury of a large number of IP addresses. Even if all the servers are equipped with iLO capabilities, there may not be enough IP addresses to assign to each and every server. If this is the case, one IP KVM can consolidate the management of 8 or 16 iLO equipped servers via a single IP address.
Finally, we need to consider that not all devices in the data center are manufactured by HP or even if they are, do not have an iLO management processor. Data center assets are acquired over time and they are not always homogeneous. In the real world, multi-vendor representation is the norm. A solution for all customer applications includes both the IP Console Switch and iLO. Today's data center requires both local and remote server management access.
For more information about HP KVM Console Switches on these links:
www.hp.com/go/kvm
www.hp.com/go/hpqo
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