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CIOs AND IT ADMINISTRATORS FACE A TOUGH DILEMMA—they want to play a more
direct role in shaping and facilitating their companies’
business strategies and are under increasing pressure
from the corner office to do just that. Standing in their
way are the many time-consuming demands associ-
ated with keeping their data centers up and running,
which prevent those data centers from operating as
efficiently and as cost-effectively as possible. It is
becoming more and more difficult to maintain service
levels while also fostering the agility necessary to
respond to business needs in a timely manner.
Given the time, IT leaders say they could add signifi-
cant value to their companies by helping to redesign
inefficient business processes, better aligning IT
initiatives to business goals, and engaging in a variety
of other business-enhancing activities, according to a
recent survey. The same survey, however, documents
that CIOs and IT administrators spend far too much
time manually performing tactical IT tasks and putting
out fires, and far too little time pursuing strategic
endeavors.
Shifting the balance of IT professional time from the
tactical to the strategic has become much more
attainable with the introduction of Hewlett-Packard
ProLiant Gen8 servers. The HP ProLiant Gen8 portfolio
delivers a collection of technologies and capabilities
that, combined, can automate and speed many of the
most time-intensive IT tasks and can eliminate some
of the costly problems and downtime that result from
human error. By offloading some of their daily tasks
to the cutting-edge ProLiant servers, administrators
can spend more of their time ensuring that IT delivers
greater business value to their companies.
Strategic IT: The Dream vs. The Reality
The simplification and automation needs of IT opera-
tions are as well documented as they have been diffi-
cult to solve. That said, IT shops have made progress of
late in moving beyond their former status as little more
than corporate cost centers. According to a recent
survey of IT managers and professionals conducted by
IDG Research Services, seven out of 10 respondents
say they already leverage their data centers as either
Automating a path to strategic IT
HP ProLiant Gen8 Servers: Shifting IT’s Focus from the Tactical to the Strategic
However, as Figure 3 shows, the majority of time is
spent performing tactical jobs such as routine main-
tenance and troubleshooting rather than strategic
activities. As a result, most IT organizations are seeing
a widening gap between what the business demands
and what IT has the time and resources to deliver.
The “black hole” time aspect of tactical IT jobs is why a
large majority of IT administrators place a high level of
importance on investing in automated and intelligent
solutions. As illustrated in Figure 4, nearly 60 percent
of survey respondents expect to invest in such solu-
tions within the next three years. If these smart and
automated solutions live up to their names, IT adminis-
trators will gain the time and the personnel needed to
play more strategic roles in their companies.
INTELLIGENCE AND AUTOMATION FOR TIME-INTENSIVE IT TASKSAs clearly illustrated by the IDG Research Services
survey results, IT professionals recognize that necessary
day-to-day server maintenance functions consume far
too much of their time and budgets. Hewlett-Packard
recognized this problem as well, and several years ago
decided to focus much of its new server development
on innovations that would help free IT professionals
from the time sink of routine yet important tasks. The
new ProLiant Gen8 rack and blade servers, which are
based on HP ProActive Insight architecture, incorporate
a broad collection of such innovations.
a strategic or transformational asset. At the same
time, as illustrated in Figure 1, far too many IT tasks are
manual and far too few are automated.
2 WHITE PAPER /// Automating a path to strategic IT
Redesigning business processes
Aligning IT initiatives to business goals
Analyzing data to identify trends and opportunities
Identifying opportunities for competitive differentiation
Leading change efforts
Cultivating relationships between IT and LOB
42%
40%
36%
30%
29%
28%
FIGURE 2 IT ACTIVITIES OFFERING THE GREATEST STRATEGIC BENEFIT
Source: IDG Research Services
Software installation and updating
System setup and configuration
Managing errors and system events
Initiating a service/ support tickets
Security management
Resolving noncritical issues
50%
45%
44%
35%
30%
30%
FIGURE 3 IT ACTIVITIES OCCUPYING THE MOST TIME CURRENTLY
Source: IDG Research Services
Data Center Administration Processes:
Updating firmware
System troubleshooting
Application tuning and acceleration
System provisioning
Security provisioning
Updating software
System monitoring
Data management/protection
Entirely/ Mostly Manual
52%
50%
43%
40%
30%
26%
21%
21%
FIGURE 1 LEVEL OF AUTOMATION CURRENTLY IN THE DATA CENTER
Source: IDG Research Services
As shown in Figure 2, survey respondents also identi-
fied a number of activities that can yield significant
benefits to their organizations, with “Redesigning
business processes” at the top of the value-add list. A
close second on the strategic activities list is “Aligning
IT initiatives to business goals.”
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Each of the new servers, for example, includes HP
Intelligent Provisioning, which embeds all of the
necessary software, drivers and tools needed for
provisioning right in the box. This approach eliminates
the need to laboriously configure servers using multiple
CDs/DVDs and additional software. Throughout the
provisioning process, HP Intelligent Provisioning checks
the configuration for errors and identifies them so
administrators can make any needed corrections
before deployment. Thanks to this “plug and manage”
embedded provisioning capability, users are able to
deploy ProLiant Gen8 servers three times faster than
their ProLiant G7 predecessors.1
To reduce the burden associated with updating
firmware, drivers and software, HP pre-tests all such
components for interdependencies and packages
them in Service Packs for the ProLiant servers. Then
the HP Smart Update Manager tool can automatically
and simultaneously sequence, schedule and stage
updates across hundreds of servers in many different
configurations.
The Smart Update facility can triple administrator
productivity during updates since it requires less
manual interaction during the update process. Further-
more, due to the online update capability, HP internal
assessments of Smart Update Manager indicate that
the tool will reduce downtime by 93 percent during
online updates.2
When problems do occur, IT administrators often
spend considerable time running diagnostics and
reconstructing recent configuration changes before
they can even begin to identify the source of the
problem. In part to speed this initial post-problem
process, all ProLiant Gen8 servers incorporate an
embedded Active Health System. This agentless
monitoring system continuously tracks, logs, and time
stamps more than 1,600 system parameters as well as
all configuration changes. With this data immediately
available, should a problem occur, service personnel
are able to start root-cause analysis five times faster
than in previous-generation servers.3
Beyond helping IT managers automate and speed
provisioning, updating and problem diagnosis, the
HP ProLiant Gen8 servers provide improvements in
performance, efficiency, and reliability. Each ProLiant
now includes an HP Smart Array storage controller
that incorporates intelligent algorithms and analytics
to deliver six times4 faster solid-state performance,
along with the ability to efficiently manage and protect
massive amounts of data. Arrays of built-in tempera-
ture sensors help to precisely control airflow and fans.
In addition, the servers use HP SmartMemory that only
draw 1.35 volts per DIMM. Together, these energy-
efficiency features allow the new systems to deliver as
much as 70 percent more compute capability per watt
than previous generation servers.5
And, inserting new processors just got easier. With
Gen8, HP has created a Smart Socket Guide that safely
and easily removes and inserts processors without
damaging pins or damaging the motherboard. HP
estimates that this technology alone will eliminate
80 percent of failures caused by improper installation
of processors.6
Nearly 60 percent of survey respondents expect
to invest in smart and automated solutions within
the next three years. If these solutions live up to
their names, IT administrators will gain the time
and the personnel needed to play more strategic
roles in their companies.
FIGURE 4 LIKELIHOOD ASSIGNED TO AUTOMATED AND INTELLIGENT SYSTEM INVESTMENTS
20%Very Likely
39%Likely
1% Very unlikely
28%Not sure
12%Unlikely
Source: IDG Research Services
HP PROLIANT GEN8 LEVERAGES ADVANCED HP TECHNOLOGIES AND SERVICEThe ProLiant Gen8 servers introduce more than 150
innovative features that didn’t exist in previous genera-
tion servers. Beyond the technology embedded in the
servers themselves, however, HP also provides a range
of supporting technologies and services that leverage
and supplement the ProLiant Gen8 capabilities.
In the past, for example, when server problems
occurred, IT managers and their services partners
usually had to start from scratch to identify the cause
of the problem. Now, critical device information is
automatically gathered by the Active Health System
for the HP call centers. By using the newest version of
HP Insight Remote Support, HP server customers gain
24x7 phone-home diagnostics, troubleshooting, and
service dispatch capabilities along with the automatic
creation of support cases without human interven-
tion. The enhanced intelligence of this HP tool can
accelerate the time required to resolve problems by as
much as 66 percent.7
In addition, all system health, asset and support
information can be aggregated into a secure personal-
ized online dashboard called HP Insight Online. Based
on HP internal estimates, customers using HP Insight
Online can save as much as 90 percent of the time
spent tracking the status of contracts and warranties
and realize up to an 85 percent time savings in tracking
asset configurations.
To deliver higher-level management functionality,
HP has continued to enhance the popular HP Insight
Control management software. HP Insight Control
functionality spans system health, performance
monitoring, remote control, automated deployment
and migration, power management, and virtualiza-
tion management. An added benefit is that this HP
management software seamlessly integrates with the
HP IT Performance Suite, Microsoft System Center,
and VMware vCenter Server, giving users the option to
work with their preferred management console.
HP PROLIANT GEN8 SERVERS GIVE IT THE GIFT OF TIMEThe HP ProLiant Gen8 rack and blade servers—in
combination with the many supporting technologies
and services that HP offers—deliver a profusion of
automation, efficiency, and intelligence capabilities.
By leveraging these capabilities, CIOs and IT adminis-
trators can free themselves from many of the labor-
intensive tasks that currently consume much of their
time and that of their IT employees. With the aid of the
HP ProLiant servers, storage and services, IT managers
and experts can instead devote more of their time
delivering high-value IT strategies and solutions that
make their entire company more efficient, competitive,
and successful. n
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HP ProLiant Gen8 servers
1 ProLiant Gen8 is over three times faster than G7 SmartStart “attended server provisioning”
2 Based on internal testing with a fully online firmware and system software update with HP SUM 5.0 vs. HP SUM 4.2.
3 Based on internal testing to run and send the RPS report vs. Active Health
4 Six-fold improved storage performance: testing of the new Smart Array controllers compared to the current generation Smart Array controllers in a RAID 6 configuration; Internal HP Lab testing
5 Based on HP internal testing with a 50 percent increase in server performance (OLTP applications), a 10 percent reduction in per-server energy consumption plus 7 percent cooling reduction from Intelligent Series rack. Assume a conservative PUE of 2.0 translates 7 percent cooling to 3.5 percent reduced cooling power. 10 percent (< per server) + 3.5 percent (< from “Intelligent Series” rack) = 13.5 percent. 150 percent (performance) x 113.5 percent (servers/P&C envelope) = 1.5 x 1.135 = 1.70
6 Based on field failure data, bent CPU socket pins account for 20 to 25 percent of system board failures. HP Engineering expects the Smart Socket Guide to solve 80 percent of these system board failures.
7 66 percent faster problem resolution time for HP Insight Remote Support-initiated cases (HW) vs. traditional phone support Source: HP internal call center data, Q4 2011