Blade vs Rack Servers

1
Blade vs Rack Servers

• Which is Better for Your Business

2
Agenda

• Define Better
• Technology Differences
• What Do I Include
• Financial analysis
• Documentation

3
Better Is.

• Define Business Need (Requirements)
• Lower Purchase Price?
• Lower TCO?
• Lower Power Consumption?
• Faster Failure Recovery?
• Better Isolation (DMZ)?
• Easier Manageability?
• Etc

4
Blade Server Front
5
Blade Server Back
6
Technology Differences

• Server Options
• Chassis
• Backplane
• Networking
• SAN
• Management
• Environmental Consideration

7
Where to Start If You are

• Looking to the future, have an interest but no
  budget.
• Have a problem to solve.
• Computer Room Space
• Current year expenses
• Have a budget and green light. Need a vendor
  bake-off

8
Product Evaluation Here

• Gather Requirements
• Design Solution
• Build Solution
• Test Solution
• Deploy Solution
• Support Solution

• General interest define what is needed
• Solve a problem via design
• A Vendor Bake-Off should include
• Financial TCO of each
• Functional Fit in Env
• Performance Has what I need

9
What Do I Include?

• As Much as is Practical
• Scope of Problem and Exclusions
• Schedule Budget
• Overall Timeline
• Deadlines for Phases and Tasks
• Sorted Validated Requirements, Notify
  Stakeholders of Disqualified Requirements
• Two Distribution Lists Status Notification,
  Working Members of Evaluation

10
What to Include Continued.

• Financial Analysis
• Process Review
• Responsibility Assignments
• Skills Assessment

11
Evaluation Documents

• Scope, Schedule, Budget Timeline are usually
  in a project definition document. Version
  Date-Stamp it (them).
• Capture requirements Type, Description,
  Submitter, Priority, and Satisfaction.
• Financial Analysis must compare current spend
  profile to new spending.

12
Evaluation Documents (cont.)

• Process Review has to look at impacts of new
  system on existing processes. Keep deployment
  training in sight.
• Responsibility Assignments Do you have the
  authority to change who performs certain tasks?
• Skills Assessment should be documented in
  accordance with HR policy / direction.

13
Examples Deferred

• ltProject Definitiongt
• Requirements Spreadsheet
• Financial Comparison
• User Guides
• Really, Really, Important to Business
  Stakeholders

14
During Transition

• Announce the transition
• Define the Rules Clearly What systems fall
  within and outside of the transition.
• Define the Exception Process Who grants the
  exceptions and when.
• Train, Hand-Hold, Repeat.
• Block time in your schedule to review, remediate,
  and decompress.

15
When Will This End

• The Good News Most organizations get comfortable
  with new technology within 12 months.
• The Bad News Unless you define, package, and
  carefully transition the support of specific
  subsystems to specific groups you will never be
  done.

16
Examples

• TCO Spreadsheet
• Requirements
• User Guides
• Technology Capabilities
• Virtual Connect Networks
• Virtual Connect MACs and WWNs