ConvergedSystem

Back in December at HP Discover EMEA, I had a chance to speak with several folks who walked me through the HP ConvergedSystem 200-HC StoreVirtual solution and specifically how this solution streamlines deployment times and processes for a self-contained VMware environment.

The HP ConvergedSystem 200-HC StoreVirtual consists of 4 identical nodes that resemble a blade, but without a full enclosure around the blade itself. The photo below shows one of the nodes outside of the chassis of the 200-HC StoreVirtual chassis. The 200-HC, both EVO:RAIL and StoreVirtual, are built on the HP ProLiant SL2500 model scalable computing hardware.

The software layer of the ConvergedSystem 200-HC StoreVirtual is the HP flavor of VMware ESXi preinstalled for each node. The HP installation of ESXi includes some agents within the OS for monitoring hardware and providing that information into ESXi and vCenter. Each node is physically connected to 6 dedicated drives on the front of the chassis. For the all SAS model, all 6 are a single RAID set for the node and in the hybrid storage model, it features 2 x 400GB SSD drives and 4 x 1.2 TB SAS drives in two RAID sets.

When the system boots for the first time, the ESXi hosts start up along with a management VM located on node 1. An additional management port on node 1 provides access directly to the management VM to connect and configure the ConvergeSystem 200-HC for the first time. This node will present the user with the OneView InstantOn wizard that will allow the user to deploy the full ConvergeSystem 200-HC software stack in as little as 15 minutes. The wizard walks you through the initial setup of the 4 ESXi nodes, with IP addresses and other basic settings. InstantOn then deploys StoreVirtual VSA across the nodes, configures the storage in ESXi and connects it to the StoreVirtual VMs. Last but not least, the management VM moves into the new StoreVirtual VSA software defined storage and the system is ready to run.

The hardware configurations in the ConvergedSystem 200-HC StoreVirtual are defined and not customizable. With the exception of the choice between all-SAS or SAS and SSD combined hybrid storage, there are no other configurable options for a 200-HC configuration. This lends its self nicely to a very smooth and repeatable deployment.

Like other HP ConvergedSystems, the defined and fully tested hardware and software configurations (aka recipe) ensures a well behaving and optimized operating environment for the workload. This is essentially the same hardware configuration as the EVO:Rail systems defined by VMware and manufactured by many vendors, including HP, but this HP solution is unique in its use of StoreVirtual instead of VMware’s VSAN. The HP folks I talked with think this is an advantage for several reasons, including a more mature storage software base in StoreVirtual compared to VSAN, the ability to replicate data between an HP ConvergedSystem 200-HC StoreVirtual and any other StoreVirtual based solution (both VSA and hardware solutions), and because of the StoreVirtual VSA price. The list storage license cost of StoreVirtual VSA is around $3,000 per node, which is about one third of the cost of a VMware’s VSAN license, while all of the components are apples for apples.

convergedsystem

I recently had the opportunity to sit in on a call announcing a new product offering from HP ConvergedSystems. The call left me with many more questions. The new ConvergedSystem offering is built for Microsoft Analytics software and is highly tailored to doing big data analysis.

As a systems administrator, many times it is up to my group to implement and integrate our storage, networking and servers to provide infrastructure for our systems analysts to deploy their software solutions. This strategy normally works well and we use the same infrastructure for a wide range of solutions. We also reuse components several times during their life cycle. So, this is the point that I don’t fully understand HP’s strategy with the ConvergedSystems.

From what I do understand, ConvergedSystems are prepackaged solutions to help customers speed up procurement, implementation and support of a solution by bringing the customer a known configuration of storage, network, compute and software. The sales pitch is simplified management and deployment of the software solution. And on the back-end, it is intended to have better support because all the components are known and tested together and the support team is versed in all the components to support it as a single solution.

At a high level, this certainly makes sense. It’s a logical approach.

Where I have questions is the fact that it seems that most of the ConvergedSystem solutions are major infrastructure investments based around a particular software solution or use case. So, what happens in an environment if the software solution launches and then flops? Are they easily repurposed or are they so tailored to a particular solution that it’s a lost investment?

What happens with the hardware hits the end of its useful life for running Exchange? Or Microsoft SQL? Or another software package? With our existing BladeSystem and storage, we simply order refreshed hardware – something more powerful with increased RAM and CPU specs – transition the running software to the new hardware and then pass down the previous generation to be re-purposed into a new use. During the life of a blade server or a rack-mount server, it may run 5 or 6 different solutions. I don’t know if the same can be done with ConvergedSystems.

That also brings into question upgrades of the package solution – how do those work? If its third-party software, does HP deliver a streamlined upgrade that’s been tested with the hardware and management? What if it requires more CPU or RAM – can those components be easily traded or upgraded moving forward? Since the ConvergedSystems are so new, I’m not sure that they’ve been through refresh cycles yet to know.

I am obviously still learning, but I’ve spent a good bit of time around the HP portfolio – the AppSystems, VirtualSystems and CloudSystems – and I am still unclear where these fit in businesses. And given the exposure I’ve had through blogger briefings, I’m sure I’m not along with my questions. I’ll be attending HP Discover next month and this is one of the topics that I hope to get some clarification on from the HP folks.

How the HP ConvergedSystem 200-HC StoreVirtual improves deployment times

Questioning HP ConvergedSystems and their Intended Purposes