IBM Power 770, Technical Overview And Introduction

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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview
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servers that use IBM POWER5, POWER6, POWER7, or later, processors. The HMC
provides basic virtualization management through support for configuring logical partitions
(LPARs) and dynamic resource allocation, including processor and memory settings for
selected Power Systems servers. The HMC also supports advanced service functions,
including guided repair and verify, concurrent firmware updates for managed systems, and
around-the-clock error reporting through IBM Electronic Service Agent™ for faster support.
The HMC management features help to improve server utilization, simplify systems
management, and accelerate provisioning of server resources using the PowerVM
virtualization technology and capacity on demand (CoD) features for temporary and
permanent resource activation. An HMC is required for temporary CoD. Although an HMC is
also suggested for permanent CoD, the Advanced System Management Interface (ASMI)
interface can also be used.
Multiple partitions and servers can be supported by a single HMC, which can be physically
attached to a server or logically attached over a LAN. A second HMC for redundancy is
suggested for customers who have significant high availability requirements.
The HMC user interface is designed to reduce the time and effort of resource management by
providing task navigation with more consistent task placement and categorization, and also
the display of additional information in the main resource views. The HMC user interface also
provides powerful table functionality with filtering, sorting, and customization of views on a
per-user basis. Most HMC management features are also accessible from the IBM Systems
Director software. IBM Systems Director provides end-to-end management support for all
HMC-managed servers and also servers that are not attached to HMCs.
Customers should upgrade the support level of the HMC to be consistent with the support
that is provided on the servers to which it is attached. Support for customer replaceable unit is
standard with the HMC. The customer has the option to upgrade this support level to IBM
on-site support to be consistent with other Power Systems servers.
HMCs offer a high-availability feature. The 7042-CR7, by default, includes two hard drives
with RAID 1 configured. If you prefer not to have RAID 1 enabled on the HMC, you can
override it in the ordering system and remove the additional HDD from the order.
RAID 1 is also offered on both the 7042-CR6 and the 7042-CR7 as an MES upgrade option.
RAID 1 uses data mirroring. Two physical drives are combined into an array, and data is
striped across the array. The first half of a stripe is the original data; the second half is a mirror
(that is, a copy) of the data, but it is written to the other drive in the RAID 1 array.
RAID 1, which requires two physical drives, enables data redundancy.
Table 2-28 has a comparison between the 7042-CR6 and the 7042-CR7 HMC modes.
Table 2-28 Comparison for 7042-CR6 and 7042-CR7
Feature CR6 CR7
IBM System x Model x3550 M3 x3550 M4
HMC Model 7042-CR6 7042-CR7
Processor Westmere-EP Intel Xeon E5
Memory 4 GB 4 GB
DASD 500 GB 500 GB
RAID 1 Optional Default