HP Power Capping and HP Dynamic Power Capping for
ProLiant servers
Technology brief, 2
nd
Edition
Introduction ......................................................................................................................................... 3
Basics of server power control ............................................................................................................... 3
Processor P-states ............................................................................................................................. 4
Clock throttling................................................................................................................................. 4
How power capping functions ............................................................................................................... 5
Maintaining power consumption below the cap ................................................................................... 5
Minimum and maximum power consumption for a server ...................................................................... 5
Differences between HP Dynamic Power Capping and HP Power Capping ................................................. 6
Power provisioning and Dynamic Power Capping ................................................................................ 6
Support for Power Capping in ProLiant servers .................................................................................... 7
Enclosure Dynamic Power Capping ....................................................................................................... 8
Elements of an enclosure power cap ................................................................................................... 8
Operation of Enclosure Dynamic Power Capping ................................................................................. 9
Active power reallocation ............................................................................................................... 10
Enclosure Dynamic Power Capping in mixed blade environments ........................................................ 10
Opting out servers .......................................................................................................................... 10
Setting power caps for servers ............................................................................................................. 10
Setting a power cap for a single server ............................................................................................. 11
Setting a power cap for a group of servers ....................................................................................... 13
Setting a BladeSystem enclosure power cap ...................................................................................... 13
Setting a power cap for a group of enclosures ................................................................................... 14
Using power capping in data center provisioning .................................................................................. 15
Choosing effective power caps ........................................................................................................ 15
Power capping to peak power consumption ...................................................................................... 17
Power capping to average power consumption ................................................................................. 19
Using Enclosure Dynamic Power Capping in power provisioning ............................................................. 19
Power capping for emergency management ...................................................................................... 20
Time-of-day power capping ............................................................................................................. 21
Subtleties of power capping ................................................................................................................ 22
Avoiding power capping conflicts within groups ................................................................................ 22
Powering up groups of servers when using Dynamic Power Capping ................................................... 22
Setting low or unattainable power caps on servers ............................................................................. 22
Peak power reporting and Dynamic Power Capping .......................................................................... 23
Using HP Power Regulator in conjunction with power capping ............................................................ 23
Power capping and CPU utilization .................................................................................................. 23
Power capping and option cards ..................................................................................................... 23
