Martin Fink, HP: Odyssey Redefines Mission Critical Computing

November 23, 2011

HP's project Odyssey aims to redefine the future of mission-critical computing with a development roadmap that will unify UNIX and x86 server architectures to bring industry-leading availability, increased performance and uncompromising client choice to a single platform.

Organizations are challenged with increasingly stringent service-level agreements for their most demanding workloads, along with the pressure to be more efficient with their IT budgets and resources. They need the availability and resilience of UNIX-based platforms along with the familiarity and cost-efficiency of industry-standard platforms.

Using advanced technology across a common, modular HP BladeSystem architecture, HP is developing platforms to enable clients to choose the best environment aligned to their organizations’ needs without compromise, helping ensure investment protection for the long term.

HP’s new development roadmap includes ongoing innovations to HP Integrity servers, HP NonStop systems and the HP-UX and OpenVMS operating systems. The roadmap also includes delivering blades with Intel Xeon processors for the HP Superdome 2 enclosure (code name “DragonHawk”) and the scalable c-Class blade enclosures (code named “HydraLynx”), while fortifying Windows and Linux environments with innovations from HP-UX within the next two years.

With the availability of “DragonHawk,” clients will be able to run mission-critical workloads on HP-UX on Intel Itanium-based blades while simultaneously running workloads on Microsoft Windows or Red Hat Enterprise Linux on Intel Xeon-based blades in the same Superdome 2 enclosure.

“Clients have been asking us to expand the mission-critical experience that is delivered today with HP-UX on Integrity to an x86-based infrastructure,” said Martin Fink, senior vice president and general manager, Business Critical Systems, HP. “HP plans to transform the server landscape for mission-critical computing by using the flexibility of HP BladeSystem and bringing key HP technology innovations from Integrity and HP-UX to the x86 ecosystem. Unlike the competition, HP offers an open, integrated, single platform approach.”

For more than 25 years, HP has powered the most demanding workloads by building a robust and proven franchise of technology and service innovations for mission-critical computing.

By expanding mission-critical HP Converged Infrastructure and bringing select proven innovations to x86 systems, HP will enable clients running Linux or Windows to:

• Increase scalability with 32-socket “DragonHawk” symmetrical multiprocessing x86 systems that will scale to hundreds of cores and support large, complex workloads. The systems will enable clients to deploy the smallest to the largest workloads in a dynamic, highly scalable pool of IT resources.
• Increase reliability and flexibility with two-, four- and eight-socket “HydraLynx” scalable x86 server blades with mission-critical virtualization and availability, all packaged in the robust c-Class enclosures of HP BladeSystem.
• Increase availability of critical Linux applications with the HP Serviceguard solution, which automatically moves application workloads between servers in the event of a failure or an on-demand request.
• Boost flexibility and availability of x86 systems with HP nPartitions technology (nPars), which provides precise partitioning of system resources across multiple or variable workloads. HP nPars is electrically isolated to eliminate failure points, which allows clients to “scale out” within a single, robust system.
• Enhance business continuity with HP Analysis Engine for x86 embedded into the system firmware. HP Analysis Engine goes beyond error logging to ensure efficient diagnoses and automatic repair of complex system errors while restoring system stability in seconds.
• Boost reliability and resiliency of x86 systems with fault-tolerant HP Crossbar Fabric that intelligently routes data within the system for redundancy and high availability.
• Achieve higher levels of availability with HP Mission Critical Services, which identify and resolve possible sources of downtime.

What partners are saying about Project Odyssey

“Intel’s continued innovation with a multigeneration Itanium processor roadmap, combined with existing and future mission-critical capabilities of Intel Xeon processors, allow HP and Intel to provide customers with greater flexibility and choice,” said Kirk Skaugen, vice president and general manager, Datacenter and Connected Systems Group, Intel. ”Together with HP we will be able to give customers the ability to do mission-critical computing on their terms, with a broad range of operating systems and applications.”

“Amdocs’ experience in implementing HP-UX/Integrity as a mission-critical platform for our market-leading BSS/OSS solutions at top global service providers has proven extremely positive,” said Rebecca Prudhomme, vice president, Product and Solutions Marketing, Amdocs. “Extending HP Converged Infrastructure features to Linux on x86 will allow customers using the Superdome 2 architecture to benefit from the cost-effectiveness of x86, while leveraging the platform’s strength, scalability and availability.”

“Customers trust Microsoft and HP with their enterprise computing needs,” said Eduardo Rosini, corporate vice president, SQL Server Marketing, Microsoft. “By furthering our partnership, Microsoft and HP will bring together the world’s leading server and software solutions to let customers harness the flexibility and scalability of Microsoft Windows Server and SQL Server on HP Converged Infrastructure for their broad mission-critical computing needs of tomorrow.”

“Red Hat and HP have worked together for more than a decade to continuously support innovation in server and Linux technologies,” said Paul Cormier, executive vice president, and president of Products and Technologies, Red Hat. “Further extending the mission-critical experience to x86 environments will enable clients to leverage the application performance, scalability and security provided by Red Hat Enterprise Linux on HP for their most demanding workloads.”