HPE Synergy Pro Part II - Chassis and Servers

Continuation, the beginning was here . I would also like to draw attention to the HPE Synergy Planning Tool .

In continuation of the announced series of articles about HPE Synergy, we start with a description of the chassis, or, as the manufacturer writes, “The HPE Synergy 12000 Frame is a key element of HPE Synergy”.

General view of the HPE Synergy 12000 Frame chassis


It can be seen that the D3940 disk module can be installed in bays 1 and 2 (zone 1), or, for example, 3 and 4 (zone 2), and in bays 2 and 3 it is impossible, because different zones. Horizontal partitions, apparently, can be dismantled for the installation of full-sized blade servers, but how (independently or not) is not clear, I also plan to ask the manufacturer this question on occasion. Rack mount handles look interesting.

At the moment, there are no normal photos of the chassis, and the quality of the information materials is not very good, so I had to read a little - draw the chassis using Visio Stensils taken on the VisioCafe website .

HPE Synergy 12000 Frame Chassis, front view:



On the front panel you can see - at the top in the compartment of Appliance Bay 1 Composer is installed (the Russian documentation calls it Composer, the literal translation is called Composer (author-compiler), but IMHO it is better to leave Composer) and, apparently, in this compartment for the main (or first ) the chassis is always installed only by him. Image Streamer is installed in Appliance Bay 2 (and its Russian documentation is called the Image Distributor. I immediately recall Andrey Rublev and the harsh faces of Orthodox saints. The correct translation is the streaming downloader of operating systems). Instead of Image Streamer, a second Composer can be installed for a single chassis case. If the chassis is more than one (two or more), HPE recommends installing Composers on different chassis. I plan a separate review about these devices.

Further, the compartments for installing the blade servers are divided into zones with two compartments in the zone. Yellow numbers indicate the location of the zones, red numbers indicate the compartments. In bays 1 and 2, that is, entirely in zone No. 1, the HPE Synergy D3940 disk module for 40 disks is installed, then various types of servers:

• in compartment 7 - a dual-disk and dual-processor Synergy (hereinafter - SY) 480 Gen9;
• in compartment 8 - diskless (sic!) and dual-processor SY 480 Gen9 are installed;
• in compartments 3 and 9 - four-disk and four-processor SY 660 Gen9;
• in compartments 4 and 10 - double-disc and dual-processor SY 620 Gen9 - in the center you can see the plug of the stacking connector;
• in compartments 5-6-11-12 - eight-disc and four-processor SY 680 Gen9, in fact these are two pieces of SY 660 Gen9.

On the right is the Synergy Console, a console for connecting a PC / laptop and controlling the chassis. There are 3 ports on the console - DisplayPort v1.2, USB 2.0 and RJ-45. At the back, the console connects to the Frame Link Module (hereinafter - FLM), which I will analyze separately with Composer and Image Streamer. Apparently, the console is installed in the presence of one chassis, when the chassis is more than one - FLM is installed in the compartments at the back, which can also be connected to control the chassis, and FLMs of different chassis stack together. The documentation says that the connections are identical in functionality, although they suggest connecting to FLM using "simplet VNC services (free VNC software may be downloaded from the internet)" at the address "192.168.10.1:5900".



While writing, I found a table with options for numbering compartments for various options for the location of equipment:


At the back, everything is fairly standard - 6 compartments for switches (we will consider them separately), 10 fans, the chassis comes with all ten by default, and the documentation says that this number cannot be different, 6 power supplies - here you can order any number, but the manufacturer strongly recommends using the HPE PowerAdvisor program to calculate the planned power consumption. As far as I can tell, the “HPE Synergy Planning Tool”, the link to which I gave above, also contains this functionality.



To the left of power supply unit No. 1 is also information on a label that is pulled onto itself. Thus, the minimum chassis configuration:

• chassis constructive;
• ten fans;
• two power supplies;
• one interconnect module;
• one flm;
• one composer.

Let's move on to the servers. First, general information. Each server has a separate information label that contains:

• product serial number
• iLO information
• QR code that points to mobile-friendly documentation - that smiled.

The simplest blade server is the HPE Synergy 480 Gen9. It exists in two versions: with a basket on two SFF disks or without a basket at all. The difference in value is about 100 USD according to the price list. It should be noted that even in the “no drives” option, you can put an SD card up to 32 GB, or an 8 GB USB flash drive (no options here) in a blade server.

Supported processors: up to two pieces per server Xeon E5-26xx v4, from Xeon E5-2603 v4 (1.7GHz / 6-core / 15MB / 85W) to E5-2699 v4 (2.2GHz / 22-core / 55MB / 145W).
Chipset: Intel C610 Series Chipset.
Memory: 12 slots for installation on the processor, total 24 slots, maximum 1.5 TB (24 pieces of 64 Gb DDR4 LRDIMM each).
There are 3 compartments for mezzanine cards for installing commutation cards.
Network:two convergent (i.e., support different types of networks) adapters - SY 3820C 10 / 20Gb (FCoE + Ethernet) and SY 2820C 10 / 20Gb (FCoE or iSCSI + Ethernet). There are also two SAN adapters - SY 3830C and SY 3530C - 16 Gb FC. It is planned to describe backplane switching in detail in an article about interconnect, now we can say that from each card there are 4 lines to the switch, which in total can produce 40 Gbit / s according to the formula 20 (up) +20 (down).
Drives: supports SFF and uFF drives. I didn’t see uFF disks (read as a micro form factor), I started looking and it turned out that these are two m.2 disks installed in a box the size of an SFF disk, the rails are attached to the box for installation in the SFF compartment. Maximum Available:

• SFF SAS - 4.0 Tb as 2 x 2.0 Tb;
• SFF SATA - 4.0 Tb as 2 x 2.0 Tb;
• SFF SAS SSD - 7.68 Tb as 2 x 3.84 Tb;
• SFF SATA SSD - 3.2 Tb as 2 x 1.6 Tb;
• SFF NVMe SSD - 4.0 Tb as 2 x 2.0 Tb;
• uFF SATA SSD - 1.36 Tb as 4 x 340 Gb.

Disk Controllers:

• HPE Smart Array P240nr Controller with 1GB Flash-Backed Write Cache (FBWC), RAID 0, 1, 10, 5, 6, and 1 ADM (two disks in RAID1 and one next to it as hot-spare);
• HPE Smart Array P542D Controller with 2GB Flash-Backed Write Cache (FBWC), RAID 0, 1, 10, 5, 50, 6, 60, 1 ADM, and 10 ADM - this controller is required to connect to the SY D3940 disk module;
• HPE H240nr Smart HBA - RAID 0, 1, 10, 5 - if you install 4 uFF disks in the server;
• HPE B140i (chipset SATA).

Options: you can put one NVIDIA Tesla M6 Mezzanine GPU video card - 8 Gb DDR5 video memory, up to 16 virtual desktop users. By the way, that one is still a “boiler” - up to 100W, in fact, like another processor.

Supported Operating Systems:

• Microsoft Windows Server
• Microsoft Hyper-V Server
• Red Hat Enterprise Linux (RHEL);
• SUSE Linux Enterprise Server (SLES);
• VMware ESXi

For some reason, the Citrix XenServer 6.5 is not on the list, although its support is announced for NVIDIA Tesla M6. In addition to all this, there is: one external USB 3.0 port, one internal USB 3.0 port, one internal port for microSD cards. Management via iLO or through Composer with built-in OneView functionality.

In general, the workhorse is also suitable for implementing graphic VDI ​​farms. An analogue among rack-mount servers is the HPE ProLiant DL380 Gen9.

Next up is the HPE Synergy 620 Gen9.

Supported processors: up to two pieces per server, but processors are already more serious - Xeon E7-48xx v4 and E7-88xx v4, including Xeon E7-8890 v4 (2.2GHz / 24-core / 60MB / 165W).
Chipset: Intel C602J Series Chipset.
Memory: 24 slots for installation on the processor, total - 48 slots, maximum - 3.0 TB (48 pieces of 64 Gb DDR4 LRDIMM). There are 5 compartments for mezzanine cards for installing commutation cards.
Network: no change regarding SY 480 G9.
Drives: supports SFF and uFF drives. Oddly enough, it also only supports two SFF-drive slots (see the left side of the server in the picture). Maximum Available:

• SFF SAS - 4.0 Tb as 2 x 2.0 Tb;
• SFF SATA - 4.0 Tb as 2 x 2.0 Tb;
• SFF SAS SSD - 7.68 Tb as 2 x 3.84 Tb;
• SFF SATA SSD - 3.2 Tb as 2 x 1.6 Tb;
• SFF NVMe SSD - 4.0 Tb as 2 x 2.0 Tb;
• uFF SATA SSD - 1.36 Tb as 4 x 340 Gb.

Disk controllers: no change.
Options: none.
Supported operating systems: no change.
In addition to all this, there is: one external USB 2.0 port, one internal USB 2.0 port (as it is written in the documentation, I suspect that the error, and in fact ports 3.0), one internal port for microSD-cards.

Management via iLO or through Composer with built-in OneView functionality. The closest analogue among rack servers is HPE ProLiant DL560 Gen9, but the rack server does not support Xeon's E7-88xx v4.

We pass to heavy artillery - HPE Synergy 660 Gen9.

Supported processors: up to four (three cannot) per Xeon E7-46xx v4 server (in SY 620 G9 - 48xx, it is important not to mix it up), including E5-4669 v4 (2.2GHz / 22-core / 55MB / 135W).
Chipset: Intel C610 Series Chipset (as in the SY 480 G9).
Memory: 12 slots for installation on the processor, total - 48 slots, maximum - 3.0 TB (48 pieces of 64 Gb DDR4 LRDIMM). There are 6 compartments for mezzanine cards to install switching cards.
Network: no change.
Drives: supports SFF and uFF drives. Maximum Available:

• SFF SAS - 8.0 Tb as 4 x 2.0 Tb;
• SFF SATA - 8.0 Tb as 4 x 2.0 Tb;
• SFF SAS SSD - 15.36 Tb as 4 x 3.84 Tb;
• SFF SATA SSD - 6.4 Tb as 4 x 1.6 Tb;
• SFF NVMe SSD - 8.0 Tb as 4 x 2.0 Tb;
• uFF SATA SSD - 2.72 Tb as 8 x 340 Gb.

Disk controllers: no change.
Options: none.
Supported operating systems: no change.
Ports and management: no change. The closest analogue among rack-mount servers is the HPE ProLiant DL580 Gen9, but the blade server already does not support Xeon's E7-88xx v4.

Well, the final blade server is the HPE Synergy 680 Gen9. It can be seen that it is “glued” from two SY 620 Gen9, all characteristics of SY 680 Gen9 are equal to double characteristics of SY 620 Gen9.

Supported processors: up to 4 pieces per server, Xeon E7-48xx v4 and E7-88xx v4.
Chipset: Intel C602J Series Chipset.
Memory: 24 slots for installation on the processor, total - 96 slots, maximum - 6.0 TB (96 pieces of 64 Gb DDR4 LRDIMM). There are 10 compartments for mezzanine cards for installing patch cards.
Network: no change regarding SY 480 G9.
Drives: supports SFF and uFF drives. Maximum Available:

• SFF SAS - 8.0 Tb as 4 x 2.0 Tb;
• SFF SATA - 8.0 Tb as 4 x 2.0 Tb;
• SFF SAS SSD - 15.36 Tb as 4 x 3.84 Tb;
• SFF SATA SSD - 6.4 Tb as 4 x 1.6 Tb;
• SFF NVMe SSD - 8.0 Tb as 4 x 2.0 Tb;
• uFF SATA SSD - 2.72 Tb as 8 x 340 Gb.

Disk controllers: no change.
Options: none.
Supported operating systems: no change.
In addition to all this, there is: one external USB 2.0 port, one internal USB 2.0 port (information on USB ports 2.0 from SY 620 G9 is repeated in documents on SY 680 G9, apparently this is another question for the vendor), one internal port for microSD- kart. Management via iLO or through Composer with built-in OneView functionality.

In fact, this blade server is almost a complete analogue of the HPE ProLiant DL580 Gen9 rack server (it is not an analog in the number of internal disks and PCI-E slots). It is interesting to compare that you can install 6 SY680 Gen9 servers in two 10U chassis (total 20U), while the same computing power in the form of six rack-mounted ProLiant DL580 Gen9 servers will already take 24U (i.e., the density of blade servers in this case is higher 20%).

Total:

• SY 480 Gen9 - server for infrastructure tasks or VDI / graphical VDI;
• SY 620 Gen9 and SY 680 Gen9 - servers for DBMS or applications that work with large amounts of memory (OLAP?);
• SY 660 Gen9 is a server for business applications or high-density virtualization of infrastructure servers.

This concludes the description of the chassis and computing modules. In the next part, we plan to consider the disk module and, possibly, SAS switches.

PS - found in one of the documents, “Five steps to building a Composable Infrastructure with HPE Synergy”, a good picture summarizing the description: