HP today rolled out Thermal Logic, a portfolio of tools to give HP BladeSystem users more precise control over power and cooling. The initiative reflects server vendors continuing focus on offerings to boost energy efficiency in high-density enterprise data centers.
Thermal Logic is a set of energy measurement and management technologies HP has built into its products, and includes several new wrinkles for data center managers:
- HP Dynamic Power Capping, which allows companies to control the amount of power used by each server, which can reduce costly overprovisioning of power. HP monitoring software allows users to confirm peak usage for each server and cap at that level, rather than relying on guesstimates based on nameplate power capacity. Dynamic Power Capping is expected to be available in mid-December.
- A new cooling architecture, HP Parallel Redundant Scalable Enterprise Cooling (PARSEC), which divides each BladeSystem enclosure into multiple zones with dedicated fans, allowing users to make better use of variable fan speeds. This allows custom configurations for servers and storage, rather than adapting all fans to one high-powered blade.
- HP Active Cool fans, which feature a new design based on aircraft technology that the company says can cool 16 blades using just 100 watts of power. HP says it has applied for multiple patents covering the new fan technology.
"With these new solutions from HP, customers are able to drive down data center costs by reducing energy consumption and, at the same time, minimize environmental impact,” said Peter Gross, chief executive officer, EYP Mission Critical Facilities, an HP company. “HP’s Green Business Technology initiative is built on decades of innovation and experience in data center design and deployment, resulting in solutions that empower CIOs to turn energy efficiency into business benefits that impact the bottom line.”
Note: HP does not indicate how many PARSECs are needed to complete the Kessel Run.
