BL60p & Windows/VMS

[Rob Crooks]

I am planning to buy 2 BL60p blades to run HP-UX/ORACLE and 2 BL20p blades to run W2003/IIS for an ERP implimentation but was wondering if anyone has heard about when HP will introduce a BL60p (or variant) to run either Windows or OpenVMS.

I have read the data about HP will support Windows and OpenVMS if the customer installs it, but I am worried about driver issues. Also, the BL60p comes bundled with HP-UX Foundation OE, but want to use Windows or OpenVMS and not pay for two OS's.

I would like to hear from anyone who has deployed this blade and/or ORACLE.

My desire is to install the infrastructure around the technology and in a few months buy another BL60 to put into my Alphaserver cluster and allow our developers to migrate away from the Alphaserver platform.

Any experiences good or bad would be appreciated.

Thanks

[Patrick Terlisten]

Hello Rob,

youre right: The BL60p came with HPUX 11iv2. You can´t get the BL60p with another OS then HPUX from HP. Where did you read that HP will support an installation of Windows or OpenVMS on a BL60p? A few weeks ago I was searching for drivers, but I only found an "Integrity Essentials Intelligent Networking Pack" for Windows 2003 IA64. I think if the BL60p uses a standard chipset, you can use the drivers from the other Itanium-2 machines.

Regards,
Patrick

[Rob Crooks]

Patrick

I read about Windows/VMS support more as an aside than a fact.

"If they choose, customers can also run Windows or Linux on the BL60p and HP will support them, an HP spokeswoman said. However, the servers will only ship with HP-UX, she said."

The "spokeswoman" is never mentioned directly, but this quote is repeated on dozen of reputable websites such as ZDNET and NetworkWorld.

Im a little dissapointed with Intel as now that I can get away from the ridiculously expensive AlphaServer, they delays the rollout of faster Itanium chips until the end of 2006, maybe even 2008. If HP (and Intel) want people to adopt Itanium and the blade concept, making us wait is not going to be good for business.

I would be interested in this link you mentioned you found.

I am not too concerned about VMS compatability as in 15 years of admin, I have found it seems to care little about drivers and delivers about as much functionality as LOGO.
It's a little off-topic, but if someone developed a GUI for VMS (not DECWindows mind you) like Linux is for Unix, I might want to continue to use it.

In any case, there isn't any new news on HP.com about the BL60p except that I thought I saw that they will be rolling out a version for Windows/OpenVMS "later on", but now it seems to mysteriously read "Windows/Linux" instead. I am more than a little suspicious.

[Patrick Terlisten]

Hello Rob,

here´s the link:

http://h20000.www2.hp.com/bizsupport/TechSupport/SoftwareIndex.jsp?lang=en&cc=us&prodNameId=1146487&prodTypeId=15351&prodSeriesId=1146484&swLang=13&taskId=135&swEnvOID=1060

Maybe it is only a question of time until HP is supporting Windows, VMS or Linux on the BL60p.

Regards,
Patrick