Comparison between rp4440 and rp7410

[Wim Rombauts]

Hi,

It is generally so thatnew technology comes at a better price.

There is a difference in concept between the rp7410 and the rp4440

In the beginning, there was the rp5470 and the rp7410, whereas the rp7410 was in fact twice the rp5470 in one box, with the ability to use hardware partitions and so on. The rp7410 is just bigger and (i think) has more redundancies.

Now the rp5470 has been replaced by the rp4440, but the rp7410 has also been replaced : there is a rp7410-16 server that also contains PA-8800processors.

If you look at performance, 1 rp4440 with 4 dual core PA-8800 processors at 1GHz outperforms an rp7410 with 8 PA-8700 processors by aprox 50%. That's the effect of new technologie. If you onl need 2 processor modules in an rp4440, you are only at 50% of it's capacity. I would certainly go for that. If you expect to need much more CPU power than that, I would go for an rp7410-16.

I had the choice to add a PA-8700+ processor to an rp5470 system and by a small testserver, or by a new rp4440 production server and move the rp5470 to test. I have chosen for the last. It was cheaper after al.

[Brian Hackley]

YC,

The only think I would worry about is the built-in Gigabit card+scsi interface on the rp7410 A6794-60001 should not be used for high volume of Gigabit network. Its not the best for disk performance either, so I would stay away from that card. The architecture of this card on the rp7410 is the reason. Details at http://www.docs.hp.com/hpux/onlinedocs/2004/rp7410_core_io_perf.pdf
Obtain a PCI Gigabit card instead. Example: A6825A (RJ45) or A6847A (SC fiber) to get near-link speed performance.
The rp4440 does not come with a built-in or combo network card and does not support the A6794-60001 so it does not see this issue. It can used either of the A6825A/A6847A Gigabit cards referenced above.

Hope that helps,
-> Brian Hackley

[yc_2]

Hi,

For rp4440, it comes with 2 network interface ( refer to http://www.hp.com/products1/servers/rackoptimized/rp4440/specifications.html):

(1) 10/100BT management LAN
(2) 10/100/1000BT LAN

I intend to use (1) for heart bit of MCSG and (2) for standby (secondary or failed over) LAN interface. The production (primary) LAN interface will be a FC network card.

Is there any issue with the above arrangement?

Would appreciate any comment.


Rgds,
YC

[Brian Hackley]

YC,

My apologies! The rp4440 comes with a 10/100/1000BaseTX lan interface A6825A as the "built in" network card.

The "management" lan is used for the "Console LAN" and is not seen by HP-UX.

You would need to order a second A6825A card for MC/Serviceguard LAN failover.

Best regards,
-> Brian Hackley

[Ted Buis]

The rp7410 uses cell based technology, and has two cell boards. The rp7410 has almost 2X the I/O slots, but is 10U in the rack versus 4U for the rp4440-8. It can do hard partitioning and the rp4440-8 cannot (ever). At the moment the rp4440-8 is not support with vpars either. If you don't ever plan to partition the systems, then the rp4440-8 is a better buy, if don't need the I/O. The number of I/O slots may not be a factor, particularily with the new combo cards putting dual 2Gbit FC, or 2Gbit FC/GigE, or 2 GigE on a single card. The rp4440-8 uses an Itanium 2 bus, so it has more CPU bandwidth than the rp7410. If you need partitioning, take a look at the rp7420-16 that also uses the pa-8800. The rp7410-8 is basically a two year old product, while the rp4440-8 and rp7420-8 were new as of February of this year.

[yc_2]

Hi,

Can I use the management LAN interface from the system for Heart-Bit of MCSG?

[Brian Hackley]

YC,

No, MC/SG cannot use the "mangement LAN". It is not seen by HPUX and is only used for System Console functions.

So you need to order another NIC to run MC/SG heartbeat on a dedicated network.

Hope that helps,
-> Brian