how well does paying for cpu's on demand work?

[John Bolene]

We are looking at getting superdomes and activating processors as they are needed.

Anyione else using this concept?

What is required for this to work?

[Chris Wong]

From what I've heard, it is best to do this if you really think you are going to need the additional growth in the next year. Adding these CPUs to the system after initial installation will be much more expensive (WAY MORE!). Also, keep in mind any additional costs that may be associated with these CPUs, even if you are not using them.

- Chris

[Bill McNAMARA_1]

the last I heard (which was 6months ago) was that you had to make a internet connection available to the hp networks so that they could monitor the number of CPUs consumed.

Also, don't know if it was fixed, but igniting a server with all CPUs paid for (ie non icod) and rescuing another with the same image poses problems to ICOD. So I'm not certain now exactly how ignite can be used with ICOD systems, but if you're going 8 cell/32 way, it does make sense... recall that only certain combinations of cpu/cell arrangements make sense and typically you should be buying 4 cpus for a 4 cell partition, not just that one extra cpu for one cell in a 4 cell partition.

Given also the number of times the sd cell boards have changed, I'm not certain it's worth it.. make sure there are going to be no new cpu uncompatabilities with your cell boards when new cpus become available

Later,
Bill

[Dan Copeland · Accepted solution]

John,

We use it quite often and it works quite well.

You get the cpu's initially for a small fee and then you pay for them when you turn them on and they'll be cheaper the longer you wait to turn them on.

You need to be able to email hp from the box w/ the icod. When you configure the software a cron job is added that sends hp an update every day.

Ignite does break any icod setup that comes from the factory--we bought a 32 way SD but only paid for 16 cpu's and after we put our golden image on it, we had 16 free cpu's. You can avoid this by including the icod software in your golden image and saving a copy of /etc/.iCOD_data before you wipe out the factory image.

It does save you money and outages. It would be really cool if you could icod memory too!

I have an icod doc from hp, but it's too big to attach. If you give me your email--I'll send it

Frank

[Paula J Frazer-Campbell]

John

With ICOD (Instant capacity on Demand) you intall icod software which will contact HP by email -(icod_notify) on the state of the icod processors to turn on the disabled processors just enter a cade word and they are then up and running, the software will notify HP and invoice will be raised.

You do not pay for them until they are used and the cost is based on the cost of a processor at the time you turn then on.

HTH

Paula

[John Bolene]

Finally found a doc that tells more about this.

I was really interested in the month-of-minutes temporary cpu license which is not how the salesman described it. He said we got a bill at the end of the month depending on how much we used, when in fact, you buy this service before you use it.

http://docs.hp.com/cgi-bin/fsearch/framedisplay?top=/hpux/onlinedocs/5990-4343/5990-4343_top.html&con=/hpux/onlinedocs/5990-4343/00/00/44-con.html&toc=/hpux/onlinedocs/5990-4343/00/00/44-toc.html&searchterms=icod&queryid=20030117-100428


Thanks to all

Microfocus Cobol is the next hurdle, since they use a number of licensed cpu's per server license.