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IBM Power 770 Technical Overview And Introduction
ibm.com/redbooks
Red
paper
Front cover
IBM Power 770 and 780
Technical Overview and Introduction
An Ding Chen
Dave Freeman
Breno Henrique Leitão
Features the 9117-MMD and 9179-MHD based on
the latest POWER7+ processor technology
Describes support of up to 20
LPARS per processor core
Discusses new I/O cards
and drawers
Summary of Power 770
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Ibm.Com/redbooks red paper front cover ibm power 770 and 780 technical overview and introduction an ding chen dave freeman breno henrique leitão features the 9117-mmd and 9179-mhd based on the latest power7+ processor technology describes support of up to 20 lpars per processor core discusses new i/...
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International technical support organization ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction february 2013 redp-4924-00
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© copyright international business machines corporation 2013. All rights reserved. Note to u.S. Government users restricted rights -- use, duplication or disclosure restricted by gsa adp schedule contract with ibm corp. First edition (february 2013) this edition applies to the ibm power 770 (9117-mm...
Page 5: Contents
© copyright ibm corp. 2013. All rights reserved. Iii contents notices . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Vii trademarks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ....
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Iv ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 1.12.9 rack-mounting rules . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 34 1.12.10 useful rack additions. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ....
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Contents v 2.9.4 dvd . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 82 2.10 external i/o subsystems . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 83 2.10.1 pci-ddr 12x expansion dra...
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Vi ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 4.1.2 placement of components . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 158 4.1.3 redundant components and concurrent repair. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15...
Page 9: Notices
© copyright ibm corp. 2013. All rights reserved. Vii notices this information was developed for products and services offered in the u.S.A. Ibm may not offer the products, services, or features discussed in this document in other countries. Consult your local ibm representative for information on th...
Page 10: Trademarks
Viii ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction trademarks ibm, the ibm logo, and ibm.Com are trademarks or registered trademarks of international business machines corporation in the united states, other countries, or both. These and other ibm trademarked terms a...
Page 11: Preface
© copyright ibm corp. 2013. All rights reserved. Ix preface this ibm® redpaper™ publication is a comprehensive guide covering the ibm power 770 (9117-mmd) and power 780 (9179-mhd) servers that support ibm aix®, ibm i, and linux operating systems. The goal of this paper is to introduce the major inno...
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X ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction the team who wrote this paper this paper was produced by a team of specialists from around the world working at the international technical support organization, poughkeepsie center. An ding chen is a power systems prod...
Page 13: Comments Welcome
Preface xi comments welcome your comments are important to us! We want our papers to be as helpful as possible. Send us your comments about this paper or other ibm redbooks® publications in one of the following ways: use the online contact us review redbooks form found at: ibm.Com/redbooks send your...
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Xii ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction.
Page 15: General Description
© copyright ibm corp. 2013. All rights reserved. 1 chapter 1. General description the ibm power 770 (9117-mmd) and ibm power 780 servers (9179-mhd) use the latest power7+ processor technology that is designed to deliver unprecedented performance, scalability, reliability, and manageability for deman...
Page 16: 1.1 Systems Overview
2 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 1.1 systems overview you can find detailed information about the power 770 and power 780 systems within the following sections. 1.1.1 ibm power 770 server the power 770 processor card features 64-bit architecture design...
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Chapter 1. General description 3 figure 1-1 shows a power 770 with the maximum four enclosures, and the front views of a single-enclosure power 770 and single-enclosure 780 cec. Figure 1-1 four-enclosure power 770, and single-enclosure power 770 and power 780 1.1.2 ibm power 780 server the power 780...
Page 18: 1.2 Operating Environment
4 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 1.2 operating environment table 1-1 lists the operating environment specifications for the servers. Table 1-1 operating environment for power 770 and power 780 (for one enclosure only) description operating non-operatin...
Page 19: 1.3 Physical Package
Chapter 1. General description 5 the ibm systems energy estimator is a web-based tool for estimating power requirements for ibm power systems. You can use this tool to estimate typical power requirements (watts) for a specific system configuration under normal operating conditions: http://www-912.Ib...
Page 20: 1.4 System Features
6 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 1.4 system features both power 770 and power 780 processor card features 64-bit architecture designed with four single-chip module (scm) power7+ processors. 1.4.1 power 770 system features the following features are ava...
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Chapter 1. General description 7 eight i/o expansion slots per enclosure (maximum 32 per system) – six gen2 pcie 8x slots plus two gx++ slots per enclosure dynamic lpar support, processor and memory capacity upgrade on demand (cuod) powervm (optional) – ibm micro-partitioning® technology – virtual i...
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8 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction choice of integrated multifunction card options; maximum one per enclosure: – dual 10 gb copper and dual 1 gb ethernet (fc 1768) – dual 10 gb optical and dual 1 gb ethernet (fc 1769) one serial port included on each int...
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Chapter 1. General description 9 the power 780 operator interface controls, located on the front panel of the primary i/o drawer, consist of a power on/off button with a power indicator, an lcd display for diagnostic feedback, a reset button, and a disturbance or system attention led. 1.4.3 minimum ...
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10 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction table 1-4 shows the minimum system configuration for a power 780 system. Table 1-4 minimum features for power 780 system 1x removable media device (fc 5771) optionally orderable, a stand-alone system (not network attac...
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Chapter 1. General description 11 1.4.4 power supply features two system ac power supplies are required for each cec enclosure. The second power supply provides redundant power for enhanced system availability. To provide full redundancy, the two power supplies must be connected to separate power di...
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12 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 1-3 shows the top view of the power 770 and power 780 system with four scms installed. The four power7+ scms and the system memory reside on a single processor card feature. Figure 1-3 top view of a power 770 or...
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Chapter 1. General description 13 epma one processor activation for processor fc epm0: each occurrence of this feature permanently activates one processor on processor card fc epm0. One processor activation for processor feature fc epm0 with inactive processors. Aix ibm i linux epmw processor cod ut...
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14 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction epmb one processor activation for processor fc epm1: each occurrence of this feature will permanently activate one processor on processor card fc epm1. One processor activation for processor feature fc epm1 with inacti...
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Chapter 1. General description 15 table 1-6 summarizes the processor feature codes for the power 780. Table 1-6 summary of processor features for the power 780 feature code description os support eph0 0 to 16-core 4.42 ghz power7+ processor card: 16-core 4.42 ghz power7+ cuod processor card containi...
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16 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction ep9t 90 day temporary on/off processor enablement aix ibm i linux eph2 0 to 32-core 3.72 ghz power7+ processor card: 32-core 3.72 ghz power7+ cuod processor planar containing four 8-core processors. Each processor has ...
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Chapter 1. General description 17 fc 7951 on/off processor enablement: this feature can be ordered to enable your server for on/off capacity on demand. After it is enabled, you can request processors on a temporary basis. You must sign an on/off capacity on demand contract before you order this feat...
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18 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 1.4.7 memory features in power7+ systems, ddr3 memory is used throughout. There are four separate capacity dimms: 8 gb, 16 gb, 32 gb, or 64 gb. The power7+ ddr3 memory has been redesigned to provide greater bandwidth a...
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Chapter 1. General description 19 the power 770 and power 780 have memory features in 32 gb, 64 gb, 128 gb, and 256 gb capacities. Table 1-7 summarizes the capacities of the memory features and highlights other characteristics. Table 1-7 summary of memory features none of the memory in these feature...
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20 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 1.5 disk and media features each system building block features two sas dasd controllers with six hot-swappable 2.5-inch small form-factor (sff) disk bays and one hot-plug, slim-line media bay per enclosure. The sff sa...
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Chapter 1. General description 21 certain adapters are available for order in large quantities. Table 1-10 lists the disk drives available in a quantity of 150. Table 1-10 available disk drives in quantity of 150 1885 300 gb 10 k rpm sff sas disk drive aix, linux 1880 300 gb 15 k rpm sas sff disk dr...
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22 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction the power 770 and power 780 support both 2.5-inch and 3.5-inch sas sff hard disks. The 3.5-inch dasd hard disk can be attached to the power 770 and power 780 but must be located in a feature fc 5886 exp12s i/o drawer, ...
Page 37: 1.6 I/o Drawers
Chapter 1. General description 23 scsi disks are not supported in the power 770 and 780 disk bays. However, if you want to use scsi disks, you can attach existing scsi disk subsystems. The disk/media backplane feature fc 5652 provides six sff disk slots and one sata media slot. In a full configurati...
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24 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction a maximum of two fc 5802 drawers can be placed on the same 12x loop. Feature fc 5877 is the same as fc 5802, except it does not support disk bays. Feature fc 5877 can be on the same loop as fc 5802. Feature fc 5877 can...
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Chapter 1. General description 25 table 1-11 summarizes the maximum number of i/o drawers supported and the total number of pci slots that are available when expansion consists of a single drawer type. Table 1-11 maximum number of i/o drawers supported and total number of pci slots table 1-12 summar...
Page 40: 1.8 Build to Order
26 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction table 1-13 summarizes the processor core options and frequencies, and matches them to the l3 cache sizes for the power 770 and power 780. Table 1-13 summary of processor core counts, core frequencies, and l3 cache size...
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Chapter 1. General description 27 1.10.2 power 780 you can upgrade the 9117-mma, 9179-mhb or 9179-mhc with 9179-mhd processors. For upgrades from 9117-mma, 9179-mhb, or 9179-mhc processor-based systems, ibm will install new cec enclosures to replace the enclosures you currently have. Your current ce...
Page 42: 1.11 Management Consoles
28 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction the power 770 and power 780 support only the sas dasd sff hard disks, internally. The existing 3.5-inch dasd hard disks can be attached to power 770 and power 780, but must be located in an i/o drawer such as fc 5886. ...
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Chapter 1. General description 29 this code level is required for new lpar function support, which allows the hmc to manage more lpars per processor core; a core can now be partitioned in up to 20 lpars (0.05 of a core). The ibm power 770 and power 780 are not supported by the integrated virtualizat...
Page 44: 1.12 System Racks
30 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 1.12 system racks the power 770 and its i/o drawers are designed to be mounted in the following existing ibm racks: 7014-t00, 7014-t42, 7014-b42, 7014-s25, fc 0551, fc 0553, or fc 0555. In addition, a 42u slim rack is ...
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Chapter 1. General description 31 1.12.2 ibm 7014 model t42 rack the 2.0-meter (79.3-inch) model t42 addresses the client requirement for a tall enclosure to house the maximum amount of equipment in the smallest possible floor space. The following features differ in the model t42 rack from the model...
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32 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction the ibm 42u slim rack (7953-94y) differs from the ibm 42u enterprise rack (7014-b42 or 7014-t42) in several aspects. Both provide 42u of vertical space, are 1100 mm deep, and have an interior rail-to-rail depth of 715 ...
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Chapter 1. General description 33 figure 1-5 pdu placement and pdu view for the power 770 and power 780 installed in ibm 7014 or fc 055x racks, the following pdu rules apply: for pdu fc 7188 and fc 7109 when using power cord fc 6654, fc 6655, fc 6656, fc 6657, or fc 6658, each pair of pdus can power...
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34 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction save previous investments, these power cords can be requested with an initial order of the rack or with a later upgrade of the rack features. The pdu has 12 client-usable iec 320-c13 outlets. There are six groups of tw...
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Chapter 1. General description 35 1.12.10 useful rack additions this section highlights several solutions for ibm power systems rack-based systems. Ibm 7214 model 1u2 sas storage enclosure the ibm system storage® 7214 tape and dvd enclosure express is designed to mount in one eia unit of a standard ...
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36 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction to attach a 7216 multi-media enclosure to the power 770 and power 780, consider the following cabling procedures: attachment by an sas adapter a pcie dual-x4 sas adapter (fc 5901) or a pcie lp 2-x4-port sas adapter 3 g...
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Chapter 1. General description 37 figure 1-6 shows the 7216 multi-media enclosure. Figure 1-6 fc 7216 multi-media enclosure in general, the 7216-1u2 is supported by the aix, ibm i, and linux operating systems. Ibm i, from version 7.1, now fully supports the internal 5.25 inch rdx sata removable hdd ...
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38 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction removable rdx drives are in a rugged cartridge that inserts in a rdx removable (usb) disk docking station (fc 1103). Rdx drives are compatible with docking stations installed internally in ibm power6 and power7 servers...
Page 53: Architecture and Technical
© copyright ibm corp. 2013. All rights reserved. 39 chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview the ibm power 770 offers a 4-socket cec enclosure, populated with 3-core or 4-core power7+ processors. A fully-configured 4-drawer system has either 48 or 64 cores, depending on which processor is spec...
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40 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-1 shows the logical system diagram of the 4-socket power 770 and power 780. Figure 2-1 ibm power 770 or 780 logical system diagram dasd backplane op panel raid card write cache write sata media usb2 exp exp gx...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 41 2.1 the ibm power7+ processor the ibm power7+ processor represents a leap forward in technology achievement and associated computing capability. The multi-core architecture of the power7+ processor has been matched with innovation across a wide range...
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42 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-2 shows the power7+ processor die layout, with the major areas identified: processor cores l2 cache l3 cache and chip interconnection simultaneous multiprocessing links memory controllers. I/o links figure 2-2...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 43 table 2-1 summarizes the technology characteristics of the power7+ processor. Table 2-1 summary of power7+ processor technology 2.1.2 power7+ processor core each power7+ processor core implements aggressive out-of-order (ooo) instruction execution to...
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44 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.1.3 simultaneous multithreading power7+ processors support smt1, smt2, and smt4 modes to enable up to four instruction threads to execute simultaneously in each power7+ processor core. The processor supports the foll...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 45 2.1.4 memory access each power7+ processor chip has one ddr3 memory controller, which uses four memory channels to connect to its quad of dimms. Each channel operates at 1066 mhz and can address up to 64 gb of memory. Thus, each power7+ processor chi...
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46 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-5 shows the flr-l3 cache regions for each of the cores on the power7+ processor die. Figure 2-5 fast local regions of l3 cache on the power7+ processor the innovation of using edram on the power7+ processor di...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 47 2.1.6 power7+ processor and intelligent energy energy consumption is an important area of focus for the design of the power7+ processor, which includes intelligent energy features that help to dynamically optimize energy usage and performance so that...
Page 62: 2.2 Power7+ Processor Card
48 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.2 power7+ processor card ibm power 770 and power 780 servers are modular systems that are built with one to four cec enclosures. The processor and memory subsystem in each cec enclosure is contained on a single proce...
Page 63: 2.3 Memory Subsystem
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 49 2.2.2 processor interconnects the power7+ processor uses one memory controller, mc0, to access four dimms. The processor uses two gx++ buses (figure 2-7). Figure 2-7 processor interconnects on 4-socket processor card each power7+ scm has two serial e...
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50 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-8 shows the physical memory dimm topology for power 770 and power 780 with four p7+ single-chip-modules (scms). Figure 2-8 physical memory dimm topology for the power 780 with four scms for the power 770 and p...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 51 the memory-placement rules are as follows: plug sequence will always allow for memory mirroring (for example, no feature code needs to be specified for memory mirroring). The highlighted (green) cells in the following tables indicate the active memor...
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52 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction table 2-4 shows the optimal placement of each dimm-quad within a dual-enclosure system. Each enclosure must have at least two dimm-quads installed. Table 2-4 optimum dimm-quad placement for a dual enclosure system encl...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 53 table 2-5 shows the optimal placement of each dimm-quad within a three-enclosure system. Each enclosure must have at least two dimm-quads installed. Table 2-5 optimum dimm-quad placement for a three-enclosure system enclosure 1 cpu 1 cpu 3 cpu 4 cpu ...
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54 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction table 2-6 shows the optimal placement of each dimm-quad within a four-enclosure system. Each enclosure must have at least two dimm-quads installed. Table 2-6 optimum dimm-quad placement for a four-enclosure system 2.3....
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 55 2.3.4 memory throughput power7+ has exceptional cache, memory, and interconnect bandwidths. Table 2-7 shows the bandwidth estimate for the power 770 system running at 3.8 ghz. Table 2-7 power 770 memory bandwidth estimates for power7+ cores running a...
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56 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-9 shows how active memory mirroring uses dimm-quads. Figure 2-9 active memory mirroring in a single cec to enable amm feature, the server must have at least eight dimms of the same size populated on slots j1a ...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 57 it is possible to check whether the active memory mirroring option is enabled and change its current status through hmc, under the advanced tab on the cec properties panel (figure 2-10). Figure 2-10 cec properties panel on an hmc after a failure on o...
Page 72: 2.4 Capacity On Demand
58 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.4 capacity on demand several types of capacity on demand (cod) offerings are optionally available on the power 770 and 780 servers to help meet changing resource requirements in an on-demand environment, by using res...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 59 the on/off cod process consists of three steps: enablement, activation, and billing. Enablement before requesting temporary capacity on a server, you must enable it for on/off cod. To do this, order an enablement feature and sign the required contrac...
Page 74
60 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction registration and usage reporting for utility cod is made using a public website and payment is based on reported usage. Utility cod requires powervm standard edition or powervm enterprise edition to be active. If a pow...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 61 the star fabric bus topology that connects the processors together in separate drawers is contained on smp flex cables that are routed external to the drawers. These flex cables attach directly to the cpu cards at the front of the drawer and are rout...
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62 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction to allow such concurrent maintenance operation, plugging the smp flex cables in the order of their numbering is extremely important. Each cable is numbered, as shown in figure 2-11. Note that the 2- and 3-drawer cablin...
Page 77
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 63 figure 2-12 three link 2-drawer smp cabling figure 2-13 two link 3-drawer smp cabling.
Page 78
64 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction similarly, the fsp flex cables must be installed in the correct order (see figure 2-14), as follows: 1. Install a second node flex cable from node 1 to node 2. 2. Add a third node flex cable from node 1 and node 2 to n...
Page 79
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 65 the total width of the server, with cables installed, is 21 inches, as shown in figure 2-15. Figure 2-15 front view of the rack with smp cables overlapping the rack rails smp cable drawer 1 b left to drawer 3 a left smp cable drawer 2 b left to...
Page 80
66 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction in the rear of the rack, the fsp cables require only some room in the left side of the racks, as figure 2-16 shows. Figure 2-16 rear view of rack with detail of fsp flex cables four drawer cable three drawer cable two ...
Page 81: 2.6 System Bus
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 67 2.6 system bus this section provides additional information related to the internal buses. 2.6.1 i/o buses and gx++ card each cec enclosure of the power 770 and power 780 contains one power7+ processor card. Each processor card comprises 3-core, 4-co...
Page 82: 2.7 Internal I/o Subsystem
68 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.7 internal i/o subsystem the internal i/o subsystem resides on the i/o planar, which supports six pcie slots. All pcie slots are hot-pluggable and enabled with enhanced error handling (eeh). In the unlikely event of ...
Page 83: 2.8 Pci Adapters
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 69 required in cec enclosure 1, but it is not required in cec enclosures 2, 3, or 4. On a multi-enclosure system, the integrated multifunction card features can differ. On the port type and cable size, the copper twinaxial ports support up to 5 m cablin...
Page 84
70 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.8.3 ibm i iop adapters ibm i iop adapters are not supported with the power 770 and power 780, which has the following results: existing pci adapters that require an iop are affected. Existing i/o devices are affected...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 71 figure 2-17 pcie adapter form factors many of the full-height card features are also available in low-profile format. For example, the pcie raid and ssd sas adapter 3 gb is available as a low-profile adapter or as a full-height adapter, each one havi...
Page 86
72 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction before adding or rearranging adapters, use the system planning tool to validate the new adapter configuration. See the system planning tool website for detailed information: http://www.Ibm.Com/systems/support/tools/sys...
Page 87
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 73 2.8.6 graphics accelerator adapters the ibm power 770 and power 780 support up to eight graphics adapters (table 2-14). They can be configured to operate in either 8-bit or 24-bit color modes. These adapters support both analog and digital monitors, ...
Page 88
74 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.8.7 scsi and sas adapters the power 770 and power 780 do not support scsi adapters and scsi disks. Sas adapters are supported and table 2-15 lists the available sas adapters. Table 2-15 available scsi and sas adapter...
Page 89
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 75 2.8.9 fibre channel adapter the ibm power 770 and power 780 servers support direct or san connection to devices that use fibre channel adapters. Table 2-17 summarizes the available fibre channel adapters. All of these adapters except fc 5735 have lc ...
Page 90
76 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.8.10 fibre channel over ethernet (fcoe) fcoe allows for the convergence of fibre channel and ethernet traffic onto a single adapter and converged fabric. Figure 2-18 compares an existing fibre channel and network con...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 77 infiniband is based on a switched fabric architecture of serial point-to-point links, where these ib links can be connected to either host channel adapters (hcas), used primarily in servers, or to target channel adapters (tcas), used primarily in sto...
Page 92: 2.9 Internal Storage
78 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.8.13 cryptographic coprocessor the cryptographic coprocessor cards provide both cryptographic coprocessor and cryptographic accelerator functions in a single card. The ibm pcie cryptographic coprocessor adapter highl...
Page 93
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 79 power 770 and power 780 supports various internal storage configurations: dual split backplane mode: the backplane is configured as two sets of three bays (3/3). Triple split backplane mode: the backplane is configured as three sets of two bays (2/2/...
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80 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction batteries provide power to maintain both copies of write-cache information in the event that power is lost. Without the dual ioa enablement card, each controller can access only two or three sas drive bays. Another exp...
Page 95
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 81 table 2-22 summarizes the internal storage combination and the feature codes that are required for any combination. Table 2-22 sas configurations summary sas subsystem configuration fc 5662 ccin 2bc2 external sas components sas port cables sas cables...
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82 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.9.1 dual split backplane mode dual split backplane mode offers two sets of three disks and is the standard configuration. If you want, one of the sets can be connected to an external sas pcie or pci-x adapter if fc 1...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 83 2.9.2 triple split backplane the triple split backplane mode offers three sets of two disk drives each. This mode requires an internal sas cable (fc 1815), a sas cable (fc 3679), and a sas controller, such as sas controller fc 5901. Figure 2-21 shows...
Page 98
84 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction this configuration increases availability by using dual storage ioa or high availability (ha) to connect multiple adapters to a common set of internal disk drives. It also increases the performance of raid arrays. The ...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 85 because the integrated sas controller is independent from the two sas disk or ssd controllers, it allows the dvd to be switched between multiple partitions without impacting the assignment of disks or ssds in the cec enclosure. 2.10 external i/o subs...
Page 100
86 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction a minimum configuration of two 12x cables (either sdr or ddr), two ac power cables, and two spcn cables is required to ensure proper redundancy. Figure 2-23 shows the rear view of the expansion unit. Figure 2-23 pci-x ...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 87 figure 2-24 shows the front view of the 12x i/o drawer pcie (fc5802). Figure 2-24 front view of the 12x i/o drawer pcie figure 2-25 shows the rear view of the 12x i/o drawer pcie (fc 5802). Figure 2-25 rear view of the 12x i/o drawer pcie 2.10.3 divi...
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88 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-26 indicates the mode switch in the rear view of the fc 5802 i/o drawer. Figure 2-26 disk bay partitioning in fc 5802 pcie 12x i/o drawer each disk bay set can be attached to its own controller or adapter. The...
Page 103
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 89 the location codes for the front and rear views of the fc 5802 i/o drawer are provided in figure 2-27 and figure 2-28. Figure 2-27 fc 5802 i/o drawer from view location codes figure 2-28 fc 5802 i/o drawer rear view location codes configuring the dra...
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90 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction each disk bay set can be attached to its own controller or adapter. The feature pcie 12x i/o drawer has four sas connections to drive bays. It connects to pcie sas adapters or controllers on the host systems. For detai...
Page 105
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 91 general rule for the 12x i/o drawer configuration to optimize performance and distribute workload, use as many multiple gx++ buses as possible. Figure 2-30 shows several examples of a 12x i/o drawer configuration. Figure 2-30 12x i/o drawer configura...
Page 106
92 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.10.5 12x i/o drawer pcie and pci-ddr 12x expansion drawer spcn cabling system power control network (spcn) is used to control and monitor the status of power and cooling within the i/o drawer. Spcn cables connect all...
Page 107
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 93 various spcn cables are available. Table 2-27 lists the spcn cables to satisfy various length requirements. Table 2-27 spcn cables 2.11 external disk subsystems this section describes the following external disk subsystems that can be attached to the...
Page 108
94 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-32 exp30 ultra ssd i/o drawer exp30 supports raid 0, 5, 6, and 10 and has up to 30% performance improvement over the older version (fc 5888). A maximum of two esp30 drawers can be attached to the power 750 and...
Page 109
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 95 figure 2-33 connection between fc 1914 card and a single fc edr1 drawer figure 2-34 connection between two fc 1914 and two fc edr1 power 770 or power 780 e rm - c1 t1 t3 e rm - c2 p su p 2 pcie gen2 8x cable pcie gen2 8x cable fc edr1 fc 1914 t2 8x 8...
Page 110
96 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction edr1 storage connection to dasd drawer it is possible to connect edr1 storage up to two hdd expansion drawers (fc 5887). The connection must be done using the same sas ports on each erm, as shown in figure 2-35. Figure...
Page 111
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 97 the large cache pci-x ddr 1.5 gb cache sas raid adapter (fc 5904) and pci-x ddr 1.5 gb cache sas raid adapter (bsc) (fc 5908) uses a sas y cable when a single port is running the exp12s expansion drawer. A sas x cable is used when a pair of adapters ...
Page 112
98 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction sff-2 sas drives that physically do not fit in the gen1 or sff-1 bays of the power7 or power7+ system unit or of the 12x pcie i/o drawers, or vice versa. The exp24s sas ports are attached to a pcie sas adapter or pair ...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 99 the exp24s sff gen2-bay drawer can be ordered in one of three possible mode settings that are manufacturing-configured (not customer set-up) of 1, 2, or 4 sets of disk bays. With ibm aix and linux the exp24s can be ordered with four sets of six bays ...
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100 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.11.4 totalstorage exp24 disk drawer and tower the totalstorage exp24 is available as a 4 eia unit drawer and mounts in a 19-inch rack (fc 5786). The front of the ibm totalstorage exp24 ultra320 scsi expandable stora...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 101 ibm system storage n series the ibm system storage n series is a network attached storage (nas) solution. It provides the latest technology to customers to help them improve performance, virtualization manageability, and system efficiency at a reduc...
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102 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction with integrated management for large and multisite xiv deployments, reducing operational complexity and enhancing capacity planning. For more information, see the following website: http://www.Ibm.Com/systems/storage/...
Page 117
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 103 servers that use ibm power5, power6, power7, or later, processors. The hmc provides basic virtualization management through support for configuring logical partitions (lpars) and dynamic resource allocation, including processor and memory settings f...
Page 118
104 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction blade management the hmc gives systems administrators a tool for planning, virtualizing, deploying, and managing ibm power system servers. With the introduction of hmc v7r760, the hmc can now manage ibm bladecenter po...
Page 119
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 105 dlpar (processors, memory, i/o, and so on) custom groups hmc management the last group relates to the management of the hmc itself, its maintenance, security, and configuration, for example: guided set-up wizard electronic service agent set up wizar...
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106 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction when ibm systems director is used to manage an hmc or if the hmc manages more than 254 partitions, the hmc should have 3 gb of ram minimum and be cr3 model, or later, rack-mounted, or c06, or later, deskside. With the...
Page 121
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 107 the default mechanism for allocation of the ip addresses for the service processor hmc ports is dynamic. The hmc can be configured as a dhcp server, providing the ip address at the time that the managed server is powered on. In this case, the fsps a...
Page 122
108 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-38 shows one possible highly available hmc configuration that is managing two servers. These servers have only one cec and therefore only one fsp. Each hmc is connected to one fsp port of all managed servers....
Page 123
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 109 figure 2-39 shows a redundant hmc and redundant service processor connectivity configuration. Figure 2-39 redundant hmc connection and redundant service processor configuration in a configuration with multiple systems or hmc, the customer is require...
Page 124
110 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 2-40 describes the four possible ethernet connectivity options between hmc and fsps. Figure 2-40 summary of hmc to fsp configuration option depending on number of cec for details about redundant hmc, see hardwa...
Page 125
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 111 2.12.6 hmc code level the hmc code must be at v7r7.6.0 to support the power 770 and power 780 systems (mmd and mhd systems). In a dual hmc configuration, both systems must be at the same version and release of the hmc. If you want to migrate an lpar...
Page 126
112 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2.13.1 virtual i/o server the minimum required level of virtual i/o server for both the power 770 and power 780 is vios 2.2.2.0. Releasing vios 2.2.1.5 will also support both models. Ibm regularly updates the virtual ...
Page 127
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 113 ibm aix version 7.1 the following minimum level of aix version 7.1 supports the power 770 and power 780: aix version 7.1 with the 7100-02 technology level or later aix version 7.1 with the 7100-01 technology level and service pack 6 or later aix ver...
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114 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction for information about suse linux enterprise server, go to: http://www.Novell.Com/products/server for information about red hat enterprise linux advanced server, go to: http://www.Redhat.Com/rhel/features 2.13.5 java v...
Page 129: 2.14 Energy Management
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 115 to the ibm xl compilers, your applications can use the most recent industry-leading optimization technology. For pl/i, it produces code that is intended to perform well across all hardware levels, including power7+ of aix. Ibm rational® development ...
Page 130
116 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction director active energy manager (an ibm systems directors plug-in) for energy management and control. Ibm energyscale makes use of power and thermal information collected from the system to implement policies that can ...
Page 131
Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 117 configurations and worst-case scenarios. The user must set and enable an energy cap from the ibm director active energy manager user interface. Soft power capping there are two power ranges into which the power cap can be set: power capping, as desc...
Page 132
118 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction automatically scans all pluggable pci slots at regular intervals, looking for those that meet the criteria for being not in use and powering them off. This support is available for all power7 and power7+ processor-bas...
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Chapter 2. Architecture and technical overview 119 table 2-29 lists all features that are supported, showing all cases in which aem is not required, and also details the features that can be activated by traditional user interfaces (for example, asmi and hmc). Table 2-29 aem support the power 770 an...
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120 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction.
Page 135: Virtualization
© copyright ibm corp. 2013. All rights reserved. 121 chapter 3. Virtualization as you look for ways to maximize the return on your it infrastructure investments, consolidating workloads becomes an attractive proposition. Ibm power systems combined with powervm technology offer key capabilities that ...
Page 136: 3.1 Power Hypervisor
122 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 3.1 power hypervisor combined with features that are designed into the power7+ processors, the power hypervisor delivers functions that enable other system technologies, including logical partitioning technology, virt...
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Chapter 3. Virtualization 123 virtual scsi the power hypervisor provides a virtual scsi mechanism for virtualization of storage devices. The storage virtualization is accomplished using two paired adapters: a virtual scsi server adapter a virtual scsi client adapter a virtual i/o server partition or...
Page 138
124 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction virtual fibre channel a virtual fibre channel adapter is a virtual adapter that provides client logical partitions with a fibre channel connection to a storage area network through the virtual i/o server logical parti...
Page 139: 3.2 Power Processor Modes
Chapter 3. Virtualization 125 3.2 power processor modes although, strictly speaking, not a virtualization feature, the power modes are described here because they affect various virtualization features. On power system servers, partitions can be configured to run in several modes, including the foll...
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126 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction the selection of the mode is made on a per-partition basis, from the managed console, by editing the partition profile (figure 3-2). Figure 3-2 configuring partition profile compatibility mode from the managed console.
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Chapter 3. Virtualization 127 table 3-2 lists the differences between these modes. Table 3-2 differences between power6 and power7 compatibility mode 3.3 active memory expansion active memory expansion enablement is an optional feature of power7+ processor-based servers that must be specified when c...
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128 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction the memory content is, and it also depends on having adequate spare cpu capacity available for this compression/decompression. On the power7+ processors, it imbeds active memory expansion onto the processor chip to pr...
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Chapter 3. Virtualization 129 to help you do this study, a planning tool is included with aix 6.1 technology level 4, allowing you to sample actual workloads and estimate how expandable the partition's memory is and how much cpu resource is needed. Any model power system can run the planning tool. F...
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130 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction after you select the value of the memory expansion factor that you want to achieve, you can use this value to configure the partition from the managed console (figure 3-5). Figure 3-5 using the planning tool result to...
Page 145: 3.4 Powervm
Chapter 3. Virtualization 131 from the hmc, you can view whether the active memory expansion feature was activated (figure 3-6). Figure 3-6 server capabilities listed from the hmc for details about active memory expansion, download the document active memory expansion: overview and usage guide: http...
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132 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 3.4.1 powervm editions this section provides information about the virtualization capabilities of the powervm. The three editions of powervm are suited for various purposes: powervm express edition this edition is des...
Page 147
Chapter 3. Virtualization 133 micro-partitioning technology micro-partitioning technology allows you to allocate fractions of processors to a logical partition. This technology was introduced with power5 processor-based systems. A logical partition using fractions of processors is also known as a sh...
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134 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction the power 780 allows up to 128 cores in a single system, supporting the following maximums: up to 128 dedicated partitions up to 1000 micropartitions (maximum 20 micropartitions per physical active core) an important ...
Page 149
Chapter 3. Virtualization 135 dedicated mode in dedicated mode, physical processors are assigned as a whole to partitions. The simultaneous multithreading feature in the power7+ processor core allows the core to execute instructions from two or four independent software threads simultaneously. To su...
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136 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction to implement mspps, there is a set of underlying techniques and technologies. Figure 3-8 shows an overview of the architecture of multiple shared processor pools. Figure 3-8 overview of the architecture of multiple sh...
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Chapter 3. Virtualization 137 default shared processor pool (spp 0 ) on any power systems server supporting multiple shared processor pools, a default shared processor pool is always automatically defined. The default shared processor pool has a pool identifier of zero (spp-id = 0) and can also be r...
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138 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 3-9 shows the levels of unused capacity redistribution implemented by the power hypervisor. Figure 3-9 the levels of unused capacity redistribution capacity allocation above the entitled pool capacity (level 1 ...
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Chapter 3. Virtualization 139 where there is unused processor capacity in under-utilized shared processor pools, the micropartitions within the shared processor pools cede the capacity to the power hypervisor. In busy shared processor pools, where the micropartitions have used all of the entitled po...
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140 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction live partition mobility and multiple shared processor pools a micropartition can leave a shared processor pool because of powervm live partition mobility. Similarly, a micropartition can join a shared processor pool i...
Page 155
Chapter 3. Virtualization 141 the virtual fibre channel adapter is used with the npiv feature, described in “n_port id virtualization (npiv)” on page 152. Shared ethernet adapter a shared ethernet adapter (sea) can be used to connect a physical ethernet network to a virtual ethernet network. The sha...
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142 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 3-11 shows a configuration example of an sea with one physical and two virtual ethernet adapters. An sea can include up to 16 virtual ethernet adapters on the virtual i/o server that share the same physical acc...
Page 157
Chapter 3. Virtualization 143 virtual scsi virtual scsi is used to refer to a virtualized implementation of the scsi protocol. Virtual scsi is based on a client/server relationship. The virtual i/o server logical partition owns the physical resources and acts as a server or, in scsi terms, a target ...
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144 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction at the time of writing, virtual scsi supports fibre channel, parallel scsi, iscsi, sas, scsi raid devices, and optical devices, including dvd-ram and dvd-rom. Other protocols such as ssa and tape devices are not suppo...
Page 159
Chapter 3. Virtualization 145 partition mobility provides systems management flexibility and improves system availability: avoid planned outages for hardware or firmware maintenance by moving logical partitions to another server and then performing the maintenance. Live partition mobility can help l...
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146 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 2. Move the logical partition to the power7+ processor-based server. Both the current and preferred modes remain unchanged for the logical partition until you restart the logical partition. 3. Restart the logical part...
Page 161
Chapter 3. Virtualization 147 3.4.6 active memory sharing active memory sharing is an ibm powervm advanced memory virtualization technology that provides system memory virtualization capabilities to ibm power systems, allowing multiple partitions to share a common pool of physical memory. Active mem...
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148 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction identical pages within the same or different lpars each require their own unique physical memory page, consuming space with repeated information. Figure 3-13 active memory sharing shared memory pool without active mem...
Page 163
Chapter 3. Virtualization 149 figure 3-14 shows the behavior of a system with active memory deduplication enabled on its active memory sharing shared memory pool. Duplicated pages from separate lpars are stored only once, providing the active memory sharing pool with more free memory. Figure 3-14 id...
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150 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction figure 3-15 shows two pages being written in the active memory sharing memory pool and having their signatures matched on the deduplication table. Figure 3-15 memory pages having their signatures matched by active mem...
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Chapter 3. Virtualization 151 figure 3-16 shows the active memory deduplication being enabled to a shared memory pool. Figure 3-16 enabling the active memory deduplication for a shared memory pool the active memory deduplication feature requires the following minimum components: powervm enterprise e...
Page 166
152 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction dynamic platform optimizer should be launched through the hmc command-line interface with the optmem command (see example 3-1). The lsoptmem command is able to show important information about current, and predicted, ...
Page 167
Chapter 3. Virtualization 153 3.4.9 operating system support for powervm table 3-5 summarizes the powervm features that are supported by the operating systems compatible with the power7+ processor-based servers. Table 3-5 virtualization features supported by aix, ibm i and linux feature aix 5.3 aix ...
Page 168
154 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 3.4.10 linux support ibm linux technology center (ltc) contributes to the development of linux by providing support for ibm hardware in linux distributions. In particular, the ltc makes tools and code available to the...
Page 169
Chapter 3. Virtualization 155 see the following sources of information: for information regarding advance toolchain, see the following website: http://www.Ibm.Com/developerworks/wikis/display/hpccentral/how+to+use+advance+t oolchain+for+linux+on+power see the university of illinois linux on power op...
Page 170: 3.5 System Planning Tool
156 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 3.5 system planning tool the ibm system planning tool (spt) helps you design systems to be partitioned with logical partitions. You can also plan for and design non-partitioned systems by using the spt. The resulting ...
Page 171
Chapter 3. Virtualization 157 3.6 power version 2.2 enhancements the latest available powervm version 2.2 contains the following enhancements: up to 20 logical partitions per core role based access control (rbac) rbac brings an added level of security and flexibility in the administration of virtual...
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158 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction.
Page 173: Continuous Availability and
© copyright ibm corp. 2013. All rights reserved. 159 chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability this chapter provides information about ibm reliability, availability, and serviceability (ras) design and features. This set of technologies, implemented on ibm power systems servers, provides ...
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160 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction ibm is the only vendor that designs, manufactures, and integrates its most critical server components, including the following items: power processors caches memory buffers hub-controllers clock cards service processo...
Page 175: 4.1 Reliability
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 161 4.1 reliability highly reliable systems are built with highly reliable components. On ibm power processor-based systems, this basic principle is expanded upon with a clear design for reliability architecture and methodology. A concentrated, sy...
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162 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 4.1.2 placement of components packaging is designed to deliver both high performance and high reliability. For example, the reliability of electronic components is directly related to their thermal environment, that i...
Page 177: 4.2 Availability
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 163 4.2 availability the ibm hardware and microcode capability to continuously monitor execution of hardware functions is generally described as the process of first-failure data capture (ffdc). This process includes the strategy of predictive fai...
Page 178
164 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction minimum capacity, the partitions are allowed to start or continue running. If processor capacity is insufficient to run a partition at its minimum value, then starting that partition results in an error condition that...
Page 179
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 165 dynamic processor deallocation dynamic processor deallocation enables automatic deconfiguration of processor cores when patterns of recoverable core-related faults are detected. Dynamic processor deallocation prevents a recoverable error from ...
Page 180
166 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction this improvement in the ecc word algorithm replaces the redundant bit steering used on power6 systems. The power 770 and 780, and power7 high-end machines (such as 9119-fhb), have a spare dram chip per rank on each di...
Page 181
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 167 figure 4-3 shows a power7 chip, with its memory interface, consisting of two controllers and four dimms per controller. Advanced memory buffer chips are exclusive to ibm and help to increase performance, acting as read/write buffers. On the po...
Page 182
168 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction finally, if an uncorrectable error in memory is discovered, the logical memory block that is associated with the address with the uncorrectable error is marked for deallocation by the power hypervisor. This deallocati...
Page 183
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 169 what memory is mirrored the following areas of memory are mirrored: hypervisor data that is mirrored – hardware page tables (hpts) that are managed by the hypervisor on behalf of partitions to track the state of the memory pages assigned to th...
Page 184
170 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction measured commercial workloads show no gain or loss in performance because of mirroring. High-performance computing (hpc) workload performing huge amounts of string manipulation might see a slight performance effect. T...
Page 185
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 171 mirroring optimization hypervisor mirroring requires specific memory locations. Those locations might be assign to other purposes (for lpar memory, for example) because of memory’s management based on the logical memory block. To “reclaim” tho...
Page 186
172 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction advanced memory mirroring features on the power 770 server, the advanced memory mirroring for hypervisor function is an optional chargeable feature. It must be selected in e-config. On this server, the advanced memory...
Page 187
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 173 4.2.6 special uncorrectable error handling although rare, an uncorrectable data error can occur in memory or a cache. Ibm power7+ processor-based systems attempt to limit, to the least possible disruption, the impact of an uncorrectable error ...
Page 188
174 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction pci adapters are generally complex designs involving extensive on-board instruction processing, often on embedded microcontrollers. They tend to use industry-standard grade components with an emphasis on product cost ...
Page 189: 4.3 Serviceability
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 175 4.2.8 power7 i/o chip freeze behavior the power7 i/o chip implements a “freeze behavior” for uncorrectable errors borne on the gx+ bus and for internal power7 i/o chip errors detected by the power7 i/o chip. With this freeze behavior, the chip...
Page 190
176 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction service processor the service processor is a microprocessor that is powered separately from the main instruction processing complex. The service processor provides the capabilities for the following items: power hyper...
Page 191
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 177 the auto-restart (reboot) option must be enabled from the advanced system management interface (asmi) or the control (operator) panel. Figure 4-8 shows this option in the asmi. Figure 4-8 asmi auto power restart setting panel fault monitoring ...
Page 192
178 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction error checkers ibm power processor-based systems contain specialized hardware detection circuitry that is used to detect erroneous hardware operations. Error checking hardware ranges from parity error detection couple...
Page 193
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 179 figure 4-9 shows a schematic of a fault isolation register implementation. Figure 4-9 schematic of fir implementation fault isolation the service processor interprets error data that is captured by the ffdc checkers (saved in the firs or other...
Page 194
180 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 4.3.2 diagnosing using the extensive network of advanced and complementary error detection logic that is built directly into hardware, firmware, and operating systems, the ibm power systems servers can perform conside...
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Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 181 4.3.3 reporting in the unlikely event that a system hardware or environmentally induced failure is diagnosed, ibm power systems servers report the error through a number of mechanisms. The analysis result is stored in system nvram. Error log a...
Page 196
182 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction service focal point (sfp) a critical requirement in a logically partitioned environment is to ensure that errors are not lost before being reported for service, and that an error should only be reported once, regardle...
Page 197
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 183 4.3.4 notifying after a power systems server detects, diagnoses, and reports an error to an appropriate aggregation point, it then takes steps to notify the client, and if necessary the ibm support organization. Depending on the assessed sever...
Page 198
184 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 4.3.5 locating and servicing the final component of a comprehensive design for serviceability is the ability to effectively locate and replace parts requiring service. Power processor-based systems use a combination o...
Page 199
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 185 in these situations, guiding light waits for the servicer’s indication of what failure to attend first and then illuminates the leds to the failing component. Data centers can be complex places, and guiding light is designed to do more than id...
Page 200
186 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction concurrent firmware fix pack updates when possible. The determination of whether a firmware fix pack release can be updated concurrently is identified in the readme file that is released with the firmware. Hot-node ad...
Page 201
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 187 introduce no more than two new release levels per year. These release levels will be supported by service packs. Service packs are intended to contain only firmware fixes and not to introduce new function. A service pack is an update to an exi...
Page 202: 4.4 Manageability
188 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction adapter or an internal storage device, the service action is always performed from the operating system of the partition owning that resource. Clients can subscribe through the subscription services to obtain the noti...
Page 203
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 189 processor provides the ability to view and manage the machine-wide settings by using the asmi, and enables complete system and partition management from the management console. With two cec enclosures and more, there are two redundant fsp, one...
Page 204
190 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction you might be able to use the service processor’s default settings. In that case, accessing the asmi is not necessary. To access asmi, use one of the following methods: access the asmi by using a management console. If...
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Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 191 the operator panel the service processor provides an interface to the operator panel, which is used to display system status and diagnostic information. The operator panel can be accessed in two ways: by using the normal operational front view...
Page 206
192 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction online diagnostics, when installed, are a part of the aix or ibm i operating system on the disk or server. They can be booted in single-user mode (service mode), run in maintenance mode, or run concurrently (concurren...
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Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 193 depending on the operating system, you typically see the following service-level functions when you use the operating system service menus: product activity log trace licensed internal code work with communications trace display/alter/dump lic...
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194 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction for access to the initial web pages that address this capability, see the support for ibm systems web page: http://www.Ibm.Com/systems/support for power systems, select the power link (figure 4-11). Figure 4-11 suppor...
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Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 195 if there is a management console to manage the server, the management console interface can be used to view the levels of server firmware and power subsystem firmware that are installed and are available to download and install. Each ibm power...
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196 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction the following example uses the convention: 01am710_086_063 = managed system firmware for 9117-mmb release 710 fixpack 086 an installation is disruptive if the following statements are true: the release levels (sss) of...
Page 211: 4.5 Power7+ Ras Features
Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 197 service agent for problem reporting enables ibm to provide better support and service for your ibm server. To learn how electronic services can work for you, visit the following site; an ibm id is required: https://www.Ibm.Com/support/electron...
Page 212: Providing Ras Capabilities
198 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction 4.6 pore in power7+: assisting energy management and providing ras capabilities the power7+ chip includes a power-on reset engine (pore), a programmable hardware sequencer responsible for restoring the state of a powe...
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Chapter 4. Continuous availability and manageability 199 pci bus extended error detection x x x x x x x pci bus extended error recovery x x x x most most most pci-pci bridge extended error handling x x x x - - - redundant rio or 12x channel link x x x x x x x pci card hot-swap x x x x x x x dynamic ...
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200 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction firmware error codes x x x x x x x operating system error codes x x x x most most most inventory collection x x x x x x x environmental and power warnings x x x x x x x hot-plug fans, power supplies x x x x x x x exte...
Page 215: Related Publications
© copyright ibm corp. 2013. All rights reserved. 201 related publications the publications listed in this section are considered particularly suitable for a more detailed discussion of the topics covered in this paper. Ibm redbooks the following ibm redbooks publications provide additional informati...
Page 216: Other Publications
202 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction other publications these publications are also relevant as further information sources: ibm power systems facts and features power7 blades and servers http://www.Ibm.Com/systems/power/hardware/reports/factsfeatures.Ht...
Page 217: Online Resources
Related publications 203 online resources these websites are also relevant as further information sources: ibm power systems hardware information center http://publib.Boulder.Ibm.Com/infocenter/systems/scope/hw/index.Jsp ibm system planning tool website http://www.Ibm.Com/systems/support/tools/syste...
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204 ibm power 770 and 780 (9117-mmd, 9179-mhd) technical overview and introduction.
Page 220: Red
® redp-4924-00 international technical support organization building technical information based on practical experience ibm redbooks are developed by the ibm international technical support organization. Experts from ibm, customers and partners from around the world create timely technical informat...