(revised 5/4/2010)

First, I’d like to thank HP for inviting me to HP Tech Day in Houston. I’m honored that I was chosen and hope that I’m invited back – event after my challenging questions about the Tolly Report. It was a fun packed day and a half, and while it was a great event, I won’t miss having to hashtag (#hpbladesday) all my tweets. I figured I’d use this last day to offer up my final thoughts – for what they are worth.

Blogger Attendees
As some of you may know, I’m still the rookie of this blogging community – especially in the group of invitees, so I didn’t have a history with anyone in the group, except Rich Brambley of http://vmetc.com .  However, this did not matter, as they all welcomed me as if I were one of their own.  In fact, they even treated me to a practical joke, letting me walk around HP’s Factory Express tour for hal an hour with a Proliant DL180 G6 sticker on my back (thanks to Stephen and Greg for that one.) Yes, that’s me in the picture.

All jokes aside, these bloggers were top class, and they offer up some great blogs, so if you don’t check them out daily, please make sure to visit them.  Here’s the list of attendees and their sites:

Rich Brambley: http://vmetc.com

Greg Knieriemen: http://www.storagemonkeys.com/  and http://iKnerd.com
Also check out Greg’s notorious podcast, “Infosmack” (if you like it, make sure to subscribe via iTunes)

Chris Evans: http://thestoragearchitect.com

Simon Seagrave: http://techhead.co.uk

John Obeto: http://absolutelywindows.com 
(don’t mention VMware or Linux to him, he’s all Microsoft)

Frank Owen: http://techvirtuoso.com

Martin Macleod: http://www.bladewatch.com/

Stephen Foskett: http://gestaltit.com/ and http://blog.fosketts.net/

Devang Panchigar: http://www.storagenerve.com

A special thanks to the extensive HP team who participated in the blogging efforts as well. 

HP Demos and Factory Express Tour
I think I got the most out of this event from the live demos and the Factory Express tour.  These are things that you can read about, but until you see them in person, you can’t appreciate the value that HP brings to the table, through their product design and through their services.

The image on the left shows the MDS6000 MDS600 storage shelf – something that I’ve read about many times, but until I saw it, I didn’t realize how cool, and useful, it was.  70 drives in a 5u space.  That’s huge.  Seeing things like this, live and in person, is what these HP Tech Days need to be about.  Hands-on, live demos. and tours of what makes HP tick.

The Factory Express Tour was really cool.  I think we should have been allowed to work the line for an hour along with the HP employees.  On this tour we saw how customized HP Server builds go from being an order, to being a solution.  Workers like the one in the picture on the right typically do 30 servers a day, depending on the type of server.  The entire process involves testing and 100% audits to insure accuracy.

My words won’t do HP Factory Express justice, so check out this video from YouTube:

For a full list of my pictures taken during this event, please check out:
http://tweetphoto.com/user/kevin_houston

http://picasaweb.google.com/101667790492270812102/HPTechDay2010#

Feedback to the HP team for future events:
1) Keep the blogger group small
2) Keep it to HP demos and presentations (no partners, please)
3) More time on hands-on, live demos and tours.  This is where the magic is.
4) Try and do this at least once a quarter.  HP’s doing a great job building their social media teams, and this event goes a long way in creating that buzz.

Thanks again, HP, and to Ivy Worldwide (http://www.ivyworldwide.com) for doing a great job.  I hope to attend again!

Disclaimer: airfare, accommodations and meals are being provided by HP, however the content being blogged is solely my opinion and does not in anyway express the opinions of HP.

Wow – the first day of HP Tech Day 2010 was jammed pack full of meetings, presentations and good information.  Unfortunately, it appears there won’t be any confidential, earth shattering news to report on, but it has still been a great event to attend.

My favorite part of the day was going to the HP BladeSystem demo, where we not only got to get our hands on the blade servers, but we got to see what the mid-plane and power bus looks like outside the chassis. 

From HP Tech Day 2010

Kudos to James Singer, HP Blade engineer, who did a great job talking about the HP BladeSystem and all it offers.  My only advice to the HP events team is to double the time we get with the blades next time.  (Isn’t that why were were here?)

Since I spent most of the day Tweeting what was going on, I figured it would be easiest to just list my tweets throughout the day.  If you have any questions about any of this, let me know.

My tweets from 2/25/2010 (latest to earliest):

Q&A from HP StorageWorks CTO, Paul Perez

• “the era of spindles for IOPS will be over soon.” Paul Perez, CTO HP StorageWorks
• CTO Perez said Memristors (http://tinyurl.com/39f6br) are the next major evolution in storage – in next 2 or 3 years
• CTO Perez views Solid State (Drives) as an extension of main memory.
• HP StorageWorks CTO, Paul Perez, now discussing HP StorageWorks X9000 Network Storage System (formerly known as IBRIX)
• @SFoskett is grilling the CTO of HP StorageWorks
• Paul Perez – CTO of StorageWorks is now in the room

Competitive Discussion

• Kudos to Gary Thome , Chief Architect at HP, for not wanting to bash any vendor during the competitive blade session
• Cool – we have a first look at a Tolly report comparing HP BladeSystem Flex-10 vs Cisco UCS…
• @fowen Yes – a 10Gb, a CNA and a virtual adapter. Cisco doesn’t have anything “on the motherboard” though.
• RT @fowen: HP is the only vendor (currently) who can embed 10GB nics in Blades @hpbladeday AND Cisco…
• Wish HP allowed more time for deep dive into their blades at #hpbladesday. We’re rushing through in 20 min content that needs an hour.
• Dell’s M1000 blade chassis has the blade connector pins on the server side. This causes a lot of issues as pins bend
• I’m going to have to bite my tongue on this competitive discussion between blade vendors…
• Mentioning HP’s presence in Gartner’s Magic Quadrant (see my previous post on this here) –> http://tinyurl.com/ydbsnan
• Fun – now we get to hear how HP blades are better than IBM, Cisco and Dell

HP BladeSystem Matrix Demo

• Brian Jacquol and Ute Albert are demo’ing the HP BladeSystem Matrix
• RT @Connect_WW: Dan Bowers’ Early Afternoon Update at HP Blades Tech Day #hpbladesday http://bit.ly/9lxga0

Insight Software Demo

• Whoops – previous picture was “Tom Turicchi” not John Schmitz
• John Schmitz, HP, demonstrates HP Insight Software http://tinyurl.com/yjnu3o9
• HP Insight Control comes with “Data Center Power Control” which allows you to define rules for power control inside your DC
• HP Insight Control = “Essential Management”; HP Insight Dynamics = “Advanced Management”
• Live #hpBladesday Tweet Feed can be seen at http://tinyurl.com/ygcaq2a

BladeSystem in the Lab

• c7000 Power Bus (rear) http://tinyurl.com/yjy3kwy #hpbladesday complete list of pics can be found @ http://tinyurl.com/yl465v9
• HP c7000 Power Bus (front) http://tinyurl.com/yfwg88t #hpbladesday (one more pic coming…)
• HP c7000 Midplane (rear) http://tinyurl.com/yhozte6
• HP BladeSystem C7000 Midplane (front) http://tinyurl.com/ylbr9rd
• BladeSystem lab was friggin awesome. Pics to follow
• 23 power “steppings” on each BladeSystem fan
• 4 fan zones in a HP BladeSystem allows for fans to spin at different rates. – controlled by the Onboard Administrator
• The designs of the HP BladeSystem cooling fans came from Ducted Electric Jet Fans from hobby planes) http://tinyurl.com/yhug94w
• Check out the HP SB40c Storage Blade with the cover off : http://tinyurl.com/yj6xode
• James Singer – talking about HP BladeSystem power (http://tinyurl.com/ykfhbb2)
• DPS takes total loads and pushes on fewer supplies which maximizes the power efficiency
• DPS – Dynamic Power Saver dynamically turns power supplies off based on the server loads (HP exclusive technology)
• HP BladeSystem power supplies are 94% efficient
• HP’s hot-pluggable equipment is not purple, it’s “port wine”
• Here’s the HP BladeSystem C3500 (1/2 of a C7000) http://tinyurl.com/yhbpddt
• In BladeSystem demo with James Singer (HP). Very cool. They’ve got a C3500 (C7000 cut in half.) Picture will come later.

 Lunch

• Having lunch with Dan Bowers (HP marketing) and Gary Thome – talking about enhancements need for Proliant support materials

 Virtual Connect

• HP’s published a “Virtual Connect for Dummies” Want a copy? Go to http://tinyurl.com/yhubgld
• New blog posting, HP Tech Day – Live TweetFeed – http://tinyurl.com/yegm9a5
• Next presenter – Mike Kendall – Virtual Connect and Network Convergence

ISB Overview and Data Center Trends 2010

• check out all my previous HP posts at http://tinyurl.com/yzx3hx6
• BladeSystem midplane doesn’t require transceivers, so it’s easy to run 10Gb at same cost as 1Gb
• BladeSystem was designed for 10Gb (with even higher in mind.)
• RT @SFoskett: Spot the secret “G” (for @GestaltIT?) in this #HPBladesDay Nth Generation slide! http://twitpic.com/159q23 
• If Cisco wants to be like HP, they’d have to buy Lenovo, Canon and Dunder Mifflon
• discussed how HP blades were used in Avatar (see my post on this here )–> http://tinyurl.com/yl32xud
• HP’s Virtual Client Infra. Solutions design allows you to build “bricks” of servers and storage to serve 1000′s of virtual PCs
• Power capping is built into HP hardware (it’s not in the software.)
• Power Capping is a key technology in the HP Thermal Logic design.
• HP’s Thermal Logic technology allows you to actively manage power overtime.

If this widget isn’t working, check out the archive at: http://twapperkeeper.com/hpbladesday/

Today kicks off the HP Blades and Infrastructure Software Tech Day 2010 (aka HP Blades Day). I’ll be updating this site frequently throughout the day, so be sure to check back. You can quickly view all of the HP Tech Day info by clicking on the “Category” tab on the left and choose “HPTechDay2010.” For live updates, follow me on Twitter @Kevin_Houston.

Here’s our agenda for today (Day 1):

9:10 – 10:00 ISB Overview and Key Data Center Trends 2010
10:00 – 10:30 Nth Generation Computing Presentation
10:45 – 11:45 Virtual Connect
1:00 – 3:00 BladeSystem in the Lab (Overview and Demo) and Insight Software (Overview and Demo)
3:15 – 4:15 Matrix
4:15 – 4:45 Competitive Discussion
5:00 – 5:45 Podcast roundtable with Storage Monkeys

Note: gaps in the times above indicate a break or lunch.

For extensive coverage, make sure you check in on the rest of the attendees’ blogs:

Rich Brambley: http://vmetc.com
Greg Knieremen: http://www.storagemonkeys.com/
Chris Evans: http://thestoragearchitect.com
Simon Seagrave: http://techhead.co.uk
John Obeto: http://absolutelywindows.com
Frank Owen: http://techvirtuoso.com
Martin Macleod: http://www.bladewatch.com/
Steven Foskett: http://blog.fosketts.net/
Devang Panchigar: http://www.storagenerve.com

Disclaimer: airfare, accommodations and meals are being provided by HP, however the content being blogged is solely my opinion and does not in anyway express the opinions of HP.