HP BL e-Class Redundant Crosslinks, Integrated Administrator, Interconnect Switch Modules, Redundant Paths to Server Blades

Introduction

Integrated Administrator

The ProLiant BL e-Class Integrated Administrator provides centralized, remote management and monitoring for the ProLiant BL e-Class server blade enclosure, interconnect switch module, and 20 server blades. The Integrated Administrator acts as a combination terminal server and remote power controller, enabling out-of-band, secure, serial console connections to all server blades in the enclosure.

The Integrated Administrator serves as a single access point for administrative functions. It provides remote and local setup, deployment, and administrative support, as well as monitoring and health reporting of server blades, interconnect switch modules, and other components in the enclosure, such as power supplies and fans.

Interconnect Switch Modules

Two interconnect switch modules (Switch A and Switch B) in the interconnect switch provide switch redundancy and redundant paths to the network ports on the server blades.

Each interconnect switch has two GB uplink ports and direct connections to one of the two network interface cards (NICs) (NIC 1 and NIC 2) on each server blade. The interconnect switch reduces as many as forty 10/100 Ethernet ports on the server blade into

as few as one (up to four) Gigabit uplink ports on the back of the system.

Redundant Crosslinks

The two interconnect switch modules are connected through redundant 100-Mb crosslinks. These two crosslinks provide an aggregate throughput of 200 Mb for traffic between the switch modules.

Redundant Paths to Server Blades

The NICs of each server blade are routed through the enclosure’s centerwall assembly to different switch modules. By default, NIC 1 on each server blade is routed to Switch A and NIC 2 on each server blade is routed to Switch B. This configuration provides redundant paths to each server.

IMPORTANT: On a heavily used system, using a single uplink port for all 40 NICs can cause a traffic bottleneck. For example, if uplink 1 on Switch A is the only uplink used, all traffic to and from NIC 2 on any of the server blades must travel over the crosslinks between Switch A and Switch B. This path to the server blade NICs is intended as a failover route and should not be used as a primary path. For optimum performance, use uplink ports from both switch modules.

HP ProLiant BL e-Class C-GbE Interconnect Switch User Guide 1-5