HP Integrity rx4640 Server AB370B#001 プリント
製品コード
AB370B#001
2
WellPoint, Inc. concentrates on establishing higher
levels of excellence in health outcomes. Similarly, the
company’s Chief Technology Office (CTO) focuses on
bringing excellence to the company’s computing
infrastructure economically. According to Nancy
Perlman, Manager—Infrastructure Architecture for the
company, the CTO is able to achieve these results by
enacting IT standards and insisting on performance,
scalability, and resilience. WellPoint is growing
through acquisitions and mergers; therefore, it
requires an IT infrastructure to carry the company
into the future.
levels of excellence in health outcomes. Similarly, the
company’s Chief Technology Office (CTO) focuses on
bringing excellence to the company’s computing
infrastructure economically. According to Nancy
Perlman, Manager—Infrastructure Architecture for the
company, the CTO is able to achieve these results by
enacting IT standards and insisting on performance,
scalability, and resilience. WellPoint is growing
through acquisitions and mergers; therefore, it
requires an IT infrastructure to carry the company
into the future.
Top-of-the-list initiatives for the CTO staff these days are
32- to 64-bit application migrations and Microsoft SQL
Server consolidations. The staff has already combined
some of the database instances and put as many as
they could on 21 paired clusters. Yet, the company’s
SQL Server landscape is still extensive, comprising 251
physical servers in a Richmond, Virginia data center.
The servers are a mixture of HP ProLiant DL580 G2
and DL380 G3 models. Some of the SQL Server 2000
databases are only 30 GB in size, but they operate
individually on a dedicated server. IBM maintains the
server platform—including the HP servers—and
provides provisioning and maintenance at a monthly
charge per server. Says Perlman, “It is in WellPoint’s
best interests to reduce its server count, which in turn,
will lower outsourcing costs.”
32- to 64-bit application migrations and Microsoft SQL
Server consolidations. The staff has already combined
some of the database instances and put as many as
they could on 21 paired clusters. Yet, the company’s
SQL Server landscape is still extensive, comprising 251
physical servers in a Richmond, Virginia data center.
The servers are a mixture of HP ProLiant DL580 G2
and DL380 G3 models. Some of the SQL Server 2000
databases are only 30 GB in size, but they operate
individually on a dedicated server. IBM maintains the
server platform—including the HP servers—and
provides provisioning and maintenance at a monthly
charge per server. Says Perlman, “It is in WellPoint’s
best interests to reduce its server count, which in turn,
will lower outsourcing costs.”
Consequently, the staff wanted to evaluate the
performance of 64-bit Microsoft SQL 2005 on a
Dual-Core Intel Itanium 2 processor-based system with
Microsoft Windows
performance of 64-bit Microsoft SQL 2005 on a
Dual-Core Intel Itanium 2 processor-based system with
Microsoft Windows
®
2003 (64-bit) as the underlying
application. They also wanted to determine how
many databases they could pile on a single server.
HP loaned WellPoint an HP Integrity rx4640 Server
to conduct the benchmarks.
many databases they could pile on a single server.
HP loaned WellPoint an HP Integrity rx4640 Server
to conduct the benchmarks.
“I had done some research on my own, so I could
see the benefit of using Itanium-based systems to run
heavily used databases and Windows, and the way
Itanium processors employ large L2 caches to provide
significant performance,” explains Shawn Peddicord,
Advisor—Technical Design Manager in the CTO
group.
see the benefit of using Itanium-based systems to run
heavily used databases and Windows, and the way
Itanium processors employ large L2 caches to provide
significant performance,” explains Shawn Peddicord,
Advisor—Technical Design Manager in the CTO
group.
Use of Integrity servers will translate into cost savings
The WellPoint team, collaborating with HP and Intel,
tested the server using the Wellpoint Performance
Trend Database Feed application, which compares
to a heavy-use production WellPoint SQL Server
application with long batch runtimes. The barrage of
tests included linear scalability, CPU and memory
utilization, and throughput scalability (64-bit vs. 32-bit
applications).
The WellPoint team, collaborating with HP and Intel,
tested the server using the Wellpoint Performance
Trend Database Feed application, which compares
to a heavy-use production WellPoint SQL Server
application with long batch runtimes. The barrage of
tests included linear scalability, CPU and memory
utilization, and throughput scalability (64-bit vs. 32-bit
applications).
“It was surprising to us that Microsoft SQL
2005 on a default setting right out of the
box gave us our best results—without any
tweaking. This indicates the outstanding
collaboration among HP, Microsoft, and
Intel, because performance this good
doesn’t happen by luck.”
— Shawn Peddicord, Advisor—Technical
Design, WellPoint, Inc.
2005 on a default setting right out of the
box gave us our best results—without any
tweaking. This indicates the outstanding
collaboration among HP, Microsoft, and
Intel, because performance this good
doesn’t happen by luck.”
— Shawn Peddicord, Advisor—Technical
Design, WellPoint, Inc.