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power management

Virtual Iron Releases Version 4.4, Introduces LivePower For Power Management

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Virtual Iron Software today announced new power management capabilities in the latest version of its software, Virtual Iron Version 4.4. This release extends Virtual Iron’s virtual infrastructure management capabilities with the addition of LivePower, a new experimental feature that optimizes power usage to deliver significant cost-savings and environmental benefits across the data center.

LivePower, available with Virtual Iron Version 4.4, optimizes data center power consumption by monitoring resource utilization in the virtual data center. When there is excess CPU capacity, LivePower consolidates virtual machines onto fewer physical servers and shuts down the remaining devices based on pre-defined policies. When the virtual machine load increases beyond pre-defined thresholds, LivePower turns physical servers back on and live migrates virtual machines to rebalance the virtual data center and ensure that resource requirements and service levels are met.
Virtual Iron also became the first server virtualization software provider to announce support for Intel Dynamic Power Node Manager, which will be available with Intel Next Generation Platform (Nehalem-EP). Node Manager utilizes processor and platform level instrumentation, controls, and OS features to monitor, report, and control system power. Node Manager, in combination with Virtual Iron’s LivePower, enables users to automatically maintain power budgets, turn servers off and on, and optimize power consumption.

Virtual Iron Version 4.4 will be generally available later this month with LivePower.

Virtual Iron

Avocent Releases DSView 3 Power Manager, Lets You Track Power Consumption In Your Data Center

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Avocent has introduced new power management software that enables users to monitor and measure the power consumption and energy usage of IT equipment in data centers in real time. DSView 3 Power Manager is an add-on “plug-in” to Avocent’s DSView 3 management software that provides centralized management for physical and virtual IT assets. DSView 3 Power Manager adds the ability to gather and aggregate power information, whether that be a power distribution unit, rack, or row of racks, to “help data center managers improve operating efficiencies, reduce outages, and reduce overall energy consumption costs”.

Avocent

The news release cites a recent IDC study, which found that the expense to power and cool the worldwide installed base of servers will grow to $44.5 billion, equivalent to 70 % of new server spending, by 2010.

Avocent’s claims its new DSView 3 Power Manager is able to provide energy consumption level data for a consolidated view of energy use within the data center. It aggregates electrical usage by kilowatt (kW) and converts it into kilowatt hours (kWh) – how companies are charged for electricity. Through the software’s cost calculator, users can enter their utility charges to calculate power costs making it possible for IT departments to monitor and chargeback power usage costs.

The Avocent DSView 3 Power Manager offers a number of reporting and alarm features to further help IT managers track power consumption, including:

  • Consumption Reports: track power and energy consumption for user-defined time periods for data centers, power source busses, racks
  • Trend Reports: tracks power consumption over time and aggregates data for customized usage reports
  • Thresholds: set warning and critical level thresholds with customizable actions for when thresholds are exceeded
  • Alarms: customizable alarms provide preemptive notification when thresholds are approached

The DSView 3 Power Manager is compatible with the latest revision of Avocent DSView 3 software and both will be available in July. The new revision of DSView 3 software, version 3.6, will feature improved functionality and ease of use with simpler deployment and maintenance, more thorough device support, and enhanced VMware support for combined access and control of both virtual and physical servers.