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Active Infrastructure – Sales FAQ

Dell Confidential – Internal Use Page 1

ACTIVE INFRASTRUCTURE DELL’S FAMILY OF CONVERGED INFRASTRUCTURE

SYSTEMS AND SOLUTIONS

Sales and Marketing FAQ



Revision History

Version Revisions Update Date

1.0 Initial version for US only launch October 18, 2012

2.0 Updated for Gale Technologies acquisition November 16, 2012



Table of Contents

1. Active Infrastructure ........................................................................................................... 7

1.1 What is converged infrastructure? What customer problems does it address? ................ 7

1.2 What is Active Infrastructure? ....................................................................................................... 7

1.3 How can my customer deploy Active Infrastructure? ............................................................ 8

1.4 Is Dell late to market with this new class of IT infrastructure offerings? .............................9

1.5 How is Active Infrastructure different than other solutions on the market? .....................10

1.6 How do we talk about Dell’s design philosophy of being “open” in the context of

converged infrastructure and our Active Infrastructure offerings? .................................................10

1.7 What does Dell mean by comprehensive? .............................................................................. 11

1.8 What do we mean by strengthening IT service quality? Did we provide poor quality in

the past? ..................................................................................................................................................... 11

1.9 How do customers vertically integrate our Active Infrastructure offerings into their

environment, either from a physical standpoint (network) or management standpoint (via

Active System Manager)? ........................................................................................................................ 12

1.10 Will an IT Consulting Services engagement be required for Active Infrastructure? ........ 12

1.11 Will our channel partners be able to provide Professional Services? ................................. 12

1.12 Is vStart part of Active Infrastructure? What customers are the ideal targets for the

existing vStarts? ......................................................................................................................................... 12

1.13 What is the future of vStart? ....................................................................................................... 13

1.14 What Active Solutions are either available or will be shortly available? ............................. 13

1.15 How might possible acquisitions impact Active Infrastructure? ......................................... 14

2. Active System ..................................................................................................................... 14

2.1 What is Active System? ................................................................................................................ 14

2.2 What is the Active System Matrix? ............................................................................................. 15

2.1 Why is the new Force10 MXL not included in the initial Active System Matrix? ............... 15

2.2 Is Active System available as only a Greenfield purchase and implementation? ............. 15

3. Active System Manager ..................................................................................................... 16

3.1 What is Active System Manager? ............................................................................................... 16



3.2 How does Active System Manager fit with Active System? .................................................. 16

3.3 How will customers purchase Active System Manager?....................................................... 16

3.4 How does Active System Manager integrated into other System Management tools

from BMC, Microsoft, VMware, and so forth. Does it have APIs that will be published for

others to use to create integrations? .................................................................................................... 17

3.5 Will Active System Manager work with OpenManage Essentials, VIS Creator, Dell

Management Plug-in for VMware vCenter, or any other Dell tool? ............................................... 17

3.6 What is the pricing and licensing model for Active System Manager? ............................... 17

3.7 Can Active System Manager be sold to customers that already have pre-requisite

hardware from the Active System Matrix (i.e., is Active System Manager available APOS)? ....... 18

3.8 What is the product delivery and customer install process for Active System Manager?

19

3.9 What is the support model for Active System Manager? ...................................................... 19

3.10 When will role-based access control (RBAC) be available? ................................................. 19

3.11 Will non-Dell hardware be supported with Active System Manager? ................................ 19

3.12 Will Active System Manager only work with blades? What about racks? ......................... 20

3.13 Will Active System Manager support previous generation Dell servers and chassis (11G

or earlier)? ................................................................................................................................................. 20

3.14 Will Active System Manager support the M8024-K? ............................................................ 20

3.15 Will Active System Manager support integration to top-of-rack (ToR) switches? .......... 20

3.16 Are there plans for OS/Hypervisor deployment capabilities to be available within Active

System Manager? .................................................................................................................................... 20

3.17 Will Active System Manager support PowerEdge-C or DCS servers? ................................ 21

3.18 Why does Active System Manager not support the M520 server? ...................................... 21

3.19 Will Active System Manager support native fibre channel in the chassis? ......................... 21

3.20 Will Active System Manager support the EqualLogic PS-M4110 blade array? .............. 21

3.21 What are the scale limitations for Active System Manager? ................................................. 21

4. Active System 800 ............................................................................................................ 22

4.1 What is Active System 800? ....................................................................................................... 22

4.2 How does Active System 800 fit with Active Infrastructure? .............................................. 22

4.3 What installation and support services are included with Active System 800? ............... 22

4.4 Does Active System 800 support a non-Dell network? ....................................................... 22



4.1 Is it possible to order an Active System 800 with less than the 8 blade configuration? 23

4.2 When will Active System 800 be available? ............................................................................ 23

4.3 What is the pricing for Active System 800? ............................................................................ 24

5. Dell vStart ........................................................................................................................... 24

See the separate vStart FAQ on SalesEdge. ......................................................................... 24

6. Ecosystem .......................................................................................................................... 24

6.1 How will products from the Quest Software portfolio be integrated with Active

Infrastructure? .......................................................................................................................................... 24

6.2 What role does Dell AIM (Advanced Infrastructure Manager) play in our converged

infrastructure strategy? Is AIM still available? .................................................................................... 25

7. HP Converged System Competitive ...............................................................................25

7.1 How does Dell approach to converged infrastructure contrasts to HP? ......................... 25

7.2 How does the Dell Active System align against HP’s Converged Systems? ..................... 26

7.3 How is HP’s converged infrastructure approach complex and costly? ............................ 26

7.4 How does the new Dell PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator compare to HP’s Virtual

Connect and FlexFabric I/O module? .................................................................................................. 27

7.5 Is Dell going to offer a fibre channel direct connection from the blade chassis, similar

to the 3PAR Direct Connect announcement? ................................................................................... 28

7.6 How do the infrastructure management experiences compare between HP

BladeSystem and Dell Active System? ................................................................................................. 28

8. Cisco Unified Compute System and Partners Competitive ....................................... 28

8.1 How does Dell approach to converged infrastructure contrasts to Cisco?..................... 28

8.2 How does the Dell Active System align against Cisco’s UCS? ............................................ 29

8.3 How is Cisco’s converged infrastructure approach inflexible and incomplete? ............. 30

8.4 How does the new Dell PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator compare to Cisco UCS’s

networking architecture? ........................................................................................................................ 31

8.5 How do the infrastructure management experiences compare between Cisco UCS

Manager and Dell Active System Manager? ....................................................................................... 32

9. Acquisition of Gale Technologies .................................................................................. 34

9.1 Who is Gale Technologies and what does it provide today? .............................................. 34

9.2 How does Gale Technologies fit within Dell’s converged infrastructure strategy and

product plans? ......................................................................................................................................... 34



9.3 What is the implication of the Gale Technologies acquisition on its existing customers?

34

9.4 What is the immediate implication of Dell’s acquisition of Gale Technologies? What do

I tell my customers who are interested in converged infrastructure?........................................... 35

9.5 I have a current Gale Technologies customer. What do I tell them? ............................... 35

9.6 What is the newly announced product and addition to Active System Manager that is

based on Gale Technologies? ............................................................................................................... 36

9.7 How does the new announced product based on Gale Technologies compare to VIS

Creator/VMware vCAC? ......................................................................................................................... 36



1. Active Infrastructure

1.1 What is converged infrastructure? What customer problems does it address?

The majority of IT organizations have adopted x86 server virtualization to increase their server

utilization and reduce capital expenditures, create greater flexibility of how they use their data

center infrastructure, improve the resiliency of the compute infrastructure, and boost the

management efficiency (number of server instances that a single admin can manage) of the

server administrator. They have built their virtualization infrastructure by selecting individual

platforms (server, storage, and networking) on a best-of-breed basis and managing the virtual

infrastructure using existing system management tools optimized for the individual platforms

and for physical environments.

In the last several years, a new paradigm for an x86 virtual computing infrastructure called

converged infrastructure has gained initial acceptance. An ideal converged infrastructure is an

integrated system of compute, storage, networking that is managed holistically by a single

software tool and provides pools of virtualized resources that be used to run applications, virtual

desktop infrastructure and private clouds.

Every major IT industry infrastructure provider has a version of converged infrastructure systems:

HP BladeSystem/VirtualSystem,/CloudSystem, Cisco UCS, VCE vBlock (with EMC), NetApp

FlexPOD, IBM PureSystem, Hitachi UCP, and Fujitsu Dynamic Infrastructure.

1.2 What is Active Infrastructure?

Active Infrastructure is the name of Dell’s family of converged infrastructure systems and solutions that blends intuitive infrastructure management, an open architecture, flexible delivery models, and a unified support experience to help IT organizations optimize their agility, efficiency, and IT service quality.

The product strategy for Active Infrastructure has four key elements.

• Modular infrastructure: modular servers, virtual networking, and fluid data platforms connected with merged SAN and Ethernet fabrics.

• Converged management: unified infrastructure operations for infrastructure teams using simple and intuitive tools for repetitive, common tasks.

• Delivery models: flexible means for customers to deploy Active Infrastructure, ranging from fully pre-integrated systems to a DIY approach.

• Active Solution reference architectures: flexible blueprints to deploy Enterprise Applications, VDI, and private clouds solutions that include Active Infrastructure

Active Infrastructure allows IT organizations to:



• Rapidly respond to dynamic business demands with template based infrastructure provisioning & modular infrastructure

• Maximize data center efficiency with automated management of pre-validated infrastructure platforms supported by a single vendor

• Strengthen IT service quality with repeatable deployment, integration, and management models

Active Infrastructure includes existing vStart models as well as the new Active Systems that developed from scratch to be an optimized converged infrastructure system.

Note: Active System Matrix not shown.

1.3 How can my customer deploy Active Infrastructure?

Active Infrastructure can be deployed in three distinct ways

• Pre-Integrated Systems– these are fully pre-integrated converged infrastructure systems that include servers, storage, networking, rack infrastructure, management and enterprise deployment services. They are pre-engineered, pre-assembled, and pre-pre-tested before their delivery to a customer’s location. Each pre-integrated system is built based on a standard architecture, and is optimized to get the best possible operational efficiency and availability. This delivery model offers customers maximum integration and superior speed of deployment. The current pre-integrated systems include the current vStart models and the new Active System 800.

• Platform Reference Architectures– these pre-engineered reference architectures

provides a customizable blueprint for building virtualized infrastructure using the Active

Infrastructure family. The result of pre-validating is consistency in the solution’s

performance, availability, and scalability attributes. This deployment model offers



customers a middle ground between the DIY and pre-integrated systems, and provides a

good balance between choice and integration. Two groups of Platform Reference Architectures are available that are based on the fully pre-integrated systems: vStart Architectures and Active System Architectures

• Pre-Validated Active System Matrix – this option provide guidance on the best-in-class products that have been optimized for convergence and are managed holistically using the Active System Manager. It provides customer the ability to custom-tailor an Active System implementation to meet their specific needs. The Pre-validated System Matrix delivers the ultimate in choice and maximizes deployment flexibility for an Active System.

1.4 Is Dell late to market with this new class of IT infrastructure offerings?

Dell does not believe it is late to the market. While Dell has not been as visible with its

converged infrastructure strategy and marketing, we have been steadily executing on a multi-

year, multi-billion dollar IP path to transform Dell into an end-to-end enterprise IT solutions and

services provider. The development of a holistic and purpose-built converged infrastructure

offering, Active System, is a key element of that broader strategy.

The converged infrastructure market is still nascent, with less than 10% adoption by the market.

We are aligned to where the market is, and we will be side-by-side with customers in their

adoption journey. We are focused on addressing their most immediate needs for converged

infrastructure. Customer requirements are continue to evolve and we are going towards where



customers are going, and not targeted the paradigms of the earliest converged infrastructure

offerings.

1.5 How is Active Infrastructure different than other solutions on the market?

Dell Active Infrastructure offers exceptional technical capabilities, but focuses on improving on the other converged infrastructure offerings on the market today that force customer to make compromises when they adopt these solutions. Active Infrastructure provides converged infrastructure systems that are more intuitive, flexible, and comprehensive.

Active Infrastructure systems are compatible with existing data center architectures and don’t lock our customers into a proprietary model like some competitive offerings. These competitive offerings are built to operate in a single way and may not support customer needs over time, and may not integrate with existing management offerings in a simple way.

Next, Dell has a history of customer led innovation, leading to products and tools that are intuitive to set-up and easy to keep using. Our focus on x86 solutions also allows us to develop products and solutions without competing priorities that oftentimes lead to compromises in usability and functionality. Competitive offerings are oftentimes difficult to implement, integrate, and use; or require multiple tools that don’t easily integrate to address core customer requirements. This complexity drives up costs on up-front product purchases, solution integration, and ongoing support/maintenance costs (e.g. licensing, training).

Finally, Dell offers end to end solutions; complete with servers, storage, networking, and management, all delivered with integrated support. As a result, Dell can address the customer’s entire infrastructure lifecycle experience and help drive down the overall total-cost-of-ownership. Competitive solutions may lack key elements such as storage, or support for physical infrastructure.

1.6 How do we talk about Dell’s design philosophy of being “open” in the context of converged infrastructure and our Active Infrastructure offerings?

By definition, since converged infrastructure offerings are ideally better integrated than a stand-alone approach to infrastructure, they are all “closed” to some degree. For example, a blade chassis can only accommodating that vendor’s blades or I/O modules. However, the various converged infrastructure offerings available today have different degrees of being proprietary versus open. The Dell approach is more open than competitive solutions in the market.

For example, Cisco has tied together blades, management, and end to end networking from an architectural standpoint. Dell, on the other hand, incorporates blades, management, and the networking edge to generate similar benefits (efficiency, workload mobility, workload quality) while providing greater flexibility to customers. When a customer chooses Cisco, they are locking themselves into a very closed and broad architecture. With Dell, they are still able to connect to a ToR switch from Dell or alternative vendors like Cisco, HP, and Juniper, thereby helping them leverage existing investments. Dell also leverages open platforms in its converged



infrastructure designs so a customer may use a Dell blade server in a converged and a non-converged implementation.

1.7 What does Dell mean by comprehensive?

Competitive solutions may lack key IP elements, such as storage, support for physical and virtual infrastructure, or comprehensive management higher in the stack. Dell offers end to end solutions; complete with servers, storage, networking, and management, all delivered with unified solution support. Dell also offers a broad set of complementary software offerings across security, data protection, and performance management and complementary services offerings across cloud and virtualization consulting, application migration and modernization, managed security services, and public cloud services.

Putting together a solution through partnerships can work, but it leads to complexity in solution design, integration, and support. This complexity in turn leads to inherent inefficiencies in system performance, availability, flexibility, and support. The support piece is critical, as cobbling together support across vendors is oftentimes an afterthought, and we see this illustrated by customers coming to Dell asking for a single vendor solutions, after having tried the multi-vendor route previously.

1.8 What do we mean by strengthening IT service quality? Did we provide poor quality in the past?

No, Dell has always provided our customers with high-quality products and will continue to do in the future. The quality we refer to in this case focuses on improving overall IT service quality in our customer’s data centers in the form of better availability and assured application performance. With our Active Infrastructure offerings, Dell’s is working to simplify physical infrastructure integration and configuration as a means to improve IT service quality in support of application, virtual desktop infrastructure and private cloud initiatives.

For example, we incorporate modular blades whenever possible as an ideal to simplify the integration of various infrastructure options. This minimizes the possibility of incorrect cabling of a server to other components.

Active System Manager further strengthens IT service quality by enforcing best practice configurations. Active System Manager leverages templates, based on standards, to automate infrastructure set-up, which not only greatly simplifies and speeds up the process, but also greatly reduces errors associated with manual set-up. This results in better initial infrastructure quality with fewer configuration errors, and also drives down potential future issues (because it enforces configurations based on best practices) while enhancing productivity within IT teams.

Lastly, by its very nature, custom designed infrastructure tends to introduce more complexity into the data center. And we all know complexity can impact quality. Dell provides a number of pre-integrated systems that are optimized for specific use cases and built using best practices. By packaging these systems for our customers, we can ensure they will perform optimally with minimal downtime and fewer errors. When issues do arise, they can be handled much faster because the system is supported as a whole versus troubleshooting each individual silo.



1.9 How do customers vertically integrate our Active Infrastructure offerings into their environment, either from a physical standpoint (network) or management standpoint (via Active System Manager)?

From a physical standpoint, there is a range of options. Part of what we talk about when we say “flexibility” is how we have multiple ways we could be connected into an existing network. There could be many topologies, number of fabrics, storage protocols, and vendors of top-of-rack (ToR) switches involved. Best practice guidance is available that covers many of the permutations.

For the initial release of Active System Manager, no published integration processes are being provided by Dell, meaning Active System Manager will need to be adopted as a stand-alone management console. APIs will be available for Active System Manager in late FY14.

1.10 Will an IT Consulting Services engagement be required for Active Infrastructure?

Active Infrastructure systems do not require IT Consulting services. The pre-integrated systems all include enterprise deployment services to complete the onsite implementation so the unit is ready for production. We recommend customers engage Dell IT Consulting when building Dell converged infrastructure using our Platform Reference Architectures or the Active System Matrix. We also recommend IT Consulting services for customer that need to implement VDI, application, and private clouds solutions that include Active Infrastructure. Finally, for customer who wish to implement the Active System Manager into an existing Active System compliant infrastructure deployment, IT Consulting services are strongly recommended as the APOS installation is a disruptive process.

1.11 Will our channel partners be able to provide Professional Services?

Yes, channel partners can either provide their own services or resell Dell Services for Active Infrastructure.

1.12 Is vStart part of Active Infrastructure? What customers are the ideal targets for the existing vStarts?

Yes, all vStarts models, the vStart 50, 100, 200, and 1000, are members of the Dell Active Infrastructure family.

Dell has two different lines of converged infrastructure offerings within the Active Infrastructure family: vStart and Active System. The development of vStart focused primarily on packaging all of HW infrastructure elements need for an integrated virtual infrastructure and is managed using Dell’s existing management integrations for either VMware vCenter or Microsoft System Center.



Active System was developed to be the foundation of Dell next generation converged infrastructure offerings. It moves beyond packaging and was developed from the ground up to ensure maximum data center efficiency and infrastructure agility with a new architecture that includes the new blade I/O module (PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator) and new infrastructure management (Active System Manager).

The current rack server-based vStarts are a good fit for a customer seeking to implement virtualization infrastructure in a rapid and standardized manner. Given the small number of compute nodes that exist in the vStart 50/100/200, leveraging Dell’s existing VMware or Microsoft management integrations is an easy and cost effective means to manage the overall infrastructure.

The vStart 1000 is targeted at more complex and larger environments running mission critical workloads such as ERP, Oracle, or SAP, or large private cloud and VDI implementations. It includes a fibre channel SAN implementation of Compellent. Environments with types of requirements and workloads typically have a greater level of staff specialization across servers, storage, and networking. Thus, these types of customer are more orientated to using dedicate element management tools for storage and networking. Basic management of the overall infrastructure is available to the virtualization admin using Dell’s existing VMware or Microsoft management integrations.

1.13 What is the future of vStart?

The current vStart models will continue to ship: vStart 50, 100, 200, 1000. Over the FY14 timeframe, the existing vStart models will transition to the Active System architecture. When a vStart model has gone through this refresh, Dell will change its naming to Active System.

For example, the vStart 1000 is targeted to go through this update in late Q2FY14 and will be called Active System 1000 at that point. The vStart 100 and 200 will be consolidated into a single vStart model in late Q4FY13 but not upgraded to Active System until the latter part of FY14.

1.14 What Active Solutions are either available or will be shortly available? To help customer deploy applications, VDI, or Private Clouds using Active Infrastructure

systems, Dell will offer Active Solution reference architectures.

Today, several Active Solutions are available using vStart:

• vStart 100m for Microsoft SharePoint: this solution is sized for 3,500 concurrent users.

• vStart 50 for VDI (up to 300 users) and vStart 1000 for VDI (up to 1000 users): options for

either VMware View or Citrix XenDesktop; guidance for using Wyse device is included

• vStart 200/100 for Private Cloud: using either Dell VIS Creator or Microsoft System

Center 2012

The following Active Solutions using the Active System 800 are planned for late Q4FY13:



• Active System 800 for Microsoft Exchange 2010, Lync 2010, and SharePoint 2010 (November 30, 2012)

• Active System 800 for VDI: options for either VMware View or Citrix XenDesktop; guidance for using Wyse device is included (November 30, 2012)

• Active System 800 for Private Cloud: using Dell VIS Creator (in planning)

1.15 How might possible acquisitions impact Active Infrastructure?

Acquisitions of key IP are core to Dell’s strategy to transform into an end-to-end enterprise

solutions and services provider. The assessment of possible acquisitions to improve and

supplement Dell solutions, including the Active Infrastructure family, is a continuous process

that is part of our strategic product planning process. The Enterprise Solutions Group does not

comment internally on possible acquisitions until the intent to acquire has been publically

announced.

2. Active System

2.1 What is Active System?

Active System is Dell’s next generation converged infrastructure offering. It builds on the

experience that Dell has garnered with vStart and moves beyond the packaging of server,

storage, and networking platforms into a pre-integrated system.

Active System was designed from scratch as an integrated system to ensure maximum data

center operational efficiency, infrastructure agility and IT service quality. Active System takes a

balanced and open approach that leverages newest platforms in Dell’s enterprise portfolio best

suited for convergence while also introducing new IP. It currently is built around the Dell

M1000e blade chassis and includes the 12G blade servers with native 10 GbE Ethernet

connections, the M420, M620, and M820. It utilizes the Broadcom and QLogic (future) CNAs.

It uses a new blade I/O module – the PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator – build from Force10 IP,

but designed with plug-and-play simplicity to easily connect the blade chassis to a Force10 or

third party ToR switch. The I/O Aggregator is designed specifically for virtualized environments

and enables east-west 10GbE traffic within the M1000e chassis while pushing advanced

networking features that need to be managed by the network admin out of the chassis to the

ToR switch. Active System can leverage Dell storage, including the new EqualLogic Blade Array

(with better together integration in the future), but can also co-exist with third-party

consolidated SAN or file storage. Lastly, it is managed with the new Active System Manager that

is designed to consolidate and automate the most common administrative tasks that a single

virtualization admin performs every day into a single, intuitive tool.



Active System is available in the three Active Infrastructure deployment models: pre-integrated

systems (starting with the Active System 800), Active System Architectures, and the Active

System Matrix. The Active System 800 offers the fast deployment and time-to-value for

customers.

Active System and Active System 800 will be start to ship on November 30, 2012 in the US and

WW in the Q1FY14 timeframe.

2.2 What is the Active System Matrix?

The Active System Matrix describes the Dell hardware platforms that can be used to build and

Active System and are all managed by the Active System Manager. Hardware platforms that are

not listed in the Active System Matrix cannot be used within an Active System. The initial

platforms within the Active System Matrix include M1000e blade chassis, the M420/M620/M820

blades, the Broadcom and QLogic (future) CNAs, and new PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator I/O

module.

2.1 Why is the new Force10 MXL not included in the initial Active System Matrix?

The Force10 MXL blade networking I/O module is a strategic product in the Dell networking portfolio, and offers more sophisticated, higher level networking switch functions than the PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator.

For customers who wish to operate their virtualized infrastructure in a converged manner, the I/O aggregator is a better fit for that use cases as it simplifies the operational process and divisions between the server/virtualization admin and the networking admin.

The addition of the Force10 MXL in the Active System Matrix will continue to be rationalized against customer demand and need.

2.2 Is Active System available as only a Greenfield purchase and implementation?

No. However, since Active System was designed as an integrated offering, it is best deployed as

a holistic system that would include the purchase and implementation of new Dell hardware

and the Active System Manager. It can be deployed using any of the three Active Infrastructure

deployment models. Selling Active System in this manner provides the best customer

experience.

A customer can upgrade their existing Dell infrastructure, provided it includes the platforms that

are specified in the Active System Matrix. However, the implementation of Active System

Manager onto an existing Active System compliant infrastructure is a disruptive process that will



require planned downtime by the customer. For this type of implementation of Active System,

Dell Services is strongly recommended and must be carefully planned and implemented. See

question 3.7 for more detail.

3. Active System Manager

3.1 What is Active System Manager?

Active System Manager is the management console for Active System converged infrastructure offerings. Active System Manager simplifies infrastructure configuration, collapsing management tools, and driving automation and consistency. Through capabilities such as template based provisioning, automated configuration and infrastructure lifecycle management, Active System Manager enables IT to respond rapidly to business needs, maximize data center efficiency and strengthen quality of IT service delivery. It is an integral part of the new Active System. At this time, it does not manage the existing vStart models. Support for existing vStart is a roadmap item.

3.2 How does Active System Manager fit with Active System?

Active System Manager configures and manages the infrastructure components within Active Systems. The platforms that it manages are defined within the Active System Matrix and include M1000e blade chassis, the M420/M620/M820 blades, the Broadcom and QLogic (future) CNAs, and new PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator I/O module. Roadmap items include the EqualLogic Blade Array PS-4110 and elements of the virtual infrastructure such as the virtual switch, ESX deployment, and cluster creation and storage provisioning.

3.3 How will customers purchase Active System Manager?

Active System Manager is an integral element of the Active System. It is included in the pre-integrated Active System 800.

It is also sold as a peripheral SKU of the M420, M620, and M820. It does not require a separate services SKU; the support for Active System Manager is covered by the ProSupport for the blade server. Note that future modules of Active System Manager that provide additional functionality may have a separate support model.

For customer would need to separate the purchase of the management software from the hardware in an Active System deployment, Active System Manager is available as a stand-alone customer kit SKU to facilitate this purchasing requirement.

Active System Manager can be applied to an existing Active System compliant infrastructure, but requires thorough planning and setting of customer expectations. See question 3.7 for more details.



Active System Manager should not be positioned as a separate or stand-alone software management tool like System Center. It was designed as an integral element of an Active System.

3.4 How does Active System Manager integrated into other System Management tools from BMC, Microsoft, VMware, and so forth. Does it have APIs that will be published for others to use to create integrations?

The initial release of Active System Manager does not include published integration processes and APIs, meaning Active System Manager will need to be adopted as a stand-alone management console. Dell does plan on making APIs available for Active System Manager in the late FY14 timeframe for integration with other Dell and third party tools.

3.5 Will Active System Manager work with OpenManage Essentials, VIS Creator, Dell Management Plug-in for VMware vCenter, or any other Dell tool?

In our initial release, Active System Manager does not directly interact with OpenManage Essentials, VIS Creator, or the Dell Management Plug-in for VMware vCenter. All these products can co-exist with Active System Manager but these consoles will not ‘talk’ to each other.

Dell OpenManage Essentials can complement Active System Manager by providing data center wide monitoring and topology across Dell Active Infrastructure and Dell stand-alone servers, storage, and networking. OME also provides visibility for select Cisco switches and EMC storage.

For Active System customers who seek the automation and integration that the Dell Management Console for VMware vCenter provides, an engineering whitepaper will be available in Q4FY13 that provides guidance on how to use the two tools side-by-side.

Active System Manager directly associates with the iDRAC w/ lifecycle controller console and the Chassis Management Console (CMC). Link and launch capabilities are provided to these consoles where appropriate within Active System Manager.

3.6 What is the pricing and licensing model for Active System Manager?

Active System Manager is licensed per physical server. The list price is $299/server. Support for Active System Manager is covered by a valid ProSupport contract on the managed server.

Future Active System Manager features (such as virtualization integration) may be offered as a separate module that have its own pricing and support model. A customer should not expect to get all future features of Active System as part of their existing license.



3.7 Can Active System Manager be sold to customers that already have pre-requisite hardware from the Active System Matrix (i.e., is Active System Manager available APOS)?

Yes. For the least disruptive adoption experience for a customer, Active System Manager should be sold as part of a net new Active System sale, either in a pre-integrated system, reference architecture or using the Active System Matrix.

Active System Manager is orderable as a stand-alone customer kit SKU to accommodate the following customer deployment scenarios:

1. Customer is purchasing a new Active System but needs to purchase the infrastructure management software (Active System Manager) on a separate PO from the hardware elements of Active System.

2. Customer wishes to purchase additional licenses to add additional blade servers to an initial implementation of Active System

3. Customer has the valid Active System platforms from the Active System Matrix and wants to upgrade that existing infrastructure deployment to an Active System after-point-of-sales (APOS) of the hardware platforms by implementing the Active System Manager software.

For the third scenario, the customer needs to be aware and plan for the following requirements for implementing Active System Manager into an existing Active System compliant infrastructure deployment. This is not a detailed list of implementation steps, but the customer should be aware of these key details. The implementation could be either disruptive or destructive.

• Customers who intentionally or unintentionally change hardware settings (such as BIOS settings) during discovery and on-boarding may be required to reboot servers, causing a temporary disruption of service. In this situation, a customer should plan to do the Active System Manager implementation during a planned maintenance cycle where the infrastructure is taken down.

• Customers that have an operating system deployed to a local server hard disks and enable RAID configuration during on-boarding will cause re-initialization of RAID containers. This will destroy the contents of the local hard disk and wiping out their current operating system installation.

Given the potential disruptive or destructive nature of implementing Active System Manager on an existing infrastructure implementation, it is strongly recommended that customers who purchase Active System Manager for this type of deployment should purchase Dell services to ensure successful migration to an Active System infrastructure and implementation of Active System Manager.

Additional guidance on implementing Active System Manager in an existing Active System compliant environment will be made available via a separate engineering whitepaper in Q1FY14.



3.8 What is the product delivery and customer install process for Active System Manager?

Active System Manager is an integral part of any Active System and is deployed as a virtual appliance.

Customer of the pre-integrated Active System (e.g., the Active System 800) will receive Active System Manager installed and ready to use.

Customers who deploy Active System using an Active System Architecture or the Active System Matrix will receive an email with a link to Dell’s digital fulfillment site where they can download the license file and OVF file; only an VMware ESX based virtual appliance is available at this time. A Hyper-V based virtual appliance will be made available in the future. Please note that though a Hyper-V based virtual appliance is not available now, a VMware-appliance based Active System Manager can be used to manage an infrastructure that is hosting Hyper-V.

Upon downloading both of these items, customers will need to open up their VMware vCenter console to set up the IP address of the web server and administrator credentials for Active System Manager.

Customers can then point their browser to the designated IP address to access the Active System Manager console. Customers will need to go through a quick one-time guided setup, that entails uploading the license file, setting the time zone and location, and any proxy settings. These steps are also included in the documentation for the Active System Manager.

3.9 What is the support model for Active System Manager?

A separate support contract is not required for Active System Manager. A valid ProSupport contract on the managed blade server cover the Active System Manager support.

Note: A valid basic HW support contract will not cover Active System Manager. A valid ProSupport contract is required.

Future Active System Manager features (such as virtualization integration) may be offered as separate modules that have their own pricing and support model.

3.10 When will role-based access control (RBAC) be available?

Role-based Access Control is a broad concept. In the 1.0 release, Active System Manager will support two roles – an administrator role and an operator role. We will continue to add more granularity and flexibility in enabling the various IT functions within a single IT domain. Across-domain roles (such as network administrator or storage administrator roles) will also be added and that is currently targeting late FY14.

3.11 Will non-Dell hardware be supported with Active System Manager?

Dell’s converged infrastructure is based on the premise of being able to seamlessly integrate with existing customer environments. For example, we will be fully qualified to connect up to a



Cisco Nexus environment and offer the same value propositions we offer with a F10 S4810 ToR switch.

However, core value propositions delivered via Active System Manager will be limited to Dell hardware. In the future (beyond FY14), we expect to be able to provide SDKs that may be used to extend our capabilities.

3.12 Will Active System Manager only work with blades? What about racks?

Dell’s POV on converged infrastructure starts with blades. Blades are commonly used as a foundation for driving the benefits of a converged infrastructure. However, the value propositions of converged infrastructure are not tied to a specific form-factor and so we expect to support non-blade form factors in the future. The timeline is estimate to be late FY14 at this time.

3.13 Will Active System Manager support previous generation Dell servers and chassis (11G or earlier)?

No, there are no plans to support legacy Dell servers and chassis, including 11G.

3.14 Will Active System Manager support the M8024-K?

Active System Manager will not support M8024-k and there are no plans to add the support for the M8024-k on the roadmap. The F10 MXL has been prioritized higher than the M8024-k as well as the M8024-k has a limited life.

3.15 Will Active System Manager support integration to top-of-rack (ToR) switches?

Active System supports an open architecture for ToR networking devices, and it currently supports Dell Force10 and Cisco devices at the ToR. However Active System Manager does not currently directly manage the ToR device. In the future, the plan is for Active System Manager to manage select Dell ToR devices.

3.16 Are there plans for OS/Hypervisor deployment capabilities to be available within Active System Manager?

In a future release, Active System Manager will automate the deployment and configuration of hypervisors. Active System Manager does not plan to have the capability to deploy an OS, such as Windows on physical servers. For the latter use case, Active System Manager will integrate with existing deployment solutions, such as Microsoft System Center Configuration Manager in the future.



3.17 Will Active System Manager support PowerEdge-C or DCS servers?

No, there are currently no plans to support PowerEdge-C or other DCS platforms.

3.18 Why does Active System Manager not support the M520 server?

The M520 is not supported since it does not support a 10GbE embedded networking daughter card. One of the pillars of Dell’s converged infrastructure POV is that customers should adopt a 10GbE fabric as a means of lowering their TCO. 10GbE is an enabler and a requirement for IO convergence that allows customers to use a single fabric for combining different types of network traffic (various LAN traffic, converging LAN/SAN traffic) thus reducing the number of network adapters, reducing the number of network cables, as well as reducing the number of ToR switch ports. Dell innovations such as NPAR also allow customers to efficiently utilize a 10GbE fabric.

3.19 Will Active System Manager support native fibre channel in the chassis?

Active System Manager does not support FC HBAs within blade servers. Customers should use CNAs (converged network adapters) in blade servers to connect to FC storage arrays. By using CNAs, customers can lower their TCO since they can use the same CNA adapter for LAN as well as FCoE traffic, thus removing the need for a separate FC HBA.

3.20 Will Active System Manager support the EqualLogic PS-M4110 blade array?

Yes, in 1H FY14, Active System Manager will offer automated initial discovery and configuration of the PS-M4110 Blade Array that currently must be done via the CMC. In addition, Active System Manager will also automate the network configuration of the IOAs to support the PS-M4110 Blade Array. The goal is to make is extremely easy to onboard the PS-M4110 Blade Array.

3.21 What are the scale limitations for Active System Manager?

Active System Manager does not have a hard limit from a scalability standpoint, but it has been thoroughly validated up to 10 chassis (320 blade servers). Note that the numbers mentioned are per instance; additional instances of Active System Manager can be instantiated but the different Active System Manager instances will not ‘talk’ to each other.

Active System Manager will officially support up to 20 chassis (640 blade servers) with a single instance by the end of FY14.



4. Active System 800

4.1 What is Active System 800?

The Active System 800 is a pre-integrated version of the Active System. Similar to vStart, it is a pre-engineered, pre-assembled, and pre-tested system that includes Dell 48U rack infrastructure and Dell enterprise deployment services.

Optimized with Dell’s latest iSCSI-accessible EqualLogic storage, PowerEdge M620 servers, Dell Force10 S4810 10GbE ToR networking (optional), and Active System Manager, it is designed to help IT improve existing processes, fabric efficiency and performance across the data center by meeting needs such as scaling storage capacity levels, optimizing for application hosting, and allowing administrators to manage server, storage and networking interdependencies. It is an ideal platform for supporting private cloud, virtualization, and mid-range application deployments.

Active System 800 does have choice one of two M1000e chassis, a choice of 8, 16, 24, and 32 M620 blade packs, a choice of server memory configurations, and a choice of the number of EqualLogic arrays and capacities. It can seamless connect into an existing ToR deployment or uses the optional Force10 S4810 ToR switches.

4.2 How does Active System 800 fit with Active Infrastructure?

Active System 800 is a pre-integrated system within the Active Infrastructure family, and leverages Dell innovations including unified management, simplified chassis networking, converged LAN/SAN fabric and bladed form factors in a solution that can be easily deployed and operated in a unified manner. The other pre-integrated systems in the Active Infrastrucure family are the existing vStart models.

4.3 What installation and support services are included with Active System 800?

Onsite installation and implementation are included with every Active System 800 deployment, complete with a brief orientation session and configuration guide. Dell ProSupport provides the foundation for secure and reliable high-availability infrastructures with enhanced hardware support and software technical support for problem resolution.

4.4 Does Active System 800 support a non-Dell network?

Yes, Active System 800 comes with the new Dell PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator, which enables interoperability with a non-Dell ToR switch and is designed to simplify blade chassis connectivity by pushing advanced networking features outside of the blade chassis to top-of-rack switch so they can be managed separately by the networking admin.



4.1 Is it possible to order an Active System 800 with less than the 8 blade configuration?

It is possible to get an approval on a smaller configuration, provided no other elements in the solution stack have changed. This type of configuration may be useful for PoC, but is not available as a standard configuration.

4.2 When will Active System 800 be available?

Active System 800 will be available based on the schedule below.

In Q4 FY13

Active System 800v (VMware) – US RTO (Ready to Order): 11/30/12, First Customer Ship – 12/10/12

Private Cloud

Active System 800 with Dell Private Cloud (VIS Creator) – in planning

VDI

VMware View VDI Reference architecture on Active System 800 – 11/30/12

Citrix XenDesktop VDI Reference architecture on Active System 800 – 11/30/12

Workloads

Microsoft Exchange 2010 Reference architecture on Active System 800 – 11/30/12

Microsoft SharePoint 2010 Reference architecture on Active System 800 – 11/30/12

Microsoft Lync 2010 Reference architecture on Active System 800 – 11/30/12

In Q1FY14

Active System 800v (VMware) – WW RTS

Active System 800m (Microsoft) (No locked plan until end of Dec 2012)

Active System 800 with Microsoft Private Cloud (Fast Track 3.0) – tied to Active System 800m (No locked plan until end of Dec 2012)



4.3 What is the pricing for Active System 800?

Active System 800 is sold in 4 different configurations, 8 blades, 16 blades, 24 blades and 32 blades. Below is the list pricing for the 4 configurations of Active System 800v (which supports VMware) and Active System 800m (which supports Microsoft Hyper-V). It is priced at a 30% discount off the list price of the individual components. Channel pricing is a 40% discount.

Configuration Starting Price A

ctiv

e Sy

stem

80

0v

8 Blades $249,900

16 Blades $299,900

24 Blades $599,900

32 Blades $649,900

Act

ive

Syst

em

80

0m

8 Blades $289,900

16 Blades $379,900

24 Blades $699,900

32 Blades $799,900

A number of software, configuration and deployment options are available, raised the pricing. The customer qualification guide can assist you in determining which configuration is best for a customer’s environment.

5. Dell vStart

See the separate vStart FAQ on SalesEdge.

6. Ecosystem

6.1 How will products from the Quest Software portfolio be integrated with Active Infrastructure?

The acquisition of Quest Software was closed on October 1, 2012. The product planning on how elements of the Quest Software portfolio might be incorporated into the Dell Active Infrastructure family is ongoing. The Quest Foglight application and infrastructure performance management software tools are a natural complement to a converged

http://salesedge.dell.com/doc?id=0901bc82805395be&ll=d&pm=111413830



infrastructure deployment and can be sold alongside Active Infrastructure in a stand-alone manner.

6.2 What role does Dell AIM (Advanced Infrastructure Manager) play in our converged infrastructure strategy? Is AIM still available?

AIM is not a part of Dell’s Active Infrastructure family of systems and solutions. AIM has been a core part of Dell’s Virtual Integrated System (VIS) portfolio as a workload mobility and recovery management solution.

In Q3 FY13, AIM will move into a “sustaining” phase commiserate with the 3.6.1 release (currently targeted for January 2013 release). Starting with the 3.6.1 release, AIM will no longer be available for sale to new customers. The sustaining phase ensures existing AIM customers will continue to receive technical support, including patches/bug-fixes for the duration of their entire Support contract. Likewise, existing customers will be able to purchase additional capacity for their environments up until January 2015. Dell will continue to work with our hypervisor partners as well as leverage capabilities from recent acquisitions to ensure viable alternatives for our customers use cases.

Existing customers of AIM have been notified and a detailed frequently asked questions (FAQ) document is in process to provide additional guidance. Please contact Steven Scott, Sr. Product Manager at Dell, for more information.

6.3 What is the status of VIS Creator?

See separate VIS Creator FAQ on CI SalesEdge Dashboard

7. HP Converged System Competitive

7.1 How does Dell approach to converged infrastructure contrasts to HP?

HP’s approach focuses on the HP CloudSystem and Converged Cloud at the CIO level. CloudSystem is a sophisticated and complex solution that includes a software stack with multiple elements. CloudSystem requires extensive services for a customer to deploy and integrate. It is a very large solution that has a high cost of entry and requires a strategic decision from a customer adoption standpoint. It is much more disruptive.

While Dell can offer similar levels of functionality through its own and partners’ software portfolios coupled with its global services capabilities, Dell is focused on the more fundamental, day-to-day operational challenges that exist in a heavily virtualized data center. This focus allows Dell to make a more immediate, lower risk, and rapid impact that results in greater infrastructure ability and cost savings with a much smaller initial investment in time and dollars. This approach also lays down a scalable foundation for a broader transformation of a customer’s IT services infrastructure.

mailto:[email protected]

http://salesedge.dell.com/cmsdoc?id=0901bc82806215e3&ll=md



7.2 How does the Dell Active System align against HP’s Converged Systems?

HP has a series of Converged Systems that simplify and extend HP Converged Infrastructure by integrating hardware, software and services into turnkey solutions that include servers, storage, networking, management and additional software: VirtualSystem, AppSystem, and CloudSystem. Each xSystem has a series of fully pre-integrated models and also have underlying reference architectures for customers seeking greater flexibility. All of them have the HP BladeSystem at their core: BladeSystem c-Class enclosures and blade servers and the Virtual Connect blade I/O technology for connecting connect systems to the networking. A VirtualSystem can be upgraded to either an AppSystem or a CloudSystem.

The most direct Active System comparison is to HP BladeSystem (= an Active System that does not include Dell storage) and HP VirtualSystem (=pre-integrated Active System that includes storage such as the Active System 800). Dell’s approach includes better individual HW components and system-level integration as well as much more intuitive infrastructure management.

Dell’s Active Solution reference architectures for applications that include either an Active System or vStart as the infrastructure foundation can be used to build an equivalent to a HP AppSystem. Dell’s approach provides greater flexibility, especially for a customer with existing software purchasing agreements. The HP AppSystem is shipped with the software already pre-installed and include versions for Business Insights (business reporting and analytics), Data Management (data warehouses using Microsoft SQL), Online Transaction Processing and Database Consolidation (databases using Microsoft SQL), and Collaboration (Microsoft Exchange). The Dell Quickstart Data Warehouse appliance that includes Boomi is a simpler, more integrated, more entry comparison to the HP Data Warehouse option.

Dell’s Active Solution reference architectures for private cloud (using Dell VIS Creator or Microsoft System Center 2012) that include either an Active System or vStart as the infrastructure foundation could be used to build an equivalent to HP CloudSystem (= HP VirtualSystem + HP Cloud Service Automation software). Dell VIS Creator is a single global tool for hybrid cloud automation that offers a great deal of functionality out-of-the box and can be quickly implemented. For customers who have standardized on Microsoft system management, the System Center 2012 is an easily adopted Cloud option. In contrast, HP Cloud Service Automation is a set of automation tools that include six functional groups. HP also offers Cloud Maps that consist of tools and best practices that enable an enterprise to quickly and easily populate the HP Cloud Service Automation service catalog with cloud services based on applications from major vendors.

7.3 How is HP’s converged infrastructure approach complex and costly?

HP leads with its CloudSystem offering that is a sophisticated and complex solution that includes a software stack with multiple elements. CloudSystem requires extensive services for a customer to deploy and integrate. It is a very large solution that has a high cost of entry and requires is a strategic decision from a customer adoption standpoint. It is much more disruptive.



The HP BladeSystem, the foundation for HP’s xSystems, and VirtualSystem leverage multiple tools to manage the infrastructure compare to the Dell Active System Manager; HP would use a combination of HP System Insight Manager as well as Virtual Connect. For installations larger than four chassis, additional management software is required (Virtual Connect Enterprise Manager) for $4,999 per chassis.

HP BladeSystem does not provide the same compute density as Dell; Dell can provide 2X more compute nodes per rack. As a result, Dell’s infrastructure allows the deployment of more virtual machines per chassis, which ultimately provides a lower cost per VM. Dell’s infrastructure is also more power efficiency with up to 45% better performance per watt. Better power efficiency leads to a simpler data center infrastructure (less power and cooling infrastructure is needed for an equivalent amount of compute work).

Dell’s implementation of blade-based storage is simpler, more functional, and higher performance. HP blade storage requires special blade slots, has multiple components (4 or 7, depending on the type), and is inefficient (either shared DAS or Lefthand architecture that wastes more storage space). The Equallogic Blade Array supports up to 48% more SQL Server, Exchange Server & SharePoint users than a comparable HP blade storage & server solution.

7.4 How does the new Dell PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator compare to HP’s Virtual Connect and FlexFabric I/O module?

From a networking standpoint, both blade I/O modules have similarities. They are designed to simplify the networking within a blade chassis and appear to be a pass-through module from the perspective of the networking external to the blade chassis. However, Dell’s approach offers greater simplicity from a couple different perspectives.

The Dell I/O Aggregator simplifies the blade connectivity to a ToR converged switch. It supports FCoE t a converged ToR switch outside of the chassis that allows the blade connection to the external environment to be 100% Ethernet based. By having a single external protocol and physical connection, a customer has greater flexibility to modulate the bandwidth between Ethernet and storage traffic (either iSCSI or FCoE). The HP FlexFabric module provides convergence of the network within the HP blade chassis, but has dedicated Ethernet and FC ports to separate LAN and SAN networks. It does not support FCoE to a ToR converged switch. Each Dell IOA also has greater bandwidth with up to sixteen 10 GbE uplinks to a ToR versus ten 10 GbE uplinks with HP’s FlexFabric module.

HP also physically embeds its Virtual Connect management within the FlexFabric module. Dell’s Active System Manager is deployed as a virtual management appliance to minimize any overhead requirements of the production infrastructure while also providing a more scalable infrastructure management framework.

Dell’s IOA does not support advanced QoS and stacking today compared to HP FlexFabric but will in future versions.



7.5 Is Dell going to offer a fibre channel direct connection from the blade chassis, similar to the 3PAR Direct Connect announcement?

Dell believes a broader set of customers benefit from the consolidation of FC storage traffic along with Ethernet or iSCSI traffic to a ToR converged switch versus more the narrow use case of connecting directly to a native fibre channel storage array in a direct attach configuration. The Dell approach allows all blade traffic to connect to the external fabric with a single means which simplifies the blade connectivity. Dell will continue to explore the ability to offer customers greater choice in connectivity options, including a native fibre channel connection from the Dell I/O Aggregator, as driven by customer feedback and demand.

The HP 3PAR Direct Connect technology only supports the larger 3PAR arrays. For storage implementations that actually justify 3PAR class storage, most customers would want to have a SAN implementation versus a direct attached implementation. A SAN allows servers to connect to a SAN backup device, allows servers to connect to other lower cost tiers of storage, and allows the storage to be shared across other servers, including rack mount servers.

7.6 How do the infrastructure management experiences compare between HP BladeSystem and Dell Active System?

Dell has taken a different approach to converged infrastructure management with the new Active System Manager that was built from the ground up to simplify that administration of the most common tasks across the entire infrastructure. It focuses on ease-of-use to amplify the productivity of a single administrator and to improve quality by minimizing manual errors. It can be used in conjunction with elements of Dell’s existing system management family such as Open Manage Essentials for monitoring and the Dell Management Plug-in for VMware vCenter for operations integration and automation with VMware vCenter.

HP’s converged infrastructure approach leverages up to three different tools to provide similar types of functionality to Dell Active System Manager. HP System Insight Manager (SIM) provides the patching and monitoring capabilities. The embedded manager in the Virtual Connect module provides blade network and blade profile management. To provide management scale beyond four HP blade chassis, a customer must separately purchase the Virtual Connect Enterprise Manager at a price of 4,999 per chassis.

8. Cisco Unified Compute System and Partners Competitive

8.1 How does Dell approach to converged infrastructure contrasts to Cisco?

Since December of 2011, Cisco has advocated a holistic vision of the data center called the Cisco CloudVerse framework. A key element of CloudVerse is the Cisco Unified Data Center (UDC), a platform that unifies networking, compute, storage, and management into a common architecture designed to deliver IT as a Service (cloud). UDC itself includes Cisco Intelligent Automation for the Cloud (IAC) and Cisco Network Services Manager. IAC is an extension of



UCS and is designed to provide automated provisioning and management of data center resources for the delivery of cloud services within and between data centers. It layers a Process Orchestrator (Tidal acquisition) and a Cloud Portal (newScale acquisition) on top of a UCS infrastructure.

Similar to HP’s Cloud System approach, UDC is a CIO level conversation. UDC and IAC are sophisticated and complex frameworks that include a software stack with multiple elements. IAC requires extensive services for a customer to deploy and integrate. It is a very large solution that has a high cost of entry and requires a strategic decision from a customer adoption standpoint. It is much more disruptive.

While Dell can offer similar levels of functionality through its own (VIS Creator) and partners’ software portfolios coupled with its global services capabilities, Dell is focused on the more fundamental, day-to-day operational challenges that exist in a heavily virtualized data center. This focus allows Dell to make a more immediate, lower risk, and rapid impact that results in greater infrastructure ability and cost savings with a much smaller initial investment in time and dollars. This approach also lays down a scalable foundation for a broader transformation of a customer’s IT services infrastructure.

8.2 How does the Dell Active System align against Cisco’s UCS?

Unified Compute System was conceived to be a different approach to virtual x86 computing. It was designed from the perspective of the data center fabric down into the compute layer. The approach focused on differentiation primarily from a blade chassis I/O and infrastructure management standpoint.

UCS creates a tight coupling between the Nexus networking family and the UCS virtualized compute unit. From a blade chassis I/O standpoint, UCS seeks to simplify chassis networking by pulling the traditional intra-chassis networking functionality out of each individual blade chassis and consolidated it into a pair of fabric interconnects (FI) that are externally mounted within a rack. The FI is based on the Cisco Nexus switch. The FIs are themselves connected to separate top-of-rack switches (ideally, a Nexus model) that are outside of the UCS architecture. Individual blade chassis connectivity is enabled by a single pair of “dumb” fabric extenders within the blade chassis (FEX) that consolidate the number of cables needed to connect the chassis to the FI, relative to a traditional pass-through module in a blade chassis. The FEX do not provide any intra-chassis switching between individual physical compute nodes. This design requires all traffic to and from physical server nodes to be sent north/south to the external fabric interconnects. It also mandates a unified fabric within the chassis and to the data center fabric that favors the FCoE storage protocol. Cisco also provides a proprietary Virtual Interface Card (VIC) in lieu of a choice of CNAs from the major industry players.

UCS seeks to simplify the management of the virtual compute unit (rack and blade servers, blade chassis, and blade I/O connectivity) by consolidating all infrastructure management functions into a single tool (UCS Manager) and simplifies infrastructure configuration and management through the promotion of stateless computing enabled by consolidated storage as well as a “dumb” blade chassis does not require its own embedded management. It also simplifies the deployment, support, and licensing of UCS Manager by embedding it with the FI hardware. No separate licensing or support is required.



To provide an end-to-end converged infrastructure solution, Cisco must depend on storage strategic alliances with NetApp and EMC/VMware. The Cisco/NetApp FlexPOD provides reference architectures for UCS + NetApp storage and the companies provide a cooperative support mode. With EMC/VMware, Cisco established an entirely separate company to provide the services and support for vBlock, a fully pre-integrated system that includes a separate infrastructure manager for storage and the virtual infrastructure called Unified Infrastructure Manager (UIM) that is costly.

Dell Active System approach is different in that is focused improving the operational efficiency and agility of the virtual infrastructure versus seeking to protect a Dell business. Today’s virtualization admin has typically evolved from the server or Windows admin roles. Thus, Dell sees the virtualization admin as the natural admin for converged infrastructure and has geared its Active System design along that path in the evolution of IT roles.

Active Systems today leverages the industry leading M1000e blade chassis as its foundation and takes advantage of Dell’s leading position in blade hardware form factors such as the industry’s only ¼ height blade – the M420 – and the industry’s simplest, most functional bladed storage array – the EqualLogic BladeArray. Active System introduces a simplified way to connect the blade chassis to the data center network – the new PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator – that is optimized for virtualization and pushed the more advanced networking functionality such as spanning trees and L3 functions to the ToR switch where those functions can be managed by the networking admin. An I/O module within the blade chassis, the I/O Aggregator provides east-west traffic capability inside the chassis while also providing industry leading bandwidth from the chassis to the data center network. This new architecture provides improved operational simplicity between the blade and networking admin while also providing the performance needed into a heavily virtualized environment.

Central to the Active System is the new Active System Manager. Unlike other infrastructure management tools, Active System Manager seeks to aggregate only the most common administrative tasks and functions done by the new CI admin with this single console and emphasizes simplicity and an intuitive design that allows for admins to quickly learn and continually use the manager. It does not seek to replace specialized storage or networking management tools that provide much deeper functionality that those specialists need but a CI admin does not. See question 7.5 for more detail on the comparison between Active System Manager and UCS Manager.

Relative to Cisco UCS, Dell offers between hardware platforms (features, power and cooling, simplicity), a more flexible and higher performance network architecture, a more intuitive approach to infrastructure management (Cisco UCSM takes several weeks to learn how to use), and a more comprehensive lifecycle experience, from the direct delivery of pre-integrated systems to a single point of accountable of support for all of the infrastructure and software.

8.3 How is Cisco’s converged infrastructure approach inflexible and incomplete?

Cisco’s approach is inflexible in several regards. It uses a singular, proprietary blade I/O architecture that is extremely rigid and limited from a scalability standpoint (see questions 7.4). It does not provide the option for different blade I/O architectures that a customer may need to



meet their specific business requirements or use cases. The individual platforms must be use within the UCS construct; they cannot be uses as individual platforms for customers seeking a best-of-breed. In contrast, Active System provides customer with the option for a more flexible blade I/O architecture by taking advantage of the multiple fabric supported within the M1000e chassis. Dell also offers greater choice of bladed form factors with the industry’s only ¼ height blade – the PowerEdge M420 – and a simplified and highly functional blade SAN array – the EquaLogic Blade Array. While the individual platforms within the Active System Matrix have been optimized for converged infrastructure, they still can be used outside of Active System in a highly functional manner. A customer can evolve their data center infrastructure at their pace, from using individual Dell standard platforms today into an Active System compliant infrastructure over time.

Cisco’s incompleteness is primarily driven by their lack of ownership of a key piece of IP needed for an end-to-end converged infrastructure system – stand-alone consolidated storage. Because it does not own storage IP, Cisco is unable to optimize converged infrastructure design at the overall system level that leads to the lower possible overall TCO and greatest infrastructure agility. This also impacts a customer’s entire lifecycle experience from the purchasing of a pre-integrated system to the support of the entire infrastructure from a single-point-of accountability.

8.4 How does the new Dell PowerEdge M I/O Aggregator compare to Cisco UCS’s networking architecture?

Please see question 7.2 for the overall explanation of the Cisco and Dell approach to the chassis networking.

Cisco UCS provides greater blade chassis switch scale in that a single pair of FIs provides the chassis networking infrastructure for up to 20 UCS chassis (support for 40 has been announced). From a cost standpoint, this appears to be advantaged because it is two FIs for 20 chassis versus two I/O modules for every Dell or HP blade chassis. It also appears to reduce the operational complexity because there are a smaller number of chassis I/O modules to manage and the fact that the Cisco chassis is “dumb” makes the addition of more UCS chassis an easy and rapid process.

The challenge with the UCS network architecture is that it is not designed for future virtualization and data center trends. Gartner predicts that there will be a 25X increase in bandwidth within a rack by 2015; in other words, east-west traffic amongst servers will skyrocket. Dell’s IOA design contemplates this future trend and provides east-west traffic with 10GbE connections within the chassis; Cisco’s design requires that traffic from a physical server blade must exit the chassis and go to the external FI and come back down (north-south). Beyond potential latency concerns, the Cisco approach can consumes more external ports and requires more cabling. The IOA combined with the M1000e’s ability to run three redundant fabrics provide 6X the bandwidth from a Dell chassis to the data center network versus the Cisco FEX/FI connection. As a Cisco customer scales the number of UCS chassis connected to the FIs, they literally have to reduce the number of FEX to FI connections as the FI ports get consumed by the new chassis being connected and thus reduces the bandwidth per chassis. Dell provides linearly scaling in chassis uplink bandwidth to a larger number of total chassis.



Finally, while Active System is geared to providing a unified fabric, it does have the flexibility with the M1000e chassis design to also support multiple, non-converged fabrics to satisfy potential security, performance, compliance, and individual uses concerns that an IT organization may have.

8.5 How do the infrastructure management experiences compare between Cisco UCS Manager and Dell Active System Manager?

Cisco UCS Manager is the key element of its converged infrastructure system and address the main pain point that customer have (manageability). It is well received by customers because of its ability to provide holistic management across the compute infrastructure.

However, because UCS Manager is the only way to manage the Cisco servers and blade I/O sub-system, it needs to include all of the functionality in the single tool. The results in a management experience that has a steep learning curve and imposes an on-going usability tax on the administrator. It is not unusual for a new UCS deployment to include three weeks of training on the UCS Manager by itself.

A second challenge with USC Manager is its scalability. Because it is physically tied to the fabric interconnect hardware, the number of nodes and chassis it can manage is tied to the physical scalability limit for the FI. Today, that is 20 chassis/160 blades (support for 40 chassis has been announced). To get around this limit, Cisco announced a Manager of Managers but has not yet released it.

Dells’ approach to infrastructure management was very different and was developed from thousands of customer conversations. Dell believes that server, storage, and networking admins will continue to need element management tools that provide very deep functionality. Dell does not believe in aggregating all of that functionality into a single tool for the complexity reasons above and because we do not believe a single admin will take over all of the responsibilities of the different domain specialists. Rather, Dell has focused on aggregating, simplifying, and automating only the most common administrative tasks a single admin would realistically need to do on a day-to-day basis across entire virtualized infrastructure. This leads to a much more intuitive management experience that is easier to use and less prone to errors. It leaves the more advanced management functions in the tools and hands of the individual domain specialists.

The Active System design considers storage and the virtual infrastructure as key elements of true converged infrastructure system. Over time, Active System Manager will expand its management scope by incorporating the ability to manage storage capacity needs with Dell storage and provide basic deployment and provisioning of the virtual infrastructure, such as virtual switch configuration, hypervisor deployment, and virtual cluster creation or addition. Active System Manager is initially offered as a virtual appliance, the preferred method of the majority of IT organizations because of the flexibility and efficiency that that packaging provides. It provides a pay-as-you-go pricing model and is licensed per physical server node. Support for the base version of Active System Manager is covered by the server ProSupport contract. Future functionality will likely be offered as add-on modules with separate licensing and support models.





9. Acquisition of Gale Technologies

9.1 Who is Gale Technologies and what does it provide today?

Gale Technologies is a leading provider of infrastructure automation software that allows organizations to streamline the deployment of on-premise and hybrid clouds for self-service access to infrastructure. Gale Technologies helps customers turn discrete compute, network and storage components into integrated and highly optimized application, virtualization, and private cloud systems featuring self-service and advanced automation. Gale Technologies’s solutions provide a comprehensive management, automation and orchestration platform for simplifying end-to-end provisioning across heterogeneous infrastructures. Gale Technologies delivers automated physical and virtual resource allocation, preserves best practice enterprise infrastructure deployment through reusable templates, and masks that complexity from the end user to provide a valuable enterprise asset.

It is important to note that the current Gale Technologies products will NOT be offered for sale to any new customers.

9.2 How does Gale Technologies fit within Dell’s converged infrastructure strategy and product plans?

Gale Technologies’ solutions are complementary to Dell’s enterprise approach in they provide management and orchestration tools that are cost effective and easy to deploy and customize in both homogeneous and heterogeneous IT environments. This approach allows customers to extend their current IT investments to capitalize on new IT models.

The addition of Gale Technologies will help accelerate the momentum of Dell’s current converged infrastructure family, Active Infrastructure, and extends development of additional integrated enterprise solutions that are intuitive, flexible and comprehensive.

The newly announced product based on Gale Technologies (codename “Harrier”) is a complementary expansion of Active System Manager that is targeted to be available in early FY14. “Harrier” will be a separate product from the Active System Manager (“Skyhawk”). It will only be available as an additional option on the vStart models and Active System 800. More details on its positioning, capabilities, and roadmap will be available later in Q4FY13; see question 9.6 for more detail.


9.3 What is the implication of the Gale Technologies acquisition on its existing customers?

Dell will continue to sell the current Gale Technologies products only to Gale Technologies’ existing customers; at this point in time there will be no change to Gale Technologies’ current



customer agreements and we will continue to support the Gale Technologies products they already use.

The current Gale Technologies leadership team will individually reach out to existing Gale Technologies customers to share the news of Dell’s acquisition. The Dell account teams (AE/GAM/CSE) that have Gale Technologies customers will receive individual briefing materials on the future plans for the current Gale Technologies product a few days after the announcement of the acquisition. If you have not received this information and your account is an existing Gale Technologies user, you can reach out to Michael Pistone for additional guidance.


9.4 What is the immediate implication of Dell’s acquisition of Gale Technologies? What do I tell my customers who are interested in converged infrastructure?

The acquisition of Gale Technologies is a clear proof point to customers of Dell’s continued and long-term intent to develop converged infrastructure solutions that are the most intuitive to purchase, use, and support, the most flexible in its architecture and support of different server, storage, and networking platforms (including select third-party platforms), and comprehensive in our ability to managed the entire converged infrastructure stack across server (rack and blade), storage, networking, and the virtual infrastructure.

The newly announced product based on Gale Technologies (codename “Harrier”) is a complementary expansion of Active System Manager. It will provide customers with an IaaS solution for end-to-end automation and orchestration of application, virtual desktop infrastructure and private cloud deployments. See question 9x..6 for more detail.


9.5 I have a current Gale Technologies customer. What do I tell them?

Current Gale Technologies customers will be informed of the acquisition and its implication by the Gale Technologies senior leadership. Dell will continue to offer Gale Technologies software to existing customers under their current terms so they can expand their deployments. A roadmap to bridge from the current Gale Technologies products to a fully Dell integrated product is being developed.

The Dell account teams (AE/GAM/CSE) that have Gale Technologies customers will receive individual briefing materials on the future plans for the current Gale Technologies product a few days after the announcement of the acquisition. If you have not received this information and your account is an existing Gale Technologies user, you can reach out to Michael Pistone for additional guidance.

The current Gale Technologies sales person should remain the primary contact for any follow-up Gale Technologies software sales (as opposed to the Dell GAM/AE/CSE).



9.6 What is the newly announced product and addition to Active System Manager that is based on Gale Technologies?

The new product based on Gale Technologies (codename “Harrier”; external name is TBD) that is a complementary expansion of Active System Manager. It is targeted to be available in 1HFY14. “Harrier” will be a separate product from the Active System Manager (“Skyhawk”). While Active System Manager (“Skyhawk”) is an intuitive tool for the most common infrastructure administrative tasks of an Active System, “Harrier” will provide customers with an IaaS solution for end-to-end automation and orchestration of application, virtual desktop infrastructure and private cloud deployments in VMware and Microsoft virtualization environments.

We anticipate that the initial Dell-branded release of “Harrier” will have the following features; these are subject to change:

• IaaS Portal (for IT admin) • Automated template based provisioning • Template management with multiple associated orchestrations • Provision and de-provision multi-VM Workload application templates with virtual

Networking and Storage • Capacity allocation/scheduling aware provisioning • Integration with ASM (roadmap item)

“Harrier” will only be available as an additional option on the vStart models and Active System 800 in early FY14 (US availability initially). Support for third-party converged solutions will be available in later releases. More detailed roadmaps and product positioning and information will be available in late Q4FY13.

9.7 How does the new announced product based on Gale Technologies compare to VIS Creator/VMware vCAC?

At a high level, there is some broad overlap with VIS Creator/VMware vCAC and the newly announced product based on Gale Technologies (“Harrier”). Both provide provisioning of workload application templates, resource scheduling and reservations, and a self-service portal. However, each is targeted at a different type of customer and customer need as shown below. Note that this positioning is preliminary and is subject to further changes and revision. It should not be shared with customers at this time. More refined and customer facing positioning will be available in late Q4FY13.



At this time, customers who are currently interested in VIS Creator 2.2/vCAC 5.1 should

continue to be directed to VMware vCAC 5.1 by Dell sales. The current Gale Technologies

product is NOT available for sale to new customers and the “Harrier” product will be available in

the 1HFY14.

See also separate VIS Creator FAQ on CI SalesEdge Dashboard

http://salesedge.dell.com/cmsdoc?id=0901bc82806215e3&ll=md