Chapter Overview

Planning for and purchasing new hardware is an arduous task. There is often a balance between over-provisioning current computing requirements based on expected growth and buying excess capacity that is under utilized. This balancing act is further complicated by the rapidly changing demands on the datacenter. New applications are regularly being added, and often new hardware is required in a short timeframe. HP's response to this problem is Instant Capacity.

HP's Instant Capacity solution allows a server to be purchased without initially paying the full price of the system. Using Instant Capacity, a subset of the hardware components are initially inactive. When the hardware is required, a license is purchased for the components and they are available for immediate activation. This enables the user to gradually purchase a server over time as workload demands increase and new applications are added to the datacenter.

This chapter begins with an overview of the Instant Capacity technology. The fundamental terminology relating to Instant Capacity is covered, followed by an example that applies Instant Capacity codewords for Instant Capacity cells, memory, and CPUs. This chapter does not discuss Temporary Instant Capacity. Temporary Instant Capacity is covered in Chapter 11, "Temporary Instant Capacity."