Understanding Server Hardware

How do you know what the capabilities of your server are? How do you choose a new server? Which processor should you select? How can you avoid having to pay exorbitant amounts for licenses, or wasting money through over-provisioning a server? This course answers all these questions and more. The course begins be explaining basic server terminology, and then explains how to decode Dell and HP server model numbers, along with Intel and AMD processor numbers so you can figure out what current servers and components you have. It then describes and demonstrates the common application, processor, memory, and disk benchmarks you can use to evaluate the performance of your current and new servers. After that, it explains all the choices you need to make when choosing a new server so that you make the best use of your hardware budget, considering the anticipated workload plus OS and application licensing limitations. Finally it covers how to maintain your servers, including how to limit maintenance downtime using high-availability technology, and then how to maximize your hardware budget through negotiation tactics, consolidation, and virtualization. This course is perfect for beginners with little knowledge of server hardware, through developers, DBAs, managers, and other IT professionals who need to understand how to successfully evaluate and provision new servers