Cassatt's new Active Power Management technology safely and intelligently powers servers off when they are not needed or idle.
White Paper: Active Power Management

Why can't you turn off computers you're not using?

Cassatt's new Active Power Management technology safely and intelligently powers servers off when they are not needed or idle. Controlled by polices set by administrators and optimized automatically, the technology continually optimizes power consumption based on the time of day, demand, curtailments imposed by power companies, or other facilities-based events. In early tests with Active Power Management, customers have experienced up to 50 percent reduction in their power usage, simply by allowing Active Power Management to turn off servers when idle, and then confirm a successful power-up when they're needed again.

Active Power Management: Best Practices Applied Intelligently and Elegantly

What sets Cassatt Active Power Management apart from any other approach is the way in which it intelligently works with existing resources in the data center. The technology is unique in that it applies best-practice principles that are:

  • Policy-Based—Administrators can apply appropriate business policies and priorities in order to determine when, where, and how to shut down idle servers, rather than leave then running 24 X 7 or relying on hard-wired power decisions. Polices can then be applied to safely and successfully power servers back on and confirm a successful start up.
  • Application Aware—Knows when and how applications can be systematically shut down and brought back up gracefully, and is aware of application interdependencies shared across multiple servers.
  • Hardware and Software Independent—Runs on any platform, requires no change to existing hardware and software configurations, and is compatible with existing power distribution/UPS equipment.

Complementary to Virtualization and Consolidation Projects

The Cassatt Active Power Management approach is complementary to current data center energy efficiency strategies–such as upgrading to more energy-efficient servers, improving HVAC efficiencies, smart power distribution systems, server consolidation, and virtualization. Organizations making use of virtualization will be able to gain not only the benefits of using fewer servers, but with Active Power Management they will be able to extend those benefits to all power management scenarios across all virtual and physical facilities.

Because it is faster and easier to implement than existing strategies, Active Power Management is an ideal first move to take when striving to cut power consumption. Cassatt's approach has been shown to provide as much as 50 percent additional savings on top of what customers would be getting with their existing efficiency plans.

How Does Active Power Management Work?

Cassatt Active Power Management technology does not require modification to hardware or software, nor does it require installing any additional software on managed servers. Rather, it leverages internal power controllers found on most modern servers or external power distribution units. This means the solution can be quickly installed in most data centers with minimum disruption to operations–enabling energy and cost savings to accrue almost immediately. Customers don't need to install an entire utility computing environment to take advantage of these energy efficiency capabilities.

Cassatt Active Power Management technology is based on a sophisticated policy engine that takes into account server priorities and needs, server interrelationships, application dependencies and relationships, and individual server power consumption in deciding when to power-down machines. It takes into account variables such as peak- and off-peak power schedules, time-of-day, and emergencies such as "demand curtailment" mandates from power companies to reduce electrical consumption–for example, on hot summer weekdays. The technology determines which servers to power down, and for how long, and then safely handles application requirements before turning them off. As servers are needed again, it applies the same logic and priorities to power those servers back on as appropriate.

Cassatt Active Power Management technology can be a cornerstone to customers' strategy to move more and more toward a green data center.