P06963-B21

HPE P06963-B21 is a ProLiant DL20 Gen10 4SFF Configure-to-order Server. It belongs to the ProLiant DL20 Gen10 Servers range. The part number is the reliable way to identify it, because accessories of this kind are often visually identical across generations that are not interchangeable.

What to check before you buy. Three things decide whether a server will suit the job. The generation, because the processors, memory and controllers that fit one generation generally do not fit the next even where the chassis looks identical. The drive configuration, because a chassis built for small form factor disks cannot take large form factor ones without a different cage and backplane. And how it is specified to be populated, since a second processor usually needs its own heatsink and may enable memory slots that are otherwise unusable. It is also worth asking what is physically included: rails, bezel, drive carriers and the remote management licence are all commonly sold separately from the chassis.

How we supply it. Supplied new where available, otherwise as tested stock with warranty, subject to availability. Tell us the chassis or model it has to work with and we will confirm the part before anything ships. Quotes go out the same or next working day.

P06963-B21 is an HPE ProLiant DL20 Gen10 supplied as a configure-to-order chassis. It is not a working server as it ships: there is no processor, no memory and no drives in the box. You specify those separately, which is the point of buying it this way.

The DL20 Gen10 is the smallest ProLiant rack server, for edge sites, a web or firewall tier, or anywhere a full 2U would be wasted. It is a 1U rack machine with 1 processor socket, taking Intel Xeon E-2100/E-2200, or Pentium processors.

To put this into service you will need a processor, memory and drives, plus an operating system.

Storage is 4 x 2.5-inch (small form factor) bays. These are hot-plug bays, so a failed drive can be swapped without powering the server down. 2.5-inch drives trade capacity per drive for spindle count.

The storage controller is the S100i, software RAID built into the chipset. Software RAID is adequate for boot volumes and light workloads; a database or virtualisation host usually wants a hardware controller with a write cache instead.

There are 4 DIMM slots for UDIMM DDR4.

Expansion runs to 2 PCIe slots with networking from the HPE embedded 1Gb 2-port 332i network Adapter.

The fans are non-redundant, which means a fan failure is a service event rather than something the server rides out.

Management is HPE iLO with Intelligent Provisioning, which gives you remote console, power control and health monitoring independently of the installed operating system.

Worth getting right when you specify one of these:

• How you populate the 4 DIMM slots. Filling them evenly across the memory channels matters more than the total figure — the same capacity spread correctly is measurably faster than the same capacity in too few slots.
• Whether the embedded software RAID is enough, or whether this needs a Smart Array controller with a write cache added at the same time.
• Drive carriers. ProLiant bays take HPE carriers, so bare drives bought separately will not simply slide in.

Green Code Technologies supplies HPE ProLiant servers from stock in the UK. If you want this quoted as a complete build — processor, memory, drives and controller specified for the workload you have in mind — ask us and we will put the configuration together and confirm it against HPE’s QuickSpecs before you order.