Carlos Bodra wrote: >We are studying to replace old IBM z890 Capacity Setting 230 (170 Mips – 26 >MSU´s) by an IBM z10 BC Capacity Setting J02 (182 Mips – 23 MSU´s). >We understand that since MSU´s are lower in z10BC (23 x 26 MSU´s), we should >pay less for software contracts with IBM, CA and SoftwareAG. >This situation is correct for IBM and CA, but not for SoftwareAG since they >charge by MIPS not MSU´s. >Questions about: >1 – Anyone had any experience with this?
Yes. There are some customers and a very few vendors with software license agreements that are based on full capacity, however defined. >2 – IBM and CA accepts capping to charge software, SoftwareAG not, is this a >normal business practice? A software vendor and their customer can agree to pretty much any charging metric, as long as it's legal. For example, if you manufacture ice cream, you and the vendor can agree to pay for software based on the number of liters of ice cream that you manufacture each month. Whatever contract you have, and can agree to, is what you have. There are some sensible industry norms, of course. >3 – Any ideas how to circumvent this situation? z890 is out of IBM service >and we need to replace it. 2nd hand machine available closer to z890 >capacity is z10BC, even due z/OS-e will run there with few ptfs applied to >support new hardware (z10BC). "Talk to your friendly IBM representative." And probably also to Brian Westerman at Syzygy. I haven't seen your contract (and don't want to!), but here are some ideas, in no particular order: (a) If you have a full capacity license for the "software of concern" AND your peak usage of that software can be substantially below 170 "MIPS," then consider setting up a basic Parallel Sysplex with two machines. For example, let's suppose you only need 75 MIPS of that particular software (at peak), and otherwise you need 130 MIPS for everything else. OK, then you could get an IBM z13s A01 capacity model and couple it to an IBM z13s A02 capacity model. You would run the "software of concern" on the A01 (softcapped at 75 MIPS, pay for 80 MIPS for that particular software), and you would run all your other software on the A02 machine (and softcap it at 130 MIPS). Other "penalty box" variations are possible, of course. Note that the machines can be physically separated a substantial amount and probably take care of your DR needs, in "flip flop" fashion, especially if you use Coupling Thin Interrupts and Asynchronous CF Duplexing. (b) Buy an IBM z13s capacity model B02 (165 MIPS, 21 MSUs). The z13s B02 is the "Price is Right" system: the closest you will get to 170 MIPS without going over, assuming you want to maintain a 2-way configuration and assuming you do not want to license more of that "software of concern." (c) Buy a used IBM z10BC capacity model N01 (168 MIPS, 21 MSUs), a 1-way machine. I do not recommend this option, for a variety of reasons. (d) Check to see if a z/OS hosting company makes sense, at least for this "software of concern" workload. Syzygy, IBM, and others can advise you on such options. (e) Migrate from the "software of concern" to a machine like the one in Option (b) but with different software with better licensing terms. And, preferably, use the same machine to run other cool stuff, too -- new stuff and stuff you may already be running on other servers. There's an excellent IBM redbook with some advice. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Timothy Sipples IT Architect Executive, Industry Solutions, IBM z Systems, AP/GCG/MEA E-Mail: [email protected] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- For IBM-MAIN subscribe / signoff / archive access instructions, send email to [email protected] with the message: INFO IBM-MAIN
