LTE 5000 and Intelligent Manageability

Table of Contents

Introduction
Intelligent Manageability- A Portable Perspective
Overview
Components of Intelligent Manageability
Details of Asset Management
Details of Fault Management
Details of Security Management
Feature Availability By Operating Systems
Local Asset Management
Local Fault Management
Remote Asset Management
Remote Fault Management
Backward Compatibility
Integration With System Management Solution Providers
DMI and LTE 5000
Availability of Intelligent Manageability on LTE 5000

Introduction

To help our customers manage these new environments and meet these new challenges, Compaq has developed, partnered and innovated to provide a broad set of management solutions under an umbrella called Intelligent Manageability. Within Intelligent Manageability, three core areas have been identified:

• Asset Management-Providing an easy way to track and manage your portables
• Fault Management-Making customer aware of potential problems before they happen
• Security Management-Safeguarding your assets (hardware, software and data)

Please refer to the following papers for more information on Intelligent Manageability:

• Intelligent Manageability White Paper, February/96
• DMI and Intelligent Manageability, February/96
• Desktop Management Solutions Partners, February/96
• Selling Intelligent Manageability, January/96
• Intelligent Manageability - First Quarter Q&A, January/96
• Competitive Analysis - Desktop Manageability, January/96
• Quickspecs - Compaq Insight Manager, January/96
• Compaq Insight Manager Demo Information, February/96
• Desktop Management Standards Terms List, January/96

Microsoft, Windows, Windows NT, Windows NT Advanced Server, SQL Server for Windows NT are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Microsoft Corporation.

INTELLIGENT MANAGEABILITY- A Portable Perspective

As reliance on PCs increases, managing them becomes even tougher. Corporations are increasingly spending a bigger portion of their budget on managing their desktop and portable PCs. According to a 1995 report published by Forrester Research, Inc., companies spend approximately $4,215 annually to manage each notebook PC. This includes the time spent by administrators and co-workers to fix notebook PCs, effort involved in failure prevention, and recovery. It does not include hardware, software or training costs.

Consider the following scenarios in a networked or a stand-alone environment:

A network administrator is asked to provide the Serial Number of all PCs for audit purposes. He walks over to every office that has a PC, and writes down all Serial Numbers.

A network administrator receives a message from a user that a hard drive has crashed. The administrator spends hours creating a new hard drive image and trying to recover data from the original hard drive.

A Sales Manager on the road needs technical support from the manufacturer of his portable PC. The technical support person wants to know the serial number of the hard disk for warranty purposes. The Sales Manager has no idea even where to begin.

A visitor to your company sees a portable PC lying on a worker's desk and decides to surreptitiously walk out of the building with it.

Much of the manual intervention required in the above scenarios can be eliminated if there is a more convenient and timely way to attain the same information. Intelligent Manageability is a convenient way for network administrators to remotely access asset information about the PC, and get automatic alerts in case of potential problems. It also allows the stand-alone portable PC users to retrieve asset information as required, and get automatic alerts in case of potential problems. Finally, Intelligent Manageability includes the ability to secure both the asset itself and the data stored on the asset.

In a networked environment, a docked portable PC offers the same functionality offered by a Compaq desktop PC. Therefore a network administrator can view the desktops and portables as clients' on the network. A standalone portable PC offers a subset of the functionality of a desktop-equivalent' docked portable PC.

OVERVIEW

COMPONENTS OF INTELLIGENT MANAGEABILITY

Compaq currently delivers Intelligent Manageability on portable PCs with three major components: Asset Management, Fault Management and Security Management.

Asset Management-Keeps track of hardware and/or software features (e.g. model number, serial number, ROM revision level, etc.) of a portable PC. This information may be used for inventory or audit purposes. A third-party automatic software distribution program may access this information. It also helps streamline service calls since the person calling technical support can provide quick information about the portable PC's configuration, such as serial number and ROM revision level.

Fault management-Warns the users and network administrators of impending failures on the users' PCs so that there is time to take appropriate action before the failure occurs. Its two primary components are:

• Thermal Sensing-Hardware and software features that track the internal temperature of the portable PC, and alerts the user and/or network administrator of excessively high internal temperature so action can be taken before damage occurs to data or internal components.
• Drive Fault Prediction-Monitors the hard drive performance, predicts hard drive failures, and alerts the user and/or network administrator so action can be taken before the hard drive fails completely.

NOTE: Drive Fault Prediction support on the PC requires that its hard drive support DFP functionality. Compaq is evaluating DFP hard drives for the LTE 5000 and intends to make them available in 3Q/96. The availability dates of these drives will be announced separately, at a later date.

Security Management-Consists of hardware and software security provided in the LTE 5000. The software security primarily consists of passwords for users and network administrators to prevent unauthorized use of a PC and/or to protect confidential data. Hardware security consists of support for physical locking devices that act as theft deterrent.

Details Of Asset Management

There are twelve features of the LTE 5000 that can be tracked either locally or remotely by a network administrator.

Field #	Field Name	Field Details
1	Serial Number	Unique number identifier that is printed on the barcode label at the back of the LTE 5000*.
2	Asset Tag	An alphanumeric value that may be changed by user to reflect internal, company-specific numbering methodology. This is the only asset field that may be changed by user. Factory setting defaults to Serial Number.
3	System Board Revision Level	The revision level of the system (CPU) board**.
4	ROM revision Level (date)	Contains the date when ROM was created. Automatically updated when a new ROM is loaded on the LTE 5000.
5, 6	Manufacturer and Model Name	"Compaq LTE 5000 series"
7, 8, 9	Hard Drive - Make, Model and Serial Number	This information is stored in the hard drive firmware, and can be accessed as required.
10,11,12	Monitor - Make, Model and Serial Number	This information is stored in the Monitor firmware, and can be accessed as required.

Earlier models of the LTE 5000 do not store the serial number which is printed on the barcode label at the back of the notebook. When accessing Computer Setup using the F10 key, the user sees a serial number that is different from the one that is printed at the back of the notebook.

Newer models of the LTE 5000 will have the valid serial number permanently stored in the notebook that matches the one printed on the barcode label at the back of the notebook. Under certain circumstances, when running Asset Management, it is important for the network administrator or the user to have access to the serial number printed on the barcode label at the back of the LTE 5000. During the installation of Intelligent Manageability software on the earlier models, if it is determined that the notebook contains an invalid serial number, the user will be prompted to enter the serial number at the back of the notebook. This will be the only time when a user will be allowed to input the serial number field into the LTE 5000.

LTE 5000 may not display proper System Board Revision Level. The Intelligent Manageability software expects a 2-digit field, whereas LTE 5000 has a 6-digit field which does not follow the Intelligent Manageability format convention.

Details Of Fault Management

Thermal Sensing

All LTE 5000s have a thermal sensor that monitors the temperature within the notebook chassis. When an excessive temperature condition is detected, a warning is sent to the user or network administrator so that appropriate action can be taken.

Drive Fault Prediction

Compaq worked with Quantum, Seagate, and Conner to develop the IntelliSafe hard drive for desktop PCs. This disk drive monitors its own health and sends a warning to the user or network administrator if it determines that it is about to fail. The IntelliSafe hard drive contains firmware that performs periodic analyses to determine how well the drive is operating. If the analysis determines that an aspect of the drive's operation has degraded to the point where failure is imminent, then the drive passes this information to management software which generates a fault alert

Drive Fault Prediction in Intelligent Manageability works only with hard drives that support this functionality. The current 510MB, 810MB, 1.35GB and new 2.16GB hard drives on the LTE 5000 do not support DFP at this time. Compaq is evaluating DFP hard drives for portable PCs and intends to make them available in 3Q/96.

The current drives that do not support DFP cannot be upgraded later to include DFP functionality.

Example of Fault Management: Drive Fault Prediction

In general, there are three basic software elements that take hardware alerts from the IntelliSafe hard drive and thermal sensor and translate them into information for the end-user and the network administrator: Instrumented Device Drivers, Management Agents, and Management Applications.

• Instrumented Device Drivers-The instrumented device driver is an extension of the traditional device driver. In addition to providing the normal device driver functionality, the instrumented device driver also maintains management information (inventory, configuration and fault) about the device's operation.
• Management Agent-The management agent takes the management information from the instrumented device driver and delivers the information to the management application. In a networked environment, the SNMP (Simple Network Management Protocol) management protocol is used to carry this information to an administrator's management application.
• Management Application-The management application is the user interface and viewing tool. It provides the monitoring, analysis, and control of the management features in the computer.

Hard drives are mechanical devices which have components that move and spin. An IntelliSafe hard drive contains firmware that performs periodic analysis to determine how operating at that moment. For instance, key hard drive information such as irregular seek and spin-up times are monitored. If the analysis determines that an aspect of the drive's operation has degraded to the point that there is an impending failure then the drive will pass this information to its instrumented device driver. The instrumented device driver passes the indication of failure and other management information (either acquired from the drive or maintained by the driver) to the management agent. The agent then stores the management information in a database-like table called a MIB (Management Information Base). Besides storing the information in the table, the agent sends a message to Compaq Insight Personal Edition which displays the warning message to the local user. In addition, an SNMP message to a management application such as Compaq Insight Manager is sent. The SNMP message tells the management application that the hard drive is likely to fail. The management application then alerts the administrator (by way of a pop-up window, audible tone, or message to a pager) that the user's hard drive is likely to fail.

Details of Security Management

The LTE 5000 incorporates two types of Security Management: Software Security and Hardware Security.

Software Security

• Power On password-The user must enter a valid password every time the notebook is powered on.
• Resume password-The user must enter a valid password every time the notebook resumes operation from standby(suspend) mode.
• Quicklock/Quickblank-The user can temporarily disable the screen and keyboard by simultaneously pressing the FN and F6 keys. The Power On password must be entered before the notebook can be used again.
• Setup password-Any user is allowed to see the contents of Computer Setup by pressing F10 key, but must enter the Setup password before any changes in the Compute Setup can be made.
• Disable Serial and Infrared ports-The user can disable the serial and infrared ports through Computer Setup.
• Disable Parallel port-The user can disable the parallel port through Computer Setup.
• Disable PC Card slots-The user can disable the PC Card slots on the notebook and either expansion base through Computer Setup.
• Disable diskette drive-The user can either disable the diskette drive completely, or disable the ability to boot from a diskette drive.

Hardware Security

• Notebook security provisions-A slot is provided on the rear of the computer to lock, using an optional Kensington cable lock, the undocked computer to an immovable object. This slot cannot be used when the LTE 5000 is docked. However, a slot is provided on the right side of both expansion bases to lock the expansion base and docked computer to an immovable object.
• Removable hard drive theft deterrent-A security screw (and a spare) is provided with the notebook that allows a user to secure the LTE 5000 removable hard drive in the dedicated hard drive bay, thereby providing a deterrent to its unauthorized removal.
• Modular device (multibay) theft deterrent-A security screw (and a spare) is provided with the notebook that allows a user to secure a device (second hard disk, second battery, diskette drive, or a CD-ROM drive) in the computer MultiBay, thereby providing a deterrent to its unauthorized removal.

FEATURE AVAILABILITY BY OPERATING SYSTEMS

The availability of Compaq Intelligent Manageability features depends on the Operating System being used on the LTE 5000. The following table summarizes how various features under Windows Operating Systems can be accessed:

	Local Asset Management	Local Fault Management	Remote Asset Management	Remote Fault Management
Windows 95	Compaq Insight Personal Edition	Compaq Insight Personal Edition (automatically alerts users in case of problems)	Compaq Insight Manager and/or Third party systems mgmt. solution	Compaq Insight Manager and/or Third party systems mgmt. solution
Windows 3.1	Diagnostics for Windows	Diagnostics for Windows (no automatic alert to users)	Third party systems mgmt. solution	Not supported
Windows NT 3.51 & 4.0	TBD	TBD	TBD	TBD

Local Asset Management

In contrast to a desktop PC, a portable PC is much more likely to be used in stand-alone mode by a mobile user. It thus becomes extremely important to support Intelligent Manageability on a mobile platform.

A user running Compaq Insight Personal Edition under Windows 95 can access asset management information. A Windows 3.1 LTE 5000 user can run Diagnostics for Windows periodically to get asset information.

Under both Compaq Insight Personal Edition and Diagnostics for Windows, there are screens that present asset information. These screens are: AssetControl screen, Video screen, and Storage screen.

• AssetControl screen: Displays manufacturer and model name, processor used, serial number and asset tag, and system board revision level.
  

• Video screen: Displays monitor manufacturer, serial number, video resolution and graphics controller.
  
  
  
  

• Storage screen: Displays information about hard drives and diskette, such as manufacturer, model and serial number of hard drives, and capacities of hard and diskette drives.
  
  

Local Fault Management

End-users are alerted to imminent hard drive and excessive temperature conditions in three ways: during boot-up, through a local pop-up, and through Diagnostics for Windows or Compaq Insight Personal Edition.

NOTE: Drive Failure Prediction requires that the hard drive support DFP functionality.

Boot-up

Each time an LTE 5000 is booted, both the IntelliSafe hard drive and thermal sensor are polled through the management agents and instrumented device drivers. If either reports a problem, then the user sees a warning.

Local pop-up

Under Windows 95, alert pop-up screens are added to Compaq Insight Personal Edition that alert the user to impending hard drive failures or thermal management problems. These alert screens provide the user with warning of an impending fault problem and allow the user to take the appropriate steps to avoid loss of mission critical data. In the case of a hard drive alert, the user can close all applications and manually backup data to the network or locally to tape before the hard drive fails. The hard drive can then be replaced and data restored without loss of data. In the case of a thermal fault alert, the user is warned to close all applications because temperatures are exceeding operating thresholds. After this warning, if the temperature in the unit continues to rise (and reaches a pre-determined threshold), the unit will shut itself down automatically.

NOTE: The recommended actions box within the Alert Pop-Ups may be customized to include corporate guidelines or other instructions pertinent to resolving the fault.

Diagnostics for Windows and Compaq Insight Personal Edition

Diagnostics for Windows and Compaq Insight Personal Edition contain a Health screen that present the status of the IntelliSafe hard drive and thermal sensor. Every time either Diagnostics for Windows or Compaq Insight Personal Edition is started, the hard drive and thermal sensor are polled through the management agents and instrumented device drivers. The results are displayed on the screen and represent a snapshot of the status.

Remote Asset Management

Remote asset management is of importance to network administrators who support mobile users. As an example, an administrator can access a portable PC and get the model name and serial number of the notebook while the user is out of the office.

Compaq Insight Manager provides this capability from LTE 5000 portables running Windows 95. A user must be logged on to the network for Compaq Insight Manager to be able to access asset information.

Third party LAN and Enterprise system management solutions are able to directly access the Intelligent Manageability agents loaded on the LTE 5000 and provide remote asset management. Please refer to section "Integration with System Management Solution Providers" in this paper for more details.

Compaq Insight Manager co-exists with and complements most major third party systems management solutions, such as IBM NetView, HP OpenView, Intel LanDesk, Norton ManageWise, Microsoft SMS etc. Both Compaq Insight Manager and the third-party software can be used for remote access management.

Remote Fault Management

Remote fault management is primarily provided by Compaq Insight Manager under Windows 95; in certain cases, however, third party systems management solutions may also provide this capability.
Remote fault management is not available under Windows 3.1.

Backward Compatibility

The Intelligent Manageability software is completely backward compatible with all LTE 5000 models.

NOTE: Earlier models of the LTE 5000 do not store a valid serial number, so the user will be prompted to enter the serial number printed on the barcode label at the back of the LTE 5000 during the installation of Intelligent Manageability software.

INTEGRATION WITH SYSTEM MANAGEMENT SOLUTION PROVIDERS

Compaq Intelligent Manageability is based on the SNMP network management standard followed by major providers of Enterprise and LAN systems management solutions. Compaq works extensively and regularly with other solution providers to ensure that the functionality provided by Compaq Intelligent Manageability complements the functionality provided by other solution providers. This collaboration is the "Desktop Management Solutions Partners Program." Doing so ensures that the benefits of Intelligent Manageability are accessible to our entire customer base through broad vendor support. This broad support ensures that customers can easily manage Compaq LTE 5000s remotely using their choice of tools.

As an example, Compaq Insight Manager and Microsoft SMS co-exist and complement each other in a networked environment. SMS is primarily a software distribution tool, and it has access to all the asset information. Compaq Insight Manager provides additional asset information to SMS for Compaq portable PCs. Compaq Insight Manager is used primarily for fault management of Compaq servers, Compaq desktops PCs, and now Compaq portable PCs.

The Compaq Portable Division is currently in the process of working with other system management solution providers to completely test the LTE 5000 in all environments. This will enable Intelligent Manageability on the LTE 5000 to be "Compaq desktop equivalent" i.e. all Intelligent Manageability features currently available on Compaq desktops will also be available on Compaq LTE 5000.

Following is a list of the management solution providers we are working with to ensure that LTE 5000 is completely supported:

First phase

• IBM (NetView)*
• HP (OpenView for AIX and Windows)*
• Microsoft Corporation (Systems Management Server)
• Intel (LANDesk)
• Symantec (Norton Administrator for Networks)
• McAfee Associates (LAN Inventory)
• McAfee Associates (Saber LAN Workstation)

* IBM NetView and HP OpenView provide SNMP-based enterprise management solutions, and are not a part of Solutions Partners.

Second phase

• Novell (ManageWise)
• Seagate Enterprise Management Systems (Frye LAN Directory)
• Seagate Enterprise Management Systems (LANAlert)
• Tally Systems (NetCensus)
• BindView

Third phase

• ASI (AssetPRO)
• Arcada (Backup Exec)
• Computer Associates Software (Monitrix)
• Computer Associates Software (ARCsolo)

DMI (DESKTOP MANAGEMENT INTERFACE) AND LTE 5000

Compaq is a DMTF (Desktop Management Task Force) Steering Committee member and fully supports the DMTF's efforts to create standards for networked PCs. The DMTF has made great strides to develop a standard framework to manage PCs. However, several key requirements still need to be met. There include broad support by operating system vendors, standardization of remote management protocol, and broad support by management tool providers.

All Compaq LTE 5000 models are DMI (Desktop Management Interface) compliant. Customers can confidently purchase the LTE 5000 notebook computers knowing that they can take advantage of the DMI technology should it become important in their environment.

AVAILABILITY OF INTELLIGENT MANAGEABILITY ON LTE 5000

Software Components

Intelligent Manageability software consists of the following pieces:

• Intelligent Manageability Agents for Windows 95 (loaded on LTE 5000)
• Compaq Insight Personal Edition for Windows 95 or Diagnostics for Windows 3.1 (may be loaded on LTE 5000, or run directly from the diskette drive)
• Latest LTE 5000 ROM-BIOS that supports Intelligent Manageability functionality

Availability

Users of LTE 5000 have two alternatives to obtain Intelligent Manageability software for their LTE 5000s: SoftPaq or Software Spare Kit.

• SoftPaq-An electronic distribution of software, it offers immediate availability to users and is free (except for phone line time). The user must be familiar, however, with downloading software from the Web, Compaq BBS, or one of the On-line services (CompuServe, America On-line and Prodigy).
• Software Spare Kit-Offers convenience over speed. Spare kits are available to customers within approximately 3-4 days after they call an authorized Compaq dealer or Compaq Technical Support. Spare kits for Intelligent Manageability have a very nominal cost.

To receive the complete Intelligent Manageability software through Spare kits, please use the following Spare kit numbers:

English	242132-001
German	242132-041
French	242132-051
Italian	242132-061
Br. Portuguese	242132-201
LA Spanish	242132-161
Danish	242132-081
Norwegian	242132-091
Dutch	242132-331
Finnish	242132-351
Swedish	242132-101
Japanese	242132-291

SoftPaq numbers will be available at a later date.

Beginning late 3Q/96, the Intelligent Manageability software (i.e. the Intelligent Manageability agents) on Windows 95 will be pre-installed on the LTE 5000

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