Started on Sunday, September 25, 2022, 4:25 PM

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Completed on Sunday, September 25, 2022, 4:40 PM
Time taken 15 mins 24 secs
Grade 19.00 out of 25.00 (76%)
Feedback A minimum of 19 correct answers required
to pass

Congratulations, you passed the Power9

Enterprise Servers Level 2 Quiz!

Question 1

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00

Your client is interested in moving to an E950 for their high-

volume transaction processing system. There are thousands of
end users that will be using the system each day to record
point of sale transactions into the database running on the
E950. The client needs the highest possible throughput from
the system. They plan to populate all 4 sockets but are not
sure which core option would be best for them. Which of the
following statements would provide them with the best
solution?

Select one:
The client should try to balance the memory affinity effects
of populating all 4 sockets and therefore we should
recommend the 10-core processor option.

All the POWER9 core options provide the same

performance and throughput and therefore it really only
depends on how much they want to spend so work with the
client to select the core option that best meets their
budget.

The client is looking for the highest throughput possible 

and with a large number of concurrent users they would
benefit greatly from the 12-core processor option.

The client is populating all 4 sockets and therefore, to

reduce costs, they should consider the 8-core processor
option.

Question 2

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

On the E950, the maximum amount of memory that can be

configured if the server has 2 sockets populated is:

Select one:
8TB


16TB

2TB

4TB

Question 3

Incorrect

0.00 points out of 1.00

A client you are working with has a workload that is memory

intensive but only at the end of each month. They would like to
purchase enough memory for their peak demand but only
activate a portion of that memory to support regular, non-
peak, periods. They are considering an E950 with 2 sockets
populated and they require 128GB of memory during their
peak demand. Which of the following statements is accurate
regarding the memory activations on the E950?

Select one:
a. The minimum amount of active memory is a single 

8GB DIMM.

b. The minimum memory activated is 50% of the installed

memory and since the client requires only 128GB
installed to meet their peak demand they can activate
only 64GB as a minimum.

c. The minimum amount of active memory is one riser card

per socket. Each riser card must have a minimum of 16
DIMMs installed and therefore the minimum active
memory is 256GB (16 DIMMs x 8GB x 1 riser card per
CPU x 2 sockets populated).

d. The minimum memory installed is 128GB and the

minimum activated is 50% of the installed memory or
128GB (whichever is greater) and therefore they must
install and activate all 128GB that they need for their
peak demand.
Question 4

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

All of the POWER9 servers have advanced Power Management

Modes in order to save energy but still deliver optimal
performance. Which of the following statements is correct
with respect to the power management modes of the E950
and E980?

Select one:
Both the E950 and E980 are shipped by default with
Dynamic Performance mode to give clients the best cost
benefits by using less power when needed.

The E950 is more cost competitive and therefore ships

with Dynamic Performance mode while the E980 ships
with Maximum Performance mode for higher performance.

We know that the E980 is often used for consolidation and

therefore often has some processors that are idle and
therefore it ships with Static Nominal mode as the default.
The E950 often has higher CPU utilization at client
locations due to the fewer processor cores in the box and
therefore we set that by default to Maximum Performance
mode.

Both the E950 and E980 are shipped by default in 

Maximum Performance mode to give clients the best

possible performance right out of the box.

Question 5

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

A client is considering an E950 with only 2 sockets populated.

How many PCIe slots are available on the E950 for the client
to populate in this configuration?

Select one:
The E950 has 12 PCIe slots with one slot reserved for the
Service Processor Card. Therefore, only half of the slots
could be activated minus the 1 service processor card slot
which would mean 5 PCIe slots would be available in this
configuration.

With 2 sockets populated the client would be able to 

populate 7 of the 11 PCIe slots available plus the one

Service Processor Card slot.

The E950 has 12 PCIe slots with one slot reserved for the
Service Processor Card. Therefore, 11 slots can be
populated in this configuration.

The E950 has 12 PCIe slots but with only half of the
sockets populated, the client would only be able to use 6
PCIe slots.

Question 6

Incorrect

0.00 points out of 1.00

Which of the following components can be migrated from an

E850 to the E950?

Select one:
IO drawers, DASD drawers, and some supported IO
adapters.

IO drawers, DDR3 and DDR4 memory, power supplies and

some supported I/O adapters.

Power supplies, IO drawers, DDR4 memory and DASD 

drawers.

Power supplies, IO drawers, and DASD drawers.

Question 7

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

When talking to existing POWER7 and POWER8 customers, it

is important to understand how much more capacity and
bandwidth the POWER9 E950 has compared to the older
generations. Which of the following statements is correct
when comparing the E950 to both the E850 and the E760?

Select one:
The E950 can has the same amount of memory as the
E850, but with the new industry standard DIMMs, the E950
delivers 20% more memory bandwidth compared to the
E850 and 4x more memory bandwidth compared to the
E760.

The E950 can have up to 8x more memory and 3x more

memory bandwidth compared to both the E850 and E760.

The E950 can have up to 4x more memory and 20% 

more memory bandwidth compared to the E850 and

can have up to 8x more memory and 3x more memory
bandwidth compared to the E760.

The E950 can have up to 2x more memory and 20% more

memory bandwidth compared to the E850 and can have up
to 4x more memory and 3x more memory bandwidth
compared to the E760.

Question 8

Incorrect

0.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

Which of the following statements is true regarding Elastic

Capacity on Demand for the E950 and E980?

Select one:
Clients can activate capacity on demand for processors 
only on the E950. They can increase or decrease
processors in units of 1 core. Memory capacity on
demand is not available on the E950 but is available on
the E980.

Clients can activate capacity on demand for both

processors and memory. They can increase processors in
units of 1 core and can increase memory in units of 8GB.
Note that on the E950 you cannot decrease processors or
memory using elastic capacity on demand. Decreasing
processors and memory capacity using elastic capacity on
demand is only available on the E980.

Clients can activate capacity on demand for both

processors and memory. They can increase or decrease
processors in units of 1 core and can increase or decrease
memory in units of 8GB.

Clients can activate capacity on demand for memory only

on the E950. They can increase or decrease memory in
units of 8GB. Processor capacity on demand is not
available on the E950 but is available on the E980.

Question 9

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00

Which of the following is NOT an option for the E980 processor?

Select one:
16-core processor


12-core processor

11-core processor

8-core processor
Question 10

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

A client is looking to leverage Elastic Capacity on Demand for

their E980 system. What is the minimum number of cores that
must be active on a 2 node E980?

Select one:
8


16

32

Question 11

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00

A client is interested in a 2 node E980 with a total of 8 sockets

populated. What is the maximum amount of memory that can
be configured for this system?

Select one:
64TB

16TB

32TB


48TB

Question 12

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

Which of the following statements is true about the memory in

the E950 and E980?

Select one:

The
E950 and E980 both use buffered memory with
industry standard DIMMs installed on a set of riser cards
(2 riser cards per socket).

The E950 and E980 both use buffered memory leveraging

CDIMMs, similar to
POWER8, with 8 CDIMM slots per
socket. This allows clients to move their memory over from
POWER8 to POWER9.

Both the E950 and E980 use buffered memory but the
E980 uses industry standard DIMMs installed on a set of
riser cards while the E950 leverages CDIMMs similar to
POWER8 which allows clients to move memory from
POWER8 systems but only to the E950 systems.

Both the E950 and E980 use buffered memory but the 
E950 uses industry standard DIMMs installed on a set
of riser cards while the E980 leverages CDIMMs similar
to POWER8 which allows clients to move memory from
POWER8 systems but only to the E980 systems.

Question 13

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

Clients are allowed to move their POWER8 DDR3 and DDR4

CDIMMs over to an E980 but there are some considerations
that they must take into account. Which of the following
statements is correct regarding the use of POWER8 DDR3 and
DDR4 CDIMMs?

Select one:
Clients can mix DDR3 and DDR4 memory in the same
system, but a single riser card must have only one type of
memory (either DDR3 or DDR4) and not both.

Clients can mix DDR3 and DDR4 memory in the same 

system, but a single drawer must have only one type of

memory (either DDR3 or DDR4) and not both.

Clients can mix DDR3 and DDR4 memory without

restrictions in an E980 system.

Clients cannot mix DDR3 and DDR4 memory in the same

system. They must either move only DDR3 or DDR4 but not
both.

Question 14

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00

Which of the following statements is correct regarding the

Operating Systems support on the E980 and E950?

Select one:
The E950 supports AIX and Linux only while the E980 

supports AIX, Linux and IBM i.

Both systems support only AIX and IBM i. They will also
support Linux but for SAP HANA implementations only with
the H950 and H980.

Both systems support AIX and Linux. They will also support
IBM  i but for SAP HANA implementations only with
the H950 and H980.

Both systems support AIX, Linux, and IBM i.

Question 15

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

It is important to understand how existing POWER7 and

POWER8 customers can benefit by moving to POWER9. Which
of the following statements is correct when comparing the
E980 to both the E880C and the E780?

Select one:
The E980 can have up to 2x more memory but has the 

same memory bandwidth as the E880C. The E980 can

have up to 16x more memory and 3x more memory
bandwidth compared to the E780.

The E980 can has the same amount of memory as the

E880C but delivers 20% more memory bandwidth.
Compared to the E780, the E980 can have 4x more
memory and 4x more memory bandwidth.

The E980 can have up to 2x more memory and 20% more

memory bandwidth compared to the E880C. The E980 can
have up to 16x more memory and 3x more memory
bandwidth compared to the E780.

The E980 can have up to 8x more memory and more than

3x the memory bandwidth compared to both the E880C
and E780.

Question 16

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

For large scale applications, especially those that are memory

intensive like SAP HANA and other in-memory databases, the
effects of accessing remote memory across nodes can cause
latency issues. To reduce the effects of memory affinity
issues, the E980 has a flatter SMP topology and increased
internode bandwidth compared to the E880C. What is the
increase in internode bandwidth between the E880C and the
E980?

Select one:
2x

8x

4x


6x

Question 17

Incorrect

0.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

You are speaking to an existing Power client who has a set of

Power 770 servers and they are discussing that they would
like to consolidate some of that workload but need your help
with justifying a move from Power 770 to POWER9. What is
your response?

Select one:
You talk to the client about using POWER9 servers for 
new workloads while they continue to run their existing
workloads on their current Power 770s because there is
no cost advantage to migrate from existing hardware to
new hardware but there are significant benefits for
deploying new workloads on POWER9.

You show them a financial example of moving from Power

770 to Power E950 and demonstrate how the total cost of
ownership savings can be over 50% thanks to the 3 years
of maintenance that is included with the E950 and the
software savings by moving to fewer but more powerful
cores.

You talk to them about how they can buy a 64 core E950 to
replace their current 64 core E770 and transfer those
licenses one for one to the POWER9. This should give them
equivalent performance as their 770 but give them better
reliability and therefore save them money when it comes to
the cost of downtime.

You show them that the E950 delivers 1.5x the

performance compared to an older Power 770 sever and
therefore they can slightly reduce the number of processor
cores they need for their workload. The savings on power
and cooling will easily justify the purchase.

Question 18

Incorrect

0.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

In the first release of the E980 in September 2018, IBM

shipped a maximum of 2 drawers with a maximum of 96
cores, 32TB of memory, 16 PCIe Gen4 slots, and 4 I/O
expansion drawers. In November 2018, IBM plans to release
the E980 with support for up to 4 drawers. Which of the
following statements is NOT true regarding the 4Q18 release
compared to the 3Q18 release?

Select one:
The 4Q18 E980 will double the number of PCIe Gen4 slots
to 32.

The 4Q18 E980 will double the maximum total memory to

64TB.

The 4Q18 E980 will double the maximum number of 

cores to 192.

The 4Q18 E980 will double the maximum number of I/O

expansion drawers to 8.

Question 19

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

Which of the following statements best describes the support

for Enterprise Pools with POWER9?

Select one:
Clients can add POWER9 servers to their existing 

POWER8 enterprise resource pools and can move CoD

resource activations among the systems in a pool as
needed.

Clients can create new enterprise pools for POWER9

systems and can move mobile capacity on demand (CoD)
resource activations between POWER9 servers. They can
also continue to move mobile CoD activations among their
POWER8 resource pools. However, they cannot move
Mobile CoD resource activations between POWER9 and
POWER8 resource pools.

Client can move CoD activations from POWER8 systems to

POWER9 systems but only for migrating workloads from
POWER8 to POWER9 and for a 3-month window when both
systems may be active at the same time during a migration
from POWER8 to POWER9. After that window of upgrade,
mobile CoD must not go between POWER8 and POWER9.

Clients can purchase POWER9 activations and use them in

their POWER8 resource pools, but they cannot purchase
POWER8 activations and use them in their POWER9
resource pools.

Question 20

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00

What percentage of Fortune 100 customers leverage Power

Systems?

Select one:
80%


100%

50%

75%

Question 21

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

Eliminating data breaches is a top imperative for IT

organizations worldwide. Enterprise customers are at an
increased risk of data breaches due to their popularity and the
size of their organization. According to a Ponemon Institute
2018 Data Breach Study, what is the likelihood that an
organization will have one or more data breaches in the next
two years?

Select one:
28%


100%

48%

5%

Question 22

Incorrect

0.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

You are speaking with a client and talking about what

downtime costs their business. The client mentions that their
system is mission critical for their internal users to be able to
do their work, however, this system will not be client facing
and therefore there will not be any revenue impact for them if
the system were to go down. The client says that cost savings
therefore should not be added to any TCO evaluation. How
should you respond?

Select one:
Highlight to the client that according to an HIS Markit study
on downtime, 78% of the cost of an outage is attributed to
lost productivity within a company and only 17% was due
to revenue loss. Ask them what the impact is to their
internal users of this system if it is ever down and what
impact that has on their productivity.

Make sure the client understands that all systems are 

interconnected and that all systems in a

customer’s business affect their revenue in one
way or another. Challenge them on their conclusion that
revenue is not impacted by this proposed system
because every system generates revenue.

Inform the client that according to Gartner, downtime

typically costs clients between $1M and $5M per hour and
so no matter what the system is, the cost of downtime can
be considerable and that they should use these numbers in
their TCO calculations to see the value of the reliability that
POWER9 Enterprise Systems brings to the table.

Agree
with the client that not all systems affect the
bottom line and try to get a
deeper discount on the server
to ensure the system is cost justified
Question 23

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

According to the ITIC 2020 Global Server Hardware, Server OS

Reliability Survey, how many years in a row has IBM Power
Systems been ranked as the “most reliable server”?

Select one:
20

12


Question 24

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00

When discussing the security and vulnerability benefits of the

POWER9 Enterprise servers, your client mentions that they
have been having trouble keeping up with all the vulnerability
patches in their existing x86 systems. Which of the following
statements is true and might pique their interest in Enterprise
Servers?

Select one:
POWER9 Enterprise Servers are designed to be your on-
premises private cloud behind your company’s
firewall. As such there is less of a need for vulnerability
patches because you are already protected by your
company firewalls.

PowerVM is the only hypervisor amongst its major 

competitors with no reported vulnerabilities and

comes preinstalled as the
default hypervisor for all
Power systems, including enterprise servers.
KVM is an open source hypervisor that runs on Power
Enterprise systems. Most open source software is more
secure than proprietary software because there are more
developers looking at the code and finding security
vulnerabilities before they get exploited.

Linux is much more secure than Microsoft Windows and

hardly ever needs to be patched. Clients running Linux
rarely need to apply vulnerability patches.

Question 25

Correct

1.00 points out of 1.00 Back

Next

Meltdown and Spectre are two security issues that have

received a lot of attention in the marketplace. For the POWER9
Enterprise servers, which of the following statements is true?

Select one:
a. IBM is shipping servers with the patches installed and 
turned on by default even though this will have a small
performance impact for clients. Clients can choose to
run with the patches turned off for higher
performance if they understand the exposure.

b. IBM will only be shipping and turning on security patches

in the scale out server line as these are the mission
critical servers from IBM. Scale out servers can be
patched by clients if they so choose.

c. IBM will be shipping patches to address these issues in

the first half of 2019.

d. IBM is shipping all POWER9 servers with the patches

installed, however, these patches are turned off by
default in order to maximize performance for clients
running behind a firewall in private clouds.