5 May 2008, 12:19

AMD collaborates with Raritan for remote PC maintenance

AMD has joined forces with remote computer maintenance specialist Raritan to develop tools for users and developers for the administration of desktop computers. Office PCs used in businesses often contain network chips that provide administrators with remote maintenance functions via the LAN. For a number of years, the Distributed Management Task Force (DMTF), an industry association, has been publishing the specifications and standards required for this process. DASH (Desktop and Mobile Architecture for System Hardware) is one of these standards that plays an especially important role for office computers.

AMD and Raritan are now working on a DASH Software Developer Kit (SDK) and a reference implementation of DASH software that simulates a DASH-compatible PC. A DASH Interoperability Test Suite has already been available since March 2007. Soon, DASH-compatible desktop computers and notebooks are to be integrated into the System Center Configuration Manager 2007, the successor to Microsoft's Systems Management Server (SMS 2003). DASH compatible networking chips are currently made by Broadcom, and they are shortly to be joined by Marvell who are also planning to provide DASH-compatible network chips.

The deal with Raritan is part of the Trinity and Raiden concepts that AMD announced in 2006 for remote PC maintenance, with a wide range of functions based on open standards. This concept is AMD's answer to Intel's vPro platform and the related Active Management Technology (AMT). Intel integrates a Baseboard Management Controller (BMC) in its vPro chipsets. The BMC controller executes firmware stored in the system's flash memory along with the system BIOS. This runs on a small ARC processor built in to the North Bridge (or NIC for AMT 1.0) of the motherboard. The system operates through a built-in web server, communicating via the system's NIC, that allows a remote user to perform a sub-set of the full AMT list of operations, even when the system is apparently switched off. Since AMT version 3.0, Intel has supported the basis of DASH with WS Management (WSMAN).

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