Blade PCs offer centrally managed workstations with easy recovery from hardware failure Companies struggling to make desktop PC administration more manageable and less expensive should consider Hewlett-Packard’s CCI (Consolidated Client Infrastructure), a new approach to computing based on HP’s bc1000 blade PC. CCI shifts applications and data from users’ desktops to arrays of PC blades, which users access from thin clients via Microsoft Windows RDC (Remote Desktop Connection). As users work, their files are stored to network shares. Adding management software, such as Microsoft Active Directory and the Big-IP Blade Controller by F5 Networks, creates a complete virtual desktop environment.My initial experience with CCI was impressive. I noticed no significant slowdown using such typical applications as Microsoft Office, and I was able to move from one thin client to another while maintaining my files and applications. After simulating a blade failure while editing a Word document, I was able to restart on another blade in minutes, having lost only the changes made since the last autosave.CCI includes Rapid Deployment Pack, a software bundle developed in partnership with Altiris. These applications make installing a consistent configuration on numerous blades a breeze and ease routine tasks like distribution of software updates and security patches. It took me only minutes to copy OS and applications from a working blade to create an installable clone image. CCI has some rigid constraints, however. Support is limited to Windows XP Pro desktops and to applications that can run over RDC. In time, the relevance of those constraints might fade, especially as the two major benefits promised by CCI — reduced administration cost and improved reliability of desktop applications — become ever more desirable. Technology Industry