Scott Stallard, an HP senior vice president and general manager of the company's enterprise servers and storage group, said that HP plans to build NonStop blades, though those products won't ship for several years. In the interim, the c-Class server incorporates NonStop capabilities for adding connections and updating systems without having to take other systems down, he said.

Screens for actors

One HP blade user, Kevin Donnellan, director of enterprise infrastructure services at theScreen Actors Guild, said the addition of LCD screens will simplify his environment.

"If they can really work, they are going to be a great boon to my administrators," said Donnellan. "A visual display really does help a lot."

The Hollywood-based labor union has been moving from rack-mounted servers to blade servers, but Donnellan noted that some applications, such as the voice response system used with SAG's telephone service, can't be run on a blade.