Virtualization Frontier

Hyper-V Performance with 24-Core R900

ToddMuirhead — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 21:12:00 GMT

I just posted a new whitepaper that I have been working on for the last month or two. It was a great opportunity to test out how well Hyper-V performs with a large number of virtual machines (VMs) on a richly configured R900. You'll have to check out the whitepaper for the complete details. Here I'm going to give you a little bit of the background into how the paper was done.

I found out in early summer that we would be announcing and shipping some new 6-core Intel Xeon processors in our PowerEdge R900 server (4-socket, 4U). I was being asked what I thought would be a good way to show how well it performed for virtualization and recommended that we use Hyper-V and the Dell DVD store in a test similar to some tests that I had done in the past with ESX. At the time, Hyper-V was still just a release candidate, and I was told that I wouldn't get the processors until early August. Both of these things changed-Hyper-V went officially final with an RTM build (which was great), and I ended up not getting any 6-core processors to test with until late August (which was bad because I had only one week to complete testing at that point).

I switched over to EqualLogic for the storage in this test. Previous tests had mostly been with Dell | EMC CX series storage, but I wanted to get a chance to run a heavy load against the EqualLogic iSCSI storage. It was fun to set up and test with the new arrays. I thought that setup was much easier, and I learned about setting up MPIO with the iSCSI initiator on Windows 2008.

Showing that the R900 with 24 cores was able to support 40 VMs, achieving a total of 74K DVD Store Orders per minute, wouldn't mean anything unless it was compared to something else. Using an R900 and an HP DL585 as quad-core comparison points, the testing showed an advantage in not only performance, but performance per watt as well.

So check out the full paper, and let me know if you have any questions.

New Performance Data on 2-Socket vs 4-Socket

ToddMuirhead — Wed, 09 Jul 2008 16:55:00 GMT

In the past I was somewhat biased towards 2-socket servers for virtualization - which was due to the results of some testing we did. I had of course realized over the past year or so that things had changed and the 4-socket servers were now more competitive. So when I ran the series of chats on Selecting a Server for Virtualization, I decided that it was a good opportunity to re-run some of those exact same tests with the brand new R900 that had arrived in the lab. I posted the results on a TechCenter page so you can see the full results, but the short summary is that the R900 stacks up as more efficient than the 2950 we tested in the previous paper. The R900 showed 10 to 23 percent better performance per watt than the older 2950. The question that remains is how would the R900 compare to a current generation 2950?

Todd

Bumping Into It on VMTN

ToddMuirhead — Tue, 20 May 2008 19:31:00 GMT

I just ran into a thread on VMTN that is exactly what we are hosting a chat on later today. The VMTN thread is titled Physical Hardware Recommendation, but I am calling the same topic Selecting a Virtualization Server. Very coincidental that this thread was started today and it even specifically asks about 2950s and R900s. So for the record - this VMTN thread was not a planted thread by me or some secret Dell conspiracy. I do have to confess that it was Scott that spotted this thread first and he deserves the credit (Again!).

Todd

The Best Server for You

ToddMuirhead — Mon, 19 May 2008 12:20:00 GMT

For the past three weeks, we at the Dell TechCenter have been focused on the decoder ring for systems management. Starting today we are going to tell you what the best server is for virtualization. The reason it is going to take three weeks is that the answer for everybody is different. So we are going to talk about key factors, advantages of one type of server over another, and learn from the decisions and thought processes of each other. We are simply hosting the conversation and I do not have a "favorite server" -- although I must admit that I used to lean heavily towards 2-socket servers.

The decision for most seems to come down to 2-socket, 4-socket, or blades servers. I hope that we end up expanding the conversation and talk about lots of other possibilities including storage options, hypervisor options, and who knows what else.

In order to get things going are going to have some chat sessions, there is a topic home page, and a server selection matrix page to specifically lay out the facts about each type of server. I've started the page off with 2-socket, 4-socket, and blades as server categories with some basic tech specs and advantages for each type. This page will grow as additional pros, cons, and others ideas come up.

Todd

VMmark Results Point to Best Performance

ToddMuirhead — Thu, 15 May 2008 20:25:00 GMT

New VMmark benchmark results highlight that the best performance for a single server is a 4-socket (or 16 cores with Quad-Core processors). This means that the R900 and R905 are at the top of the list, with the Intel based R900 slightly ahead of the AMD based R905. So if you absolutely need the most performance possible from a single server - then this is the way to go.

A little bit of analysis could lead you to believe that the 2-socket (or 8 core) servers are actually better performing. The VMmark score for the 4-socket R900 is 14.23 with 10 tiles, but the VMark score for the 2-socket 2950 III is 8.47 with 6 tiles. So on a per socket basis, the two-socket 2950 III is actually providing more performance. The same holds true for the two-socket M600 blade and two-socket R805 2U server.

There is much more to choosing a server than the results of a single benchmark, but I think that these results are fair barometers of performance. In general performance does not scale in a linear fashion when moving from 2-socket servers to 4-socket servers, and this seems to hold true with virtualization.

Todd

Decisions Decisions Decisions

ToddMuirhead — Fri, 09 May 2008 21:33:00 GMT

With the release of the 2U, 2-socket R805 and the 4U, 4-socket R905 (both AMD based servers) and the already existing 4U, 4-socket R900 (Intel based server) now is a really good time to be looking for a server to run your virtualization farm on. All three are excellent choices and could be the right server. To determine which one depends on lots of things. I'm looking for reasons to choose one over the other (let me know your thoughts). We will be putting together some information to help people decide here on TechCenter and hosting some chat sessions to enable discussion.

Specifically, I ran across this article from The Register that I think has a pretty good take on the R805/R905 Virtualization announcement from a couple of days ago. They point out all of the server options as well as the virtualizaiton services that were a part of the announcement on Tues.

Todd