Scribd
Upload
147 views15 pages

SAS Vs FC Vs ISCSI PDF

The document compares the performance and latency of SAS, Fibre Channel, and iSCSI interfaces connecting a storage system to a host server. It finds that 6Gb SAS and 8Gb Fibre Channel have the lowest latency and highest performance, followed by 10Gb iSCSI, with 1Gb iSCSI having the highest latency and lowest performance. The author believes SSDs will become the standard for tier 1 storage by 2012 as prices decrease and capacities increase.

Uploaded by

Leon
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
147 views15 pages

SAS Vs FC Vs ISCSI PDF

The document compares the performance and latency of SAS, Fibre Channel, and iSCSI interfaces connecting a storage system to a host server. It finds that 6Gb SAS and 8Gb Fibre Channel have the lowest latency and highest performance, followed by 10Gb iSCSI, with 1Gb iSCSI having the highest latency and lowest performance. The author believes SSDs will become the standard for tier 1 storage by 2012 as prices decrease and capacities increase.

Uploaded by

Leon
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
Available Formats
Download as PDF, TXT or read online on Scribd
You are on page 1/ 15

Measuring Interface Latencies for

SAS, Fibre Channel and iSCSI

Dennis Martin
Demartek President

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 1
Demartek Company Overview

 Industry analysis with on-site test lab


 Lab includes servers, networking and storage
infrastructure
 Fibre Channel: 4 & 8 Gbps (16Gb soon)
 Ethernet: 1 & 10 Gbps (including NFS, CIFS, iSCSI & FCoE)
 Servers: 8+ cores, very large RAM
 Virtualization: ESX, Hyper-V, Xen
 We prefer to run real-world applications to test servers
and storage solutions
 Currently testing various SSD and FCoE implementations
 Web: www.demartek.com
Flash Memory Summit 2011
Santa Clara, CA 2
Demartek News
 Demartek Deployment Guides
 Completed: iSCSI – May 31, 2011
 In-progress: SAS, SSD & 16Gb Fibre Channel

 Free Monthly Newsletter


 http://www.demartek.com/Newsletter/Newsletter_main.html
 Text “DemartekLabNotes” to 22828

 Storage Interface Comparison


 http://www.demartek.com/Demartek_Interface_Comparison.html
 Internet search for “Storage Interface Comparison”
Flash Memory Summit 2011
Santa Clara, CA 3
Latency is Important

 OLTP applications require short response


times (small latencies)
 Some transactions require several successive
queries in order to provide complete response
 HDDs have same maximum RPM (15000) as
a decade ago, limiting latency improvements
 RAID5 striping and latency
 Latencies can actually increase with large disk groups!
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Standard_RAID_levels#RAID_5_latency

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 4
Host Storage Interfaces

 The host storage system interface matters


 We compared the performance and latency of
the same storage system with multiple host
interfaces
 What kinds of performance and latency would
you expect from these four host interfaces?
 1Gb iSCSI, 10Gb iSCSI, 6Gb SAS, 8Gb FC

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 5
Evaluation Environment

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 6
Performance – Random IOPS
SQLIO - IOPS (Random)
35,000

30,000

25,000

20,000

15,000

10,000

5,000

0
4KB rnd read 8KB rnd read 16KB rnd read 32KB rnd read 64KB rnd read 4KB rnd write 8KB rnd write 16KB rnd write32KB rnd write64KB rnd write

Direct 6G SAS Switched 6G SAS Direct 8G FC Switched 8G FC


Direct 10G iSCSI Switched 10G iSCSI Direct 1G iSCSI Switched 1G iSCSI

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 7
Performance – Random MBPS
SQLIO - MBPS (Random)
1200

1000

800

600

400

200

0
4KB rnd read 8KB rnd read 16KB rnd read 32KB rnd read 64KB rnd read 4KB rnd write 8KB rnd write 16KB rnd write 32KB rnd write 64KB rnd write

Direct 6G SAS Switched 6G SAS Direct 8G FC Switched 8G FC


Direct 10Gb iSCSI Switched 10Gb iSCSI Direct 1Gb iSCSI Switched 1Gb iSCSI

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 8
Performance – Sequential IOPS
SQLIO - IOPS (Sequential)
35,000

30,000

25,000

20,000

15,000

10,000

5,000

0
4KB seq 8KB seq 16KB seq 32KB seq 64KB seq 128KB 256KB 4KB seq 8KB seq 16KB seq 32KB seq 64KB seq 128KB 256KB
read read read read read seq read seq read write write write write write seq write seq write

Direct 6G SAS Switched 6G SAS Direct 8G FC Switched 8G FC


Direct 10G iSCSI Switched 10G iSCSI Direct 1G iSCSI Switched 1G iSCSI

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 9
Performance – Sequential MBPS
SQLIO - MBPS (Sequential)
1400

1200

1000

800

600

400

200

0
4KB seq 8KB seq 16KB seq 32KB seq 64KB seq 128KB 256KB 4KB seq 8KB seq 16KB seq 32KB seq 64KB seq 128KB 256KB
read read read read read seq read seq read write write write write write seq write seq write

Direct 6G SAS Switched 6G SAS Direct 8G FC Switched 8G FC


Direct 10Gb iSCSI Switched 10Gb iSCSI Direct 1Gb iSCSI Switched 1Gb iSCSI

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 10
Performance – Latencies up to 5ms
Latencies - Up to 5 ms
100

90

80

70
Percentage of Results

60

50

40

30

20

10

0
0 1 2 3 4 5
Latencies (milliseconds)

Direct 6G SAS Switched 6G SAS Direct 8G FC Switched 8G FC


Direct 10G iSCSI Switched 10G iSCSI Direct 1G iSCSI Switched 1G iSCSI

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 11
Performance Summary

 Performance rankings for this test:


1. 6Gb SAS
2. 8Gb FC (close second)
3. 10Gb iSCSI
4. 1Gb iSCSI
 iSCSI imposes additional overhead, and even
at 10Gb, has higher latency than 6Gb SAS
and 8Gb FC

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 12
Commentary

 Some real-world applications are moving


towards larger I/O block sizes and more
importance on bandwidth
 Virtualized servers result in higher percentage
of random I/O for storage systems
 Deployment of SSDs can increase CPU
utilization and network bandwidth needs
 I believe that at the current rate of price
decreases and capacity increases, SSDs
(probably NAND flash) will become the new
standard for tier-1 storage by 2012
Flash Memory Summit 2011
Santa Clara, CA 13
Demartek SSD Resources

 Demartek SSD Zone


 www.demartek.com/SSD.html

 Demartek involved in ongoing real-world


testing of SSDs

 Contact me regarding our upcoming


Deployment Guides (SAS, SSD, 16Gb FC)

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 14
Contact Information

(303) 940-7575
www.demartek.com
http://twitter.com/Demartek
YouTube: www.youtube.com/Demartek
Skype: Demartek

Dennis Martin, President


[email protected]
www.linkedin.com/in/dennismartin

Flash Memory Summit 2011


Santa Clara, CA 15

You might also like