Learn tips and techniques that will improve the performance of your applications and databases running on Amazon EC2 instance storage and/or Amazon Elastic Block Store (EBS).  This advanced session discusses when to use HI1, HS1, and Amazon EBS.  We will share an "under the hood" view to tune the performance of your Elastic Block Store and best practices for running workloads on Amazon EBS, such as relational databases (MySQL, Oracle, SQL Server, postgres) and NoSQL data stores, such as MongoDB and Riak. 

1. © 2014 Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates. All rights reserved. May not be copied, modified, or distributed in whole or in part without the express consent of Amazon.com, Inc.© 2014 Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates. All rights reserved. May not be copied, modified, or distributed in whole or in part without the express consent of Amazon.com, Inc.
Maximizing EC2 and Elastic Block
Store Disk Performance
Vinay Kumar, Sr. Product Manager, EBS

2. What We’ll Cover
Maximizing EC2 and Elastic Block Store
• Four key pieces
• Configuration Options
• Tips and Best Practices

3. For most builders AWS is get in and go!

4. What is Amazon EBS?
• Network block storage
• Designed for five nines of availability
• Attach to EC2 within the same AZ
• Point-in-time snapshots to S3
• Provision and pay just for what you need

5. EBS Volume Types
• General Purpose (SSD)
• Provisioned IOPS (SSD)
• Magnetic
When performance matters, use SSD-backed volumes

6. Amazon EBS General Purpose(SSD)
• New default volume type for EBS
• Every volume can burst up to 3,000 IOPS
• Larger volumes can burst for longer periods
• 3 IOPS per GB baseline performance
• Maximum of 3,000 on a 1TB volume
• Throughput bursts up to 128MB/s per volume
• 99% performance consistency
• Latency: Single digit milliseconds

7. Sizing General Purpose (SSD)
• For generic boot, developer, test/dev and web apps
– Just provision GB’s required for your applications
• For database apps
– Calculate your required IOPS needed in steady state
– Provision the GB = (Steady state IOPS) ÷ 3
• For example, customer requiring1500 steady state IOPS, provision 1500
÷ 3 = 500 GB
– IO bursts will support
• Database load or table scan operations
• Spike in IO workload
7

8. Amazon EBS PIOPS (SSD)
• Provision up to 4,000 IOPS per volume
• Supports IOPS to GB ratio of 30
• Designed to offers 99.9% consistency
• Throughput: up to 128MB/s per volume
• Latency: Single digit millisecond
• Best for IO intensive databases that require highest consistency
NEW

9. Amazon EBS Magnetic
• IOPS: ~100 IOPS steady-state, with best-effort bursts
• Throughput: variable by workload, best effort to 10s of MB/s.
• Latency: Varies, reads typically ~20-40 ms, writes typically ~2-10ms
• Best for cold workloads

10. EBS Volume Types (Cheat Sheet)
General Purpose (SSD) Provisioned IOPS (SSD) Magnetic
Recommend Use Cases
Boot Volumes
Small to Med DBs
Dev and test
I/O intensive
Large DBs
Cold Storage
Storage Media SSD-backed SSD-backed Magnetic-backed
Volume Size 1GB- 1TB 1GB- 1TB 1GB- 1TB
Max IOPS per volume
3 IOPS/GB Burst up to 3000
IOPS
4,000 IOPS ~100 IOPS
Read and Write Peak
Throughput
128 MB/s 128 MB/s ~50-90 MBps
Max I/O per node 48,000 48,000 ~ 1000-5000
Peak Throughput Node 800 MB/s 800 MB/s ~800MB/s
Latency (random read) 1-2ms 1-2 ms 20-40 ms
API Name gp2 io1 standard
Price* $.10/GB-Month
$.125/GB-Month
$.065/provisioned IOPS
$.05/GB-Month $.05/ 1M
I/O

11. Always use General Purpose (SSD) for boot volumes

12. Performance Optimization is Measured by
1. IOPS:
2. Latency:
3. Throughput:

13. Four Key Pieces
(1) Amazon EC2
(2) I/O
(4) Amazon
EBS
(3) Network
link

14. Tools available for tuning
1. EC2 Instance:
2. EBS Optimized:
3. Workload:
4. Queue Depth:
5. RAID:
6. Pre-warm:

15. 1. EC2 Instance
Amazon
EBS
Amazon
EC2
Select EC2 instance that has the right Network, RAM and CPU
resources for your applications.

16. 2. EBS-Optimized
• Offers “SAN like” experience
• All new instance family supports EBS-
optimized flag
• EBS-optimized now supports up-to 2Gb/s
– Drive 16,000 16K IOPS or 256MB/s
• EC2 8XL instances support 10Gb/s network
• Max IOPS per node supported is ~100,000
IOPS @ 4K IO
* Max 2X for 8kB IO & * Max 4X for 4kB IO
b
Instance Type Dedicated EBS
(Mbps)
Max 16K
IOPS*
Max MB/s
c1.xlarge 1,000 8,000 128
c3.xlarge 500 4,000 64
c3.2xlarge 1,000 8,000 128
c3.4xlarge 2,000 16,000 256
g2.2xlarge 1,000 8,000 128
i2.xlarge 500 4,000 64
i2.2xlarge 1,000 8,000 128
i2.4xlarge 2,000 16,000 256
m1.large 500 4,000 64
m1.xlarge 1,000 8,000 128
m2.2xlarge 500 4,000 64
m2.4xlarge 1,000 8,000 128
m3.xlarge 500 4,000 64
m3.2xlarge 1,000 8,000 128
r3.xlarge 500 4,000 64
r3.2xlarge 1,000 8,000 128
r3.4xlarge 2,000 16,000 256
r3.8xlarge NA 48,000 800
c3.8xlarge NA 48,000 800
i2.8xlarge NA 48,000 800
cc2.8xlarge NA 48,000 800

17. Use EBS-Optimized instances for consistent EBS
performance

18. 3. Workload
• I/O size
– 4 KB to 64 MB
• I/O pattern
– Sequential and random
EBS SSD-backed volumes measure IO size up to 256KB
EBS SSD-backed delivers same performance for read and write
• I/O type
– Read and write
• I/O concurrency
– Number of concurrent IO
NEW

19. IOPS and Throughput limits on EBS
4,000 IOPS
PIOPS volume
4,000 IOPS
128MB/s throughput
You can achieve 4,000 IOPS
when driving smaller IO
You can achieve up to 128MB/s
when driving larger IO

20. IOPS and Throughput limits on EBS
4,000 IOPS
PIOPS volume
4,000 IOPS
128MB/s throughput
4,000 X 4KB = 16MB/s
4,000 X 32KB =128MB/s
8,000 x 8KB = 64MB/s
4,000 x 8KB = 32MB/s
2,000 x 128KB=256MB/s
1,000 x 128KB =128MB/s

21. Block (IO) size determines whether your application is IOPS bound or
throughput bound

22. 4. Queue Depth
An I/O
Amazon
EBS
After it’s gone, it’s gone
Amazon
EC2
Queue depth is the pending IO in flight.

23. IO Latency
• Elapsed time between IO submission and it’s completion
time
• Performance requirements may be driven by IOPS or
latency or both
• There is an interdependency among IOPS, queue depth,
and latency

24. Random Read Latency
0.075
35.1
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
1 4 8 12 16 20 24 28 32
LatencyTP90(ms)
Queue Depth
Random READ latency across various QDs
Latency (TP90)
Read latency linearly increases with increase in queue depth

25. Random Read Latency
0.075
35.1
2.09
1,865
4,152
3,851
-
500
1,000
1,500
2,000
2,500
3,000
3,500
4,000
4,500
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
1 4 8 12 16 20 24 28 32
LatencyTP90(ms)
Queue Depth
16 KB random READ IOPS, Latency across various QDs
Latency (TP90) Avg Read IOPS
IOPS
Queue depth of one has the lowest latency, but has the lowest IOPS

26. Random Read Latency
0.075
35.1
2.09
1,865
4,152
3,851
-
500
1,000
1,500
2,000
2,500
3,000
3,500
4,000
4,500
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
1 4 8 12 16 20 24 28 32
LatencyTP90(ms)
Queue Depth
16 KB random READ IOPS, Latency across various QDs
Latency (TP90) Avg Read IOPS
IOPS
Queue depth between 4-8 has the optimal IOPS and latency performance

27. Random Read Latency
0.075
35.1
2.09
1,865
4,152
3,851
-
500
1,000
1,500
2,000
2,500
3,000
3,500
4,000
4,500
0
5
10
15
20
25
30
35
1 4 8 12 16 20 24 28 32
LatencyTP90(ms)
Queue Depth
16 KB random READ IOPS, Latency across various QDs
Latency (TP90) Avg Read IOPS
IOPS
Higher queue depths have negative impact on IOPS and latency

28. Random Write Latency
0.08
7.71
845
4,152
0
500
1,000
1,500
2,000
2,500
3,000
3,500
4,000
4,500
0
1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
1 4 8 12 16 20 24 28 32
LatencyTP90(ms)
Queue Depth
16 KB random WRITE IOPS, Latency across various QDs
Latency (TP90) AvgIOPS
IOPS
Write latency, queue depth and IOPS interaction is similar to
that of read latency

29. Optimal queue depth to achieve lower latency and highest IOPS is
between 4-8; 1 QD per 500 IOPS
EBS-Optimized offers consistent latency experience

30. 5. RAID
Amazon
EBS
Amazon
EC2
Amazon
EBS
Amazon
EC2

31. Maximum performance per instance
• How should you think about taking snapshots on a striped volume?
– Quiesce file systems and take snapshot
– Unmount file system and take snapshot
– Use OS-specific tools
12×400 GB PIOPS, pre-warmed, RAID 0 LVM, Stripe size 64 KB, attached to CR1 instance

32. Use stripe size of 128KB or 256KB

33. 6. Pre-warming
• First write penalty for new volumes
• Lazy loading for volumes created from snapshots
• Typically 5%, extreme worst case of 50% performance reduction in IOPS and
latency when volumes are used without pre-warming
– Performance is as provisioned when all the chunks are accessed
• Recommendation if testing or you have spare setup time:
– For new volumes
• Linux: DD write
• Windows: NTFS Full format
– Takes roughly an hour to pre-warm 1 TB 4 KB PIOPS/General Purpose (SSD) volumes
– Be warned, can take up to a day for a 1 TB standard Amazon EBS volume

34. Use large block size to speed up your pre-warming.
Ex: sudo dd if=/dev/xvdf of=/dev/xvdf conv=notrunc bs=1M

35. Performance / Stability Tips
• Ext4 or XFS (understand journal impact!)
• EBS encryption has no visible IOPS
performance impact for many EC2 instances

36. Workload/
Software
Typical
block size
Random
/Seq?
Typical
correct
EBS type
Max EBS @
500 Mb/s
Max EBS @
1 Gb/s
Max EBS @ 10Gb/s
instances
Oracle DB Configurable:2 KB –
16 KB
Default 8 KB
random PIOPS/GP2 RAID 0, 2 × 4000
PIOPS:
~7800 IOPS
RAID 0, 4 × 4000
PIOPS:
~15,600 IOPS
RAID 0, 24 × 4000 PIOPS:
~96,000 IOPS
Microsoft
SQL Server
8 KB w/ 64 KB
extents
random PIOPS/GP2 RAID 0, 2 × 4000
PIOPS:
~7800 IOPS
RAID 0, 4 × 4000
PIOPS:
~15,600 IOPS
RAID 0, 20 × 4000 PIOPS:
~80,000 IOPS
MySQL 16 KB random PIOPS/GP2 1 x 4000 PIOPS:
~4000 IOPS
RAID 0, 2 × 4000
PIOPS:
~7,800 IOPS
RAID 0, 12 × 4000 PIOPS:
~48,000 IOPS
PostgreSQL 8 KB random PIOPS/GP2 RAID 0, 2 × 4000
PIOPS:
~7,800 IOPS
RAID 0, 4 × 4000
PIOPS:
~15,600 IOPS
RAID 0, 24 × 4000 PIOPS:
~96,000 IOPS
MongoDB 4 KB serialized PIOPS/GP2 RAID 0, 4 ×
4000 PIOPS:
~15,600 IOPS
RAID 0, 8 × 4000
PIOPS:
~31,000 IOPS
RAID 0, 24 × 4000
PIOPS:
~96,000 IOPS
Cassandra 4 KB random PIOPS/GP2 RAID 0, 4 ×
4000 PIOPS:
~15,600 IOPS
RAID 0, 8 × 4000
PIOPS:
~31,000 IOPS
RAID 0, 24 × 4000
PIOPS:
~96,000 IOPS
GlusterFS 128 KB sequential PIOPS/GP
2
1 × 4000
PIOPS:
~500 IOPS
RAID 0, 2 × 4000
PIOPS:
~1000 IOPS
RAID 0, 12 × 4000
PIOPS:
~6,000 IOPS
(768MB/s)
Cheat Sheet Sample! Storage Workloads on AWS

37. EBS-optimized
Four Key Pieces: Balanced Oh, YEAH!!
Amazon
EC2
A “boatload” of I/O
Right sized EBS

38. Tools available for tuning
1. EC2 Instance:
2. EBS Optimized:
3. Workload:
4. Queue Depth:
5. RAID:
6. Pre-warm:

39. © 2014 Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates. All rights reserved. May not be copied, modified, or distributed in whole or in part without the express consent of Amazon.com, Inc.© 2014 Amazon.com, Inc. and its affiliates. All rights reserved. May not be copied, modified, or distributed in whole or in part without the express consent of Amazon.com, Inc.
Maximizing EC2 and Elastic Block
Store Disk Performance
Vinay Kumar, Sr. Product Manager, EBS
Thank you!