SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930 QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage SC9000 all-flash array
As support ends for aging software and applications, such as SQL Server 2005, migrating to a new, updated version is inevitable and necessary. This migration presents a unique opportunity to upgrade the hardware running these applications, too—a real change to your datacenter.
In our test, the modern four-socket Dell PowerEdge R930 powered by Intel Xeon E7-8860 v4 processors working with the powerful Dell Storage SC9000 array and running SQL Server 2016 got over six times the database performance of a legacy solution running SQL Server 2005. The modern PowerEdge solution also delivered a faster response time.
As you move to a more modern, fully featured database software, why not also move to a powerful, modern server hardware solution as well? Consolidating your SQL Server workloads from legacy servers onto Dell PowerEdge R930 servers powered by Intel Xeon E7 v4 processors can let you do more with less, streamline your datacenter, and reduce costs.
SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R830 QLogic 16G Fi...Principled Technologies
The document summarizes a test report that evaluated the performance of SQL Server 2016 on a modern Dell PowerEdge R830 server with all-flash storage compared to SQL Server 2005 on an older Dell PowerEdge R820 server with HDD storage. The modern Dell configuration achieved over five times the database workload performance and sub-millisecond storage response times compared to the older configuration. Migrating from older servers and HDD storage to new servers and all-flash storage can significantly improve performance and efficiency.
DellEMC PowerEdge R740xd Rack Server - Sinteza CoSintezaCo
The document compares the performance of Dell PowerEdge R740xd servers with Intel Xeon Scalable processors using VMware vSAN storage against Dell PowerEdge R720 servers using traditional HDD storage. Testing showed the R740xd cluster processed database transactions 8 times faster, supported 12 times the input/output operations, and had 98% lower storage latency. This superior performance from the newer hardware could help businesses better support customer needs.
Dell PowerEdge R930 with Oracle: The benefits of upgrading to Samsung NVMe PC...Principled Technologies
Strong server performance is essential to companies running Oracle Database. The new Dell PowerEdge R930 provided strong performance with 22 SAS HDDs, but this performance improved when we replaced all of the drives with SAS solid-state drives. It improved further when we used a mix of HDDs and SDDs along with a caching solution. We saw the greatest performance boost when we used eight Samsung-powered NVMe PCIe SSDs. The upgraded configurations of the Dell PowerEdge R930 with Samsung-powered NVMe PCIe SSDs delivered up to 13.9 times the database performance of the all-HDD configuration. This makes the new Dell PowerEdge R930 a powerful platform with scalable storage options that can potentially translate into significant service improvements for your business and your customers, which helps in maximizing ROI.
Dell PowerEdge R930 with Oracle: The benefits of upgrading to PCIe storage us...Principled Technologies
Strong server performance is essential to companies running Oracle Database. The new Dell PowerEdge R930 provided strong performance with 22 SAS HDDs, but this performance improved when we replaced all of the drives with SAS solid-state drives. It improved further when we used a mix of HDDs and SDDs along with SanDisk DAS Cache. We saw the greatest performance boost when we used eight PCIe SSDs with SanDisk DAS Cache. The upgraded configuration of the Dell PowerEdge R930 with PCIe SSDs and SanDisk DAS Cache delivered 11.1 times the database performance of the all-HDD configuration. This makes the new Dell PowerEdge R930 a powerful platform with scalable storage options that can potentially translate into significant service improvements for your business and your customers, which helps in maximizing ROI.
Workstation heat and power usage: Lenovo ThinkStation P500 vs. HP Z440 Workst...Principled Technologies
A workstation that runs coolly and uses less power is a great asset to workers and the companies they work for. In our tests, both when idle and when under load, the Lenovo ThinkStation P500 generally ran at lower surface temperatures and used less power than the HP Z440 Workstation. These findings show that the Lenovo ThinkStation P500 could meet the needs of those who want to provide a reliable, comfortable work environment while using less power.
Dell Solutions Tour 2015- Dells Storage-strategi - Et hav av muligheter, Clae...Kenneth de Brucq
I høst kommer mange nyheter for de som er opptatt av god lagring. Vi deler vår ferskeste strategi og gode råd for å levere mer for mindre. Virtualisering og programvaredefinering er viktige stikkord når høstens maskinkolleksjon fra Dell presenteres
Database server comparison: Dell PowerEdge R630 vs. Lenovo ThinkServer RD550Principled Technologies
We tested the OLTP performance of a 1U Dell PowerEdge R630, powered by Intel Xeon processors E5-2660 v3, running Microsoft Hyper-V and virtual machines running SQL Server 2014, and compared it to that of the Lenovo ThinkServer RD550 running the same software. For each server, we selected the maximum SATA SSD count that was configurable for each model. The Dell PowerEdge R630 outperformed the Lenovo ThinkServer RD550 by 14.9 percent and offered more than one and a half times the storage space for data in our configuration.
By selecting a server that handles more orders per minute and offers significantly more storage capacity potential than the competition, you get a not only faster, efficient experience for your database users, but also have the scaling potential for your storage needs ahead of your business growing.
The Dell PowerEdge R920 could replace nine older Oracle database servers and provide nine times the performance while reducing power consumption by 64% and lowering software licensing costs by 17%. Testing showed the R920 running Oracle Database 12c with pluggable databases provided significant savings over three years in power, cooling, and licensing costs compared to running the databases on nine older servers.
SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R830 QLogic 16G Fi...Principled Technologies
The document summarizes a test report that evaluated the performance of SQL Server 2016 on a modern Dell PowerEdge R830 server with all-flash storage compared to SQL Server 2005 on an older Dell PowerEdge R820 server with HDD storage. The modern Dell configuration achieved over five times the database workload performance and sub-millisecond storage response times compared to the older configuration. Migrating from older servers and HDD storage to new servers and all-flash storage can significantly improve performance and efficiency.
DellEMC PowerEdge R740xd Rack Server - Sinteza CoSintezaCo
The document compares the performance of Dell PowerEdge R740xd servers with Intel Xeon Scalable processors using VMware vSAN storage against Dell PowerEdge R720 servers using traditional HDD storage. Testing showed the R740xd cluster processed database transactions 8 times faster, supported 12 times the input/output operations, and had 98% lower storage latency. This superior performance from the newer hardware could help businesses better support customer needs.
Dell PowerEdge R930 with Oracle: The benefits of upgrading to Samsung NVMe PC...Principled Technologies
Strong server performance is essential to companies running Oracle Database. The new Dell PowerEdge R930 provided strong performance with 22 SAS HDDs, but this performance improved when we replaced all of the drives with SAS solid-state drives. It improved further when we used a mix of HDDs and SDDs along with a caching solution. We saw the greatest performance boost when we used eight Samsung-powered NVMe PCIe SSDs. The upgraded configurations of the Dell PowerEdge R930 with Samsung-powered NVMe PCIe SSDs delivered up to 13.9 times the database performance of the all-HDD configuration. This makes the new Dell PowerEdge R930 a powerful platform with scalable storage options that can potentially translate into significant service improvements for your business and your customers, which helps in maximizing ROI.
Dell PowerEdge R930 with Oracle: The benefits of upgrading to PCIe storage us...Principled Technologies
Strong server performance is essential to companies running Oracle Database. The new Dell PowerEdge R930 provided strong performance with 22 SAS HDDs, but this performance improved when we replaced all of the drives with SAS solid-state drives. It improved further when we used a mix of HDDs and SDDs along with SanDisk DAS Cache. We saw the greatest performance boost when we used eight PCIe SSDs with SanDisk DAS Cache. The upgraded configuration of the Dell PowerEdge R930 with PCIe SSDs and SanDisk DAS Cache delivered 11.1 times the database performance of the all-HDD configuration. This makes the new Dell PowerEdge R930 a powerful platform with scalable storage options that can potentially translate into significant service improvements for your business and your customers, which helps in maximizing ROI.
Workstation heat and power usage: Lenovo ThinkStation P500 vs. HP Z440 Workst...Principled Technologies
A workstation that runs coolly and uses less power is a great asset to workers and the companies they work for. In our tests, both when idle and when under load, the Lenovo ThinkStation P500 generally ran at lower surface temperatures and used less power than the HP Z440 Workstation. These findings show that the Lenovo ThinkStation P500 could meet the needs of those who want to provide a reliable, comfortable work environment while using less power.
Dell Solutions Tour 2015- Dells Storage-strategi - Et hav av muligheter, Clae...Kenneth de Brucq
I høst kommer mange nyheter for de som er opptatt av god lagring. Vi deler vår ferskeste strategi og gode råd for å levere mer for mindre. Virtualisering og programvaredefinering er viktige stikkord når høstens maskinkolleksjon fra Dell presenteres
Database server comparison: Dell PowerEdge R630 vs. Lenovo ThinkServer RD550Principled Technologies
We tested the OLTP performance of a 1U Dell PowerEdge R630, powered by Intel Xeon processors E5-2660 v3, running Microsoft Hyper-V and virtual machines running SQL Server 2014, and compared it to that of the Lenovo ThinkServer RD550 running the same software. For each server, we selected the maximum SATA SSD count that was configurable for each model. The Dell PowerEdge R630 outperformed the Lenovo ThinkServer RD550 by 14.9 percent and offered more than one and a half times the storage space for data in our configuration.
By selecting a server that handles more orders per minute and offers significantly more storage capacity potential than the competition, you get a not only faster, efficient experience for your database users, but also have the scaling potential for your storage needs ahead of your business growing.
The Dell PowerEdge R920 could replace nine older Oracle database servers and provide nine times the performance while reducing power consumption by 64% and lowering software licensing costs by 17%. Testing showed the R920 running Oracle Database 12c with pluggable databases provided significant savings over three years in power, cooling, and licensing costs compared to running the databases on nine older servers.
Whether you’re looking for the highest possible performance per rack unit or the strongest RAS-enabled server to run your mission-critical databases, Dell has a server to meet your needs. Factors such as performance per rack, expansion capabilities, and flash storage options will also drive your server decision.
In our hands-on tests, we found that the Dell PowerEdge R820 server could handle up to 382,397 database orders per minute and had 73.6 percent greater performance per U of rack space than the R910.
The Dell PowerEdge R910 processed 440,475 OPM. Its high number of logical processors, maximum expansion capabilities, and support for RAS technologies make the Dell PowerEdge R910 an excellent choice for your mission-critical data center applications.
Dell PowerEdge M520 server solution: Energy efficiency and database performancePrincipled Technologies
As energy prices continue to rise, building a power-efficient data center that does not sacrifice performance is vital to organizations looking to keep costs down while keeping application performance high. Choosing servers that pair high performance with new power-efficient technologies helps you do so. In our tests, the Dell PowerEdge M520 with Dell EqualLogic PS-M4110 arrays outperformed the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8 server with HP StorageWorks D2200sb arrays by 113.5 percent in OPM. Not only did the Dell PowerEdge M520 blade server solution deliver higher overall performance, it also did so more efficiently, delivering 79.9 percent better database performance/watt than the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8 solution.
Get insight from document-based distributed MongoDB databases sooner and have...Principled Technologies
With additional drive bays and 2nd Generation Intel Xeon Scalable processors, Dell EMC PowerEdge R640 servers handled more Yahoo Cloud Serving Benchmark (YCSB) operations per second than previous-generation servers and handled them more efficiently
Hardware upgrades to improve database, SharePoint, Exchange, and file server ...Principled Technologies
Legacy tower servers that cannot meet workload demands can restrict business growth. By upgrading to the Dell PowerEdge T630, you can obtain immediate benefits for current IT performance needs and implement upgrades that will expand server capabilities to help meet future demands. We found that replacing a legacy server with the new Dell PowerEdge T630 tower server offered up to 97.9 percent lower workload latency, 131.9 percent more IOPS, and 421.9 percent more OPM when running the same workload. With component upgrades, the PowerEdge T630 supported more Exchange, SharePoint, and file server users, and more database VM instances. Help ensure that your applications have sufficient hardware resources to keep up with the needs of today and the future by choosing to upgrade to the new Dell PowerEdge T630 tower server.
Populating your data center with new, more powerful and energy efficient servers can deliver numerous benefits to your organization. By consolidating multiple older servers onto a new platform, you can save in the areas of data center space and port costs, management costs, and power and cooling costs.
In our tests, we found that the Lenovo ThinkServer RD630 could consolidate the workloads of three HP ProLiant DL385 G5 servers, while increasing overall performance by 82.6 percent and reducing power consumption by 58.8 percent, making the ThinkServer RD630 an excellent choice to reduce the costs associated with running your data center.
Tungsten University: Load A Vertica Data Warehouse With MySQL DataContinuent
Continuent Tungsten offers real-time replication from MySQL to a variety of DBMS types including Vertica. In this Tungsten University webcast we will show you the details of setting up MySQL-to-Vertica replication, including the following topics:
• Introduction to Continuent Tungsten features for data warehouse loading
• Installation for MySQL to Vertica replication
• Best practices for applications: charsets, schema design, time zones, etc.
• Techniques for filtering and transforming data
• Performance tuning and trouble shooting
• Adapting batch loading for new use cases
The webinar includes technical information and a live demo to help you get your own data warehouse loading application up and running quickly.
Comparing Dell Compellent network-attached storage to an industry-leading NAS...Principled Technologies
A flexible NAS solution addresses many organizational challenges from server backup to hosting production applications and databases. Advanced NAS solutions such as the Intel Xeon processor-based Dell Compellent FS8600 NAS provide flexibility and scalability, allowing various use options as well as drive options throughout its lifecycle. This scale and flexibility enables an organization to alleviate performance bottlenecks anywhere in the organization simply by reallocating or adding more disk resources.
We found that the Intel Xeon processor-based Dell Compellent FS8600 NAS solution backed up a small-file corpus up to 15.9 percent faster and a large-file corpus up to 17.1 percent faster than a similarly configured, industry-leading NAS solution. This means that selecting the Dell Compellent FS8600 NAS has the potential to help optimize an organization’s infrastructure.
SharePoint 2010 Virtualization - Hungarian SharePoint User GroupMichael Noel
Michael Noel is an author of books on Microsoft technologies and a partner at Convergent Computing. The document discusses virtualizing SharePoint 2010, including guidelines, models, and Microsoft's virtualization options. It provides recommendations for virtualizing different SharePoint roles and the licensing implications. It demonstrates quickly provisioning a SharePoint farm using a VM template and PowerShell script.
Performance of persistent apps on Container-Native Storage for Red Hat OpenSh...Principled Technologies
The document summarizes benchmark testing of Container-Native Storage (CNS) on Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform using two different storage media: solid-state drives (SSDs) and hard disk drives (HDDs). It tested CNS under IO-intensive and CPU-intensive workloads. For the IO-intensive workload, the SSD configuration significantly outperformed the HDD configuration, achieving over 5 times the maximum performance. However, for the CPU-intensive workload, the two configurations achieved similar maximum performance levels, with SSDs having less than a 5% improvement. The testing demonstrated that CNS can provide scalable storage and that storage performance depends on understanding how it matches the workload characteristics.
Learn about the features that can help you modernize your mission critical applications, where security and performance can go hand in hand. From the wide range of SQL Server features available, we will take a closer look at In-Memory performance, Automatic Tuning, Advanced Security Features like Always Encrypted, Polybase and integration with Machine Learning through R and Python.
This document summarizes the results of a proof of concept test of PolyServe's solution for scalable shared databases with SQL Server 2005. The test involved running a set of reporting queries against a database with 100 million rows on 1, 2, and 4 SQL Server instances attached to the same database via PolyServe's software. Performance improved linearly as more servers were added, with completion time reducing by up to 16 times on 4 servers compared to running the queries on 1 server. PolyServe's approach simplified database administration by allowing servers to directly access shared storage and avoiding the need to manually create and manage read-only database copies or volumes.
This document summarizes the results of a benchmark comparing the performance of several cloud database systems, including Cassandra, HBase, Sherpa, and MySQL. The benchmark uses a standard workload and measures key metrics like latency and throughput. Overall, Cassandra showed strong write performance but weaker reads. Sherpa delivered good read and write latency as well as high throughput. HBase read latency was poor. Later versions of Cassandra showed performance improvements over earlier versions.
1) PerfAccel is a solution that provides in-depth analytics and intelligent data placement in Ceph clusters to optimize storage performance and costs.
2) It uses SSD caching to accelerate I/O and place frequently accessed "hot" data from VMs onto SSDs for faster performance.
3) PerfAccel's analytics provide insights into I/O patterns and behaviors to determine optimal SSD sizing and placements that improve performance while reducing storage costs.
Resource balancing comparison: VMware vSphere 6 vs. Red Hat Enterprise Virtua...Principled Technologies
Having ample resources to handle user requests is a necessity of modern virtualization solutions. Allocating and distributing those resources evenly, however, is imperative to the success of your business’s virtualized environment. In our tests, after powering on the other two servers in our three-node cluster and adding resource management features, VMware vSphere 6 improved performance by 183 percent over its baseline configuration of one active server and no resource management features. RHEV 3.5, in contrast, delivered only a 79 percent increase over its baseline. As you design your business’s infrastructure and applications, improvements such as those offered by VMware vSphere 6 DRS and Storage DRS can play a critical role by offering your users better application experiences. Optimized and modern resource management provided by VMware DRS can also help to lower your IT purchase and maintenance costs by reducing the number of servers necessary to run your applications.
This document discusses MongoDB sharding which involves horizontally scaling MongoDB across multiple machines or shards. It describes the components of a sharded MongoDB cluster including shards, config servers, and mongos query routers. It provides examples of when and why sharding would be used such as for large datasets, high throughput, hardware limitations, storage engine limitations, isolating failures, and separating hot and cold data. The document then outlines steps to set up a basic two node sharded cluster with one shard, three config servers, and mongos query routers on the same two machines.
Minimizing licensing costs for enterprise applications is vital to organizations looking to keep costs down. When your applications use per-core licensing, choosing higher-performance servers with fewer cores dramatically reduces your software-related spending. The Dell PowerEdge M820 blade solution with Compellent storage could deliver up to $96,236 in savings as compared to a single HP ProLiant BL680c G7 solution, and if consolidating multiple workloads, could deliver even more savings in licensing costs when running Microsoft SQL Server in a virtualized scenario – all while maintaining or exceeding previous performance levels.
SQL Server 2017 - Mejoras Impulsadas por la ComunidadJavier Villegas
Con SQL Sever 2017 Microsoft incorpora nuevas funcionalidades propuestas por la comunidad de profesionales de Data Platform, hablaremos acerca de las mismas así como también sobre las funcionalidades más destacadas de la próxima versión de SQL
2015 deploying flash in the data centerHoward Marks
Deploying Flash in the Data Center discusses various ways to deploy flash storage in the data center to improve performance. It describes all-flash arrays that provide the highest performance but also more expensive options like hybrid arrays that combine flash and disk. It also covers using flash in servers or as a cache to accelerate storage arrays. Choosing the best approach depends on factors like workload, budget, and existing infrastructure.
This presentation, delivered by Howard Marks at Interop in Las Vegas May 2013 explores how system administrators can provide high performance storage for VDI implementations.
Whether you’re looking for the highest possible performance per rack unit or the strongest RAS-enabled server to run your mission-critical databases, Dell has a server to meet your needs. Factors such as performance per rack, expansion capabilities, and flash storage options will also drive your server decision.
In our hands-on tests, we found that the Dell PowerEdge R820 server could handle up to 382,397 database orders per minute and had 73.6 percent greater performance per U of rack space than the R910.
The Dell PowerEdge R910 processed 440,475 OPM. Its high number of logical processors, maximum expansion capabilities, and support for RAS technologies make the Dell PowerEdge R910 an excellent choice for your mission-critical data center applications.
Dell PowerEdge M520 server solution: Energy efficiency and database performancePrincipled Technologies
As energy prices continue to rise, building a power-efficient data center that does not sacrifice performance is vital to organizations looking to keep costs down while keeping application performance high. Choosing servers that pair high performance with new power-efficient technologies helps you do so. In our tests, the Dell PowerEdge M520 with Dell EqualLogic PS-M4110 arrays outperformed the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8 server with HP StorageWorks D2200sb arrays by 113.5 percent in OPM. Not only did the Dell PowerEdge M520 blade server solution deliver higher overall performance, it also did so more efficiently, delivering 79.9 percent better database performance/watt than the HP ProLiant BL460c Gen8 solution.
Get insight from document-based distributed MongoDB databases sooner and have...Principled Technologies
With additional drive bays and 2nd Generation Intel Xeon Scalable processors, Dell EMC PowerEdge R640 servers handled more Yahoo Cloud Serving Benchmark (YCSB) operations per second than previous-generation servers and handled them more efficiently
Hardware upgrades to improve database, SharePoint, Exchange, and file server ...Principled Technologies
Legacy tower servers that cannot meet workload demands can restrict business growth. By upgrading to the Dell PowerEdge T630, you can obtain immediate benefits for current IT performance needs and implement upgrades that will expand server capabilities to help meet future demands. We found that replacing a legacy server with the new Dell PowerEdge T630 tower server offered up to 97.9 percent lower workload latency, 131.9 percent more IOPS, and 421.9 percent more OPM when running the same workload. With component upgrades, the PowerEdge T630 supported more Exchange, SharePoint, and file server users, and more database VM instances. Help ensure that your applications have sufficient hardware resources to keep up with the needs of today and the future by choosing to upgrade to the new Dell PowerEdge T630 tower server.
Populating your data center with new, more powerful and energy efficient servers can deliver numerous benefits to your organization. By consolidating multiple older servers onto a new platform, you can save in the areas of data center space and port costs, management costs, and power and cooling costs.
In our tests, we found that the Lenovo ThinkServer RD630 could consolidate the workloads of three HP ProLiant DL385 G5 servers, while increasing overall performance by 82.6 percent and reducing power consumption by 58.8 percent, making the ThinkServer RD630 an excellent choice to reduce the costs associated with running your data center.
Tungsten University: Load A Vertica Data Warehouse With MySQL DataContinuent
Continuent Tungsten offers real-time replication from MySQL to a variety of DBMS types including Vertica. In this Tungsten University webcast we will show you the details of setting up MySQL-to-Vertica replication, including the following topics:
• Introduction to Continuent Tungsten features for data warehouse loading
• Installation for MySQL to Vertica replication
• Best practices for applications: charsets, schema design, time zones, etc.
• Techniques for filtering and transforming data
• Performance tuning and trouble shooting
• Adapting batch loading for new use cases
The webinar includes technical information and a live demo to help you get your own data warehouse loading application up and running quickly.
Comparing Dell Compellent network-attached storage to an industry-leading NAS...Principled Technologies
A flexible NAS solution addresses many organizational challenges from server backup to hosting production applications and databases. Advanced NAS solutions such as the Intel Xeon processor-based Dell Compellent FS8600 NAS provide flexibility and scalability, allowing various use options as well as drive options throughout its lifecycle. This scale and flexibility enables an organization to alleviate performance bottlenecks anywhere in the organization simply by reallocating or adding more disk resources.
We found that the Intel Xeon processor-based Dell Compellent FS8600 NAS solution backed up a small-file corpus up to 15.9 percent faster and a large-file corpus up to 17.1 percent faster than a similarly configured, industry-leading NAS solution. This means that selecting the Dell Compellent FS8600 NAS has the potential to help optimize an organization’s infrastructure.
SharePoint 2010 Virtualization - Hungarian SharePoint User GroupMichael Noel
Michael Noel is an author of books on Microsoft technologies and a partner at Convergent Computing. The document discusses virtualizing SharePoint 2010, including guidelines, models, and Microsoft's virtualization options. It provides recommendations for virtualizing different SharePoint roles and the licensing implications. It demonstrates quickly provisioning a SharePoint farm using a VM template and PowerShell script.
Performance of persistent apps on Container-Native Storage for Red Hat OpenSh...Principled Technologies
The document summarizes benchmark testing of Container-Native Storage (CNS) on Red Hat OpenShift Container Platform using two different storage media: solid-state drives (SSDs) and hard disk drives (HDDs). It tested CNS under IO-intensive and CPU-intensive workloads. For the IO-intensive workload, the SSD configuration significantly outperformed the HDD configuration, achieving over 5 times the maximum performance. However, for the CPU-intensive workload, the two configurations achieved similar maximum performance levels, with SSDs having less than a 5% improvement. The testing demonstrated that CNS can provide scalable storage and that storage performance depends on understanding how it matches the workload characteristics.
Learn about the features that can help you modernize your mission critical applications, where security and performance can go hand in hand. From the wide range of SQL Server features available, we will take a closer look at In-Memory performance, Automatic Tuning, Advanced Security Features like Always Encrypted, Polybase and integration with Machine Learning through R and Python.
This document summarizes the results of a proof of concept test of PolyServe's solution for scalable shared databases with SQL Server 2005. The test involved running a set of reporting queries against a database with 100 million rows on 1, 2, and 4 SQL Server instances attached to the same database via PolyServe's software. Performance improved linearly as more servers were added, with completion time reducing by up to 16 times on 4 servers compared to running the queries on 1 server. PolyServe's approach simplified database administration by allowing servers to directly access shared storage and avoiding the need to manually create and manage read-only database copies or volumes.
This document summarizes the results of a benchmark comparing the performance of several cloud database systems, including Cassandra, HBase, Sherpa, and MySQL. The benchmark uses a standard workload and measures key metrics like latency and throughput. Overall, Cassandra showed strong write performance but weaker reads. Sherpa delivered good read and write latency as well as high throughput. HBase read latency was poor. Later versions of Cassandra showed performance improvements over earlier versions.
1) PerfAccel is a solution that provides in-depth analytics and intelligent data placement in Ceph clusters to optimize storage performance and costs.
2) It uses SSD caching to accelerate I/O and place frequently accessed "hot" data from VMs onto SSDs for faster performance.
3) PerfAccel's analytics provide insights into I/O patterns and behaviors to determine optimal SSD sizing and placements that improve performance while reducing storage costs.
Resource balancing comparison: VMware vSphere 6 vs. Red Hat Enterprise Virtua...Principled Technologies
Having ample resources to handle user requests is a necessity of modern virtualization solutions. Allocating and distributing those resources evenly, however, is imperative to the success of your business’s virtualized environment. In our tests, after powering on the other two servers in our three-node cluster and adding resource management features, VMware vSphere 6 improved performance by 183 percent over its baseline configuration of one active server and no resource management features. RHEV 3.5, in contrast, delivered only a 79 percent increase over its baseline. As you design your business’s infrastructure and applications, improvements such as those offered by VMware vSphere 6 DRS and Storage DRS can play a critical role by offering your users better application experiences. Optimized and modern resource management provided by VMware DRS can also help to lower your IT purchase and maintenance costs by reducing the number of servers necessary to run your applications.
This document discusses MongoDB sharding which involves horizontally scaling MongoDB across multiple machines or shards. It describes the components of a sharded MongoDB cluster including shards, config servers, and mongos query routers. It provides examples of when and why sharding would be used such as for large datasets, high throughput, hardware limitations, storage engine limitations, isolating failures, and separating hot and cold data. The document then outlines steps to set up a basic two node sharded cluster with one shard, three config servers, and mongos query routers on the same two machines.
Minimizing licensing costs for enterprise applications is vital to organizations looking to keep costs down. When your applications use per-core licensing, choosing higher-performance servers with fewer cores dramatically reduces your software-related spending. The Dell PowerEdge M820 blade solution with Compellent storage could deliver up to $96,236 in savings as compared to a single HP ProLiant BL680c G7 solution, and if consolidating multiple workloads, could deliver even more savings in licensing costs when running Microsoft SQL Server in a virtualized scenario – all while maintaining or exceeding previous performance levels.
SQL Server 2017 - Mejoras Impulsadas por la ComunidadJavier Villegas
Con SQL Sever 2017 Microsoft incorpora nuevas funcionalidades propuestas por la comunidad de profesionales de Data Platform, hablaremos acerca de las mismas así como también sobre las funcionalidades más destacadas de la próxima versión de SQL
2015 deploying flash in the data centerHoward Marks
Deploying Flash in the Data Center discusses various ways to deploy flash storage in the data center to improve performance. It describes all-flash arrays that provide the highest performance but also more expensive options like hybrid arrays that combine flash and disk. It also covers using flash in servers or as a cache to accelerate storage arrays. Choosing the best approach depends on factors like workload, budget, and existing infrastructure.
This presentation, delivered by Howard Marks at Interop in Las Vegas May 2013 explores how system administrators can provide high performance storage for VDI implementations.
[db tech showcase Tokyo 2016] D32: SPARCサーバ + Pure Storage DB仮想化のすべらない話 〜 Exa...Insight Technology, Inc.
NTTぷらら様は、「柔軟に増減設できるDB基盤」と「コスト最適化」をキーワードに、DB仮想化をSPARCサーバ + Pure Storageの組み合わせで実現しました。更に現在、理想のDB基盤を実現するために、Exadata環境のリプレースも進めています。本セッションでは、検証結果や生のデモンストレーションに、スライドには書けない生々しい話を加え、理想のDB環境実現までの道のりをご紹介します。
[db tech showcase Tokyo 2016] A35: NVMe徹底検証 by 株式会社インサイトテクノロジー 平間 大輔
Similar to SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930 QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage SC9000 all-flash array
SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell EMC PowerEdge FC630 QLogic 1...Principled Technologies
Upgrading the hardware running your SQL Server to a space-efficient modular Dell EMC modern environment can help your company achieve a great deal of database work in a small amount of space. With the Dell Express Flash technology, adding a caching solution such as Samsung AutoCache can make the environment even more efficient.
In the PT labs, we ran a mixed database workload on six Dell EMC PowerEdge FC630 servers, powered by Intel Xeon E5-2667 processors, in three PowerEdge FX2 enclosures. The solution included the QLogic QLE2692 16Gb FC adapter with StorFusion Technology, Dell EMC Storage SC9000 all-flash storage, and Dell EMC PowerEdge Express Flash NVMe Performance PCIe SSDs.
With no caching solution, the 36 SQL Server 2016 VMs on the six servers achieved a total of 431,839 orders per minute while an Oracle workload ran on 12 VMs. When we added a caching solution to accelerate the SQL database volumes, the performance across the 36 SQL Server 2016 VMs doubled to 871,580. These numbers show the power of server-side caching to alleviate pressure on the storage array allowing you to get even more out of the Dell EMC modern environment.
Dell PowerEdge R920 and Microsoft SQL Server 2014 Migration and Benefits GuidePrincipled Technologies
The latest Dell PowerEdge R920 server is designed to provide highly scalable performance for large enterprises, with greater memory capacity, improved and expanded attached storage options, and processor architectures designed for high availability. Microsoft SQL Server 2014 is the perfect companion software to take advantage of the Dell PowerEdge R920’s impressive specifications. Upgrading has never looked more attractive, and with hardware/software upgrades must come data migration.
Migrating legacy database applications to the latest database technologies on newer Dell server platforms is a common task for businesses upgrading their hardware/software stack. As this guide shows, the process is straightforward and the cost benefits can be enormous. We calculated the savings attainable from multiple consolidation ratios, as well as how long it would take to pay off the replacement server. We found that a consolidation ratio of 13 to 1 could yield $531,725 in software savings, many times the cost of the replacement hardware itself. So not only will the business benefit from the massively-scalable current-generation Dell server technology paired with Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 running SQL Server 2014, but you can save money in the process.
Dell PowerEdge R920 running Oracle Database: Benefits of upgrading with NVMe ...Principled Technologies
Strong server performance is essential to companies running Oracle Database. The new Dell PowerEdge R920 provides strong performance in its base configuration with 24 SAS hard disks, but this performance gets an enormous boost when running the configuration containing NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs. In our testing, the upgraded configuration of the Dell PowerEdge R920 delivered 14.9 times the database performance of the base configuration. In addition, in testing the raw I/O throughput of the NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs, we saw as much as 192.8 times the IOPS as compared to the base configuration. Given that the storage subsystem is critical in servers and specifically database applications, the performance improvements offered by NVMe Express Flash PCIe SSDs can lead to great service improvements for your customers, making this upgrade a very wise investment.
Consolidate and upgrade to save up to $172K: Dell PowerEdge R620 and Microso...Principled Technologies
Your growing business needs upgraded infrastructure to keep up with increased users and demand on your hardware. Adding memory and upgrading processors does not provide the same benefits to your infrastructure as a consolidation and upgrade can. Upgrading and consolidating your IT infrastructure to the Dell PowerEdge R620 running Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 and SQL Server 2014 can improve performance while saving money and rack space.
Based on our findings, a single Dell PowerEdge R620 can replace four four-year-old dual-socket servers with VMs running heavy SQL Server database workloads. We found that consolidating four older servers onto a Dell PowerEdge R620 and upgrading to Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 with Hyper-V and SQL Server 2014 could save up to $172,573 over three years, compared to keeping the four-year-old dual-socket servers. The Dell PowerEdge R620 can also consolidate 8U worth of legacy servers into 1U of space. If your business runs older versions of Microsoft SQL Server on end-of-life dual-socket servers, the Dell PowerEdge R620 with Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 with Hyper-V and SQL Server 2014 could save your company these costs while delivering better performance than the aging hardware and software.
As our tests show, investing in the powerful new Dell PowerEdge R920 running Oracle VM Server 3.2.8 with Oracle Database 12c VMs achieves cost savings without compromising performance. In our testing, a single Dell PowerEdge R920 could perform five times the work of a single HP ProLiant DL385 G6 server; the costs to power and cool the Dell PowerEdge would be 43 percent less than the five servers it could replace. The three-year software licensing costs of the Dell PowerEdge R920 server would be 22 percent lower than the licensing costs for the five-server solution. These dramatic savings—which come out to $212,091 for our single test environment — could grow to millions of dollars in a larger consolidation effort.
Maximizing Oracle Database performance with Intel SSD DC P3600 Series NVMe SS...Principled Technologies
If your organization runs critical, high-demand databases in environments such as Oracle Database, strong performance is not an option: it’s a must-have. Additionally, getting that necessary strong performance out of a single server can be essential for running a space and cost-efficient datacenter. In the Principled Technologies labs, we found that the Dell PowerEdge R930 offered strong performance for such transactional databases when configured with SATA SSDs. When we upgraded the servers to Intel SSD DC P3600 Series NVMe SSDs, performance doubled, increasing by 2.17 times, or 117 percent. If your datacenter needs a new powerhouse server, purchasing your Dell PowerEdge R930 with Intel NVMe SSDs for a cost increase of only 18 percent can double the performance you get from each server. This increases what your infrastructure can do within the same amount of space and lets you ultimately save money that would otherwise be spent purchasing additional servers and software.
Boosting virtualization performance with Intel SSD DC Series P3600 NVMe SSDs ...Principled Technologies
When it comes time to make your server purchase or if you’re looking for an easy way to boost performance of existing infrastructure, consider upgrading your server’s internal storage. As our hands-on tests with a Dell EMC PowerEdge R630 environment running VMware Virtual SAN proved, Intel SSD DC P3600 Series NVMe SSDs could increase virtualized mixed-workload performance by as much as 59.9 percent compared to SATA SSDs while allowing you to run a large additional number of VMs. When you improve performance for your virtualized workloads, your employees and customers will benefit. By increasing performance with Intel NVMe SSDs on your Dell EMC PowerEdge R630 servers, you can potentially slash wait times and do more work on your servers without having to expand your infrastructure with additional storage arrays, which can translate to happier users and a more efficient infrastructure.
Database performance in blade environments: Dell PowerEdge M1000e vs. Cisco U...Principled Technologies
Scalable and reliable compute performance, in conjunction with your 16Gb Fibre Channel capability with SAN-based storage, means you don’t have to worry about your application VMs losing performance as your business grows. In our tests, the Dell PowerEdge M1000e blade environment delivered up to 91.7 percent greater throughput while running a virtualized OLTP database workload than the similarly priced Cisco UCS 5108 blade environment. More importantly, the Dell M1000e blade environment delivered consistent scaling as we added blade servers, in contrast to the performance degradation we observed in the Cisco UCS 5108 blade environment. The Dell M1000e also left room to grow within the 10U, with eight additional half-height slots available for compute nodes in the future, whereas the Cisco UCS 5108 blade environment would require a second enclosure to house additional blades. Finally, both solutions were similarly priced, so there is no additional cost associated with the advantages of the Dell environment. For applications demanding dense compute environments, high throughput, and lower response rates, companies will find the Dell PowerEdge M1000e blade environment better able to scale to meet predictable performance requirements as their business grows.
Moving your legacy database workloads to the Dell PowerEdge R930 can help you realize the benefits of consolidation, which can include savings in management costs, power usage, and cable management costs. More importantly, the licensing costs of the database application itself may be reduced by the consolidation effort. In addition to these benefits, greater database transactions per minute can keep your orders flowing smoothly.
We found that the Dell PowerEdge R930, powered by the Intel Xeon processor E7 v3 series, could consolidate three legacy servers running four Oracle Database 12c VMs each. The Dell PowerEdge R930 outperformed the legacy server with 4.4 times the overall database performance, delivering an average of 47.1 percent more performance per VM. By consolidating that many legacy servers, you can save up to 67 percent in rack space, 25 percent in database licenses, and even reduce other operating costs to improve your bottom line.
Boosting performance with the Dell Acceleration Appliance for DatabasesPrincipled Technologies
If your business is expanding and you need to support more users accessing your databases, it’s time to act. Upgrading your database infrastructure with a flash storage-based solution is a smart way to improve performance without adding more servers or taking up very much rack space, which comes at a premium. The Dell Acceleration Appliance for Databases addresses this by providing strong performance when combined with your existing infrastructure or on its own.
We found that adding a highly available DAAD solution to our database application provided up to 3.01 times the Oracle Database 12c performance, which can make a big difference to your bottom line. Additionally, the DAAD delivered 3.14 times the database performance when replacing traditional storage completely, which could enable your infrastructure to keep up with your growing business’ needs.
Consolidate and upgrade: Dell PowerEdge VRTX and Microsoft SQL Server 2014Principled Technologies
Your growing business shouldn’t run on aging hardware and software until it fails. Adding memory and upgrading processors will not provide the same benefits to your infrastructure as a consolidation and upgrade can. Upgrading and consolidating your IT infrastructure to the Dell PowerEdge VRTX running Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 and SQL Server 2014 can improve performance while adding features such as high availability.
Based on our findings, a single Dell PowerEdge VRTX can replace four four-year-old dual-socket servers with VMs running heavy SQL database workloads. We found that consolidating four older servers onto a Dell PowerEdge VRTX and upgrading to Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 with Hyper-V and SQL Server 2014 could save up to $16,390 over three years, compared to keeping the four-year-old dual-socket servers and upgrading existing storage infrastructure. If your business runs older versions of Microsoft SQL Server on end-of-life dual-socket servers, the Dell PowerEdge VRTX with Microsoft Windows Server 2012 R2 with Hyper-V and SQL Server 2014 could save your company these costs while delivering better performance than the aging hardware and software.
Apache Cassandra performance advantages of the new Dell PowerEdge C6620 with ...Principled Technologies
The PowerEdge C6620 with PERC 12 delivered lower latency and higher throughput than an HPE ProLiant XL170r Gen9 server with an HPE Smart Array P440ar controller
Conclusion
Data proliferation today is rapid, and its growth shows no signs of stopping. For businesses that can take advantage of that data, there is tremendous potential value. One recent McKinsey study notes that “companies that are using data-driven B2B sales-growth engines report above-market growth and EBITDA increases in the range of 15 to 25 percent.” With data flooding in so quickly and in so many different forms, however, companies need high-performing big data solutions to have a chance at utilizing that data effectively.
We tested the performance of two platforms with a read-intensive Apache Cassandra database system bigdata workload to assess which might be better suited to speedily deliver the insights decision makers need. Compared to an older HPE ProLiant XL170r Gen9 server with an HPE Smart Array P440ar controller, the new Dell PowerEdge C6620 with Broadcom-based PERC 12 RAID controller delivered faster read and update latencies and more than twice the throughput. This improvement in performance can help you glean more value from your unstructured data more quickly. If you’re watching your stores of unstructured data grow but are still leaning on older servers for your critical Cassandra workloads, it may be time for an upgrade.
By upgrading from the legacy solution we tested to the new Intel processor-based Dell and VMware solution, you could do 18 times the work in the same amount of space. Imagine what that performance could mean to your business: Consolidate workloads from across your company, lower your power and cooling bills, and limit datacenter expansion in the future, all while maintaining a consistent user experience—the list of potential benefits is huge.
Try running DPACK, which can help you identify bottlenecks in your environment and inform you about your current performance needs. Then consider how the consolidation ratio we proved could be helpful for your company. The Intel processor-powered Dell PowerEdge R730 solution with VMware vSphere and Dell Storage SC4020, also powered by Intel, could be the right destination for your upgrade journey.
Upgrade to Dell EMC PowerEdge R6515 servers and gain better OLTP and VDI perf...Principled Technologies
Additionally, PowerEdge R6515 servers with 3rd Gen AMD EPYC processors could lower licensing costs and also empower your business to explore Kubernetes with VMware Tanzu
Speeding time to insight: The Dell PowerEdge C6620 with Dell PERC 12 RAID con...Principled Technologies
The new PowerEdge C6620 delivered better performance—both higher throughput and lower latency—than a previous-generation PowerEdge C6520 with PERC 11
Conclusion
The vast amounts of unstructured data that people and organizations generate daily have the potential to bring incredible value to companies that can utilize it quickly and correctly. Buried in the data are insights about consumer preferences, product performance, environmental trends, and more—but to access those insights at the speed of business, you need high-performing NoSQL databases. Aging servers may be holding you back from the full value of your data.
We found that the new Dell PowerEdge C6620 with Broadcom-based PERC 12 RAID controller can speed read-intensive Apache Cassandra database workloads compared to an older server solution. Faster read and update latencies and higher throughput, as we saw the PowerEdge C6620 deliver, can speed the retrieval, processing, and analysis of your unstructured data, enabling you to more effectively extract its value. To more fully utilize your data to inform your everyday business operations, consider the Dell PowerEdge C6620 with Broadcom-based PERC 12 RAID controller.
Upgrade your cloud infrastructure with Dell PowerEdge R760 servers and VMware...Principled Technologies
Compared to a cluster of PowerEdge R750 servers running VMware Cloud Foundation 4.5
Conclusion
If your company is struggling with underperforming infrastructure, upgrading to 16th Generation Dell PowerEdge servers running VCF 5.1 could be just what you need to handle more database throughput and reduce vSAN latencies. We found that a Dell PowerEdge R760 server cluster running VCF 5.1 processed over 78 percent more TPM and 79 percent more NOPM than a Dell PowerEdge R750 server cluster running VCF 4.5. It’s also worth noting that the PowerEdge R750 cluster bottlenecked on vSAN storage, with max write latency at 8.9ms. For reference, the PowerEdge R760 cluster clocked in at 3.8ms max write latency. This higher latency is due in part to the single disk group per host on the moderately configured PowerEdge R750 cluster, while the better-configured PowerEdge R760 cluster supported four disk groups per host. As an additional benefit to IT admins, we also found that the embedded VMware Aria Operation adapter provided useful infrastructure insights.
Handle 19.7% more SQL Server work and support 25% more VMs with new Dell Powe...Principled Technologies
New 16th generation Dell PowerEdge MX760c servers achieved up to 19.7% more orders per minute on a SQL Server workload compared to previous generation servers, while simultaneously supporting 25% more virtual machines at the same response times. Testing showed the new servers could handle more transactions and increased VM density without slowing performance. Upgrading to the latest Dell servers allows businesses to improve database performance and scalability without expanding their data center footprint.
Analyze data from Cassandra databases more quickly: Select Dell PowerEdge C66...Principled Technologies
This new Dell PERC 12 solution delivered stronger Apache Cassandra distributed database performance than a legacy solution.
When speedy, in-depth analysis is crucial in a NoSQL environment, relying on legacy hardware can hurt your company. We found that a Dell PowerEdge C6620 server with a Dell PERC 12 RAID controller handled more OPS for a Cassandra data analysis workload than a previous-generation Dell PowerEdge C6520 server with a
PERC 11 RAID controller. This superior performance could help business units in your organization reap in-depth actionable intelligence from unstructured data more quickly.
OLTP with Dell hybrid arrays: Comparing the EqualLogic PS6210XS with the Equa...Principled Technologies
The effectiveness of your OLTP database environment can depend to an enormous degree on the storage system you select. We compared a database server solution using the Dell EqualLogic PS6210XS with a database server solution using the previous-generation Dell EqualLogic PS6110XS.
The EqualLogic PS6210XS solution was superior in all areas we tested. It delivered greater performance with faster response time, and used less power. The Dell EqualLogic PS6210XS is a clear improvement over the previous-generation Dell EqualLogic PS6110XS.
Dell PowerEdge C6620 server with Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC 12) ana...Principled Technologies
Dell PowerEdge C6620 server with Dell PowerEdge RAID Controller (PERC 12) analyzed Cassandra database data more quickly than an HPE ProLiant XL170r Gen9 server with an HPE Smart Array P440ar controller
Detailed, up-to-the-moment data analysis is becoming increasingly important for those who make business decisions. In our hands-on tests, a Dell PowerEdge C6620 server with a Dell PERC 12 RAID controller handled more operations per second for data analysis Cassandra workloads than an HPE ProLiant XL170r Gen9
server with an HPE Smart Array P440ar controller. By selecting the Dell solution, you could give the decisionmakers in your organization earlier access to in-depth, actionable intelligence, by finding anomalies quickly in unstructured data.
Similar to SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930 QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage SC9000 all-flash array (20)
Bring ideas to life with the HP Z2 G9 Tower Workstation - InfographicPrincipled Technologies
We compared CPU performance and noise output of an HP Z2 G9 Tower Workstation in High Performance Mode to a similarly configured Dell Precision 3660 Tower Workstation in its out-of-box performance mode
Investing in GenAI: Cost‑benefit analysis of Dell on‑premises deployments vs....Principled Technologies
Conclusion
Diving into the world of GenAI has the potential to yield a great many benefits for your organization, but it first requires consideration for how best to implement those GenAI workloads. Whether your AI goals are to create a chatbot for online visitors, generate marketing materials, aid troubleshooting, or something else, implementing an AI solution requires careful planning and decision-making. A major decision is whether to host GenAI in the cloud or keep your data on premises. Traditional on-premises solutions can provide superior security and control, a substantial concern when dealing with large amounts of potentially sensitive data. But will supporting a GenAI solution on site be a drain on an organization’s IT budget?
In our research, we found that the value proposition is just the opposite: Hosting GenAI workloads on premises, either in a traditional Dell solution or using a managed Dell APEX pay-per-use solution, could significantly lower your GenAI costs over 3 years compared to hosting these workloads in the cloud. In fact, we found that a comparable AWS SageMaker solution would cost up to 3.8 times as much and an Azure ML solution would cost up to 3.6 times as much as GenAI on a Dell APEX pay-per-use solution. These results show that organizations looking to implement GenAI and reap the business benefits to come can find many advantages in an on-premises Dell solution, whether they opt to purchase and manage it themselves or choose a subscription-based Dell APEX pay-per-use solution. Choosing an on-premises Dell solution could save your organization significantly over hosting GenAI in the cloud, while giving you control over the security and privacy of your data as well as any updates and changes to the environment, and while ensuring your environment is managed consistently.
Workstations powered by Intel can play a vital role in CPU-intensive AI devel...Principled Technologies
In three AI development workflows, Intel processor-powered workstations delivered strong performance, without using their GPUs, making them a good choice for this part of the AI process
Conclusion
We executed three AI development workflows on tower workstations and mobile workstations from three vendors, with each workflow utilizing only the Intel CPU cores, and found that these platforms were suitable for carrying out various AI tasks. For two of the workflows, we learned that completing the tasks on the tower workstations took roughly half as much time as on the mobile workstations. This supports the idea that the tower workstations would be appropriate for a development environment for more complex models with a greater volume of data and that the mobile workstations would be well-suited for data scientists fine-tuning simpler models. In the third workflow, we explored tower workstation performance with different precision levels and learned that using 16-bit floating point precision allowed the workstations to execute the workflow in less time and also reduced memory usage dramatically. For all three AI workflows we executed, we consider the time the workstations needed to complete the tasks to be acceptable, and believe that these workstations can be appropriate, cost-effective choices for these kinds of activities.
Enable security features with no impact to OLTP performance with Dell PowerEd...Principled Technologies
Get comparable online transaction processing (OLTP) performance with or without enabling AMD Secure Memory Encryption and AMD Secure Encrypted Virtualization - Encrypted State
Conclusion
You’ve likely already implemented many security measures for your servers, which may include physical security for the data center, hardware-level security, and software-level security. With the cost of data breaches high and still growing, however, wise IT teams will consider what additional security measures they may be able to implement.
AMD SME and SEV-ES are technologies that are already available within your AMD processor-powered 16th Generation Dell PowerEdge servers—and in our testing, we saw that they can offer extra layers of security without affecting performance. We compared the online transaction processing performance of a Dell PowerEdge R7625 server, powered by AMD EPYC 9274F processors, with and without these two security features enabled. We found that enabling AMD Secure Memory Encryption and Secure Encrypted Virtualization-Encrypted State did not impact performance at all.
If your team is assessing areas where you might be able to enhance security—without paying a large performance cost—consider enabling AME SME and AMD SEV-ES in your Dell PowerEdge servers.
Improving energy efficiency in the data center: Endure higher temperatures wi...Principled Technologies
In high-temperature test scenarios, a Dell PowerEdge HS5620 server continued running an intensive workload without component warnings or failures, while a Supermicro SYS‑621C-TN12R server failed
Conclusion: Remain resilient in high temperatures with the Dell PowerEdge HS5620 to help increase efficiency
Increasing your data center’s temperature can help your organization make strides in energy efficiency and cooling cost savings. With servers that can hold up to these higher everyday temperatures—as well as high temperatures due to unforeseen circumstances—your business can continue to deliver the performance your apps and clients require.
When we ran an intensive floating-point workload on a Dell PowerEdge HS5620 and a Supermicro SYS-621CTN12R in three scenario types simulating typical operations at 25°C, a fan failure, and an HVAC malfunction, the Dell server experienced no component warnings or failures. In contrast, the Supermicro server experienced warnings in all three scenario types and experienced component failures in the latter two tests, rendering the system unusable. When we inspected and analyzed each system, we found that the Dell PowerEdge HS5620 server’s motherboard layout, fans, and chassis offered cooling design advantages.
For businesses aiming to meet sustainability goals by running hotter data centers, as well as those concerned with server cooling design, the Dell PowerEdge HS5620 is a strong contender to take on higher temperatures during day-to-day operations and unexpected malfunctions.
Dell APEX Cloud Platform for Red Hat OpenShift: An easily deployable and powe...Principled Technologies
The 4th Generation Intel Xeon Scalable processor‑powered solution deployed in less than two hours and ran a Kubernetes container-based generative AI workload effectively
Dell APEX Cloud Platform for Red Hat OpenShift: An easily deployable and powe...Principled Technologies
The 4th Generation Intel Xeon Scalable processor‑powered solution deployed in less than two hours and ran a generative AI workload effectively
Conclusion
The appeal of incorporating GenAI into your organization’s operations is likely great. Getting started with an efficient solution for your next LLM workload or application can seem daunting because of the changing hardware and software landscape, but Dell APEX Cloud Platform for Red Hat OpenShift powered by 4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors could provide the solution you need. We started with a Dell Validated Design as a reference, and then went on to modify the deployment as necessary for our Llama 2 workload. The Dell APEX Cloud Platform for Red Hat OpenShift solution worked well for our LLM, and by using this deployment guide in conjunction with numerous Dell documents and some flexibility, you could be well on your way to innovating your next GenAI breakthrough.
Upgrade your cloud infrastructure with Dell PowerEdge R760 servers and VMware...Principled Technologies
Compared to a cluster of PowerEdge R750 servers running VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF)
For organizations running clusters of moderately configured, older Dell PowerEdge servers with a previous version of VCF, upgrading to better-configured modern servers can provide a significant performance boost and more.
Upgrade your cloud infrastructure with Dell PowerEdge R760 servers and VMware...Principled Technologies
Compared to a cluster of PowerEdge R750 servers running VMware Cloud Foundation 4.5
If your company is struggling with underperforming infrastructure, upgrading to 16th Generation Dell PowerEdge servers running VCF 5.1 could be just what you need to handle more database throughput and reduce vSAN latencies. As an additional benefit to IT admins, we also found that the embedded VMware Aria Operation adapter provided useful infrastructure insights.
Realize 2.1X the performance with 20% less power with AMD EPYC processor-back...Principled Technologies
Three AMD EPYC processor-based two-processor solutions outshined comparable Intel Xeon Scalable processor-based solutions by handling more Redis workload transactions and requests while consuming less power
Conclusion
Performance and energy efficiency are significant factors in processor selection for servers running data-intensive workloads, such as Redis. We compared the Redis performance and energy consumption of a server cluster in three AMD EPYC two-processor configurations against that of a server cluster in two Intel Xeon Scalable two-processor configurations. In each of our three test scenarios, the server cluster backed by AMD EPYC processors outperformed the server cluster backed by Intel Xeon Scalable processors. In addition, one of the AMD EPYC processor-based clusters consumed 20 percent less power than its Intel Xeon Scalable processor-based counterpart. Combining these measurements gave us power efficiency metrics that demonstrate how valuable AMD EPYC processor-based servers could be—you could see better performance per watt with these AMD EPYC processor-based server clusters and potentially get more from your Redis or other data intensive applications and workloads while reducing data center power costs.
Improve performance and gain room to grow by easily migrating to a modern Ope...Principled Technologies
We deployed this modern environment, then migrated database VMs from legacy servers and saw performance improvements that support consolidation
Conclusion
If your organization’s transactional databases are running on gear that is several years old, you have much to gain by upgrading to modern servers with new processors and networking components and an OpenShift environment. In our testing, a modern OpenShift environment with a cluster of three Dell PowerEdge R7615 servers with 4th Generation AMD EPYC processors and high-speed 100Gb Broadcom NICs outperformed a legacy environment with MySQL VMs running on a cluster of three Dell PowerEdge R7515 servers with 3rd Generation AMD EPYC processors and 25Gb Broadcom NICs. We also easily migrated a VM from the legacy environment to the modern environment, with only a few steps required to set up and less than ten minutes of hands-on time. The performance advantage of the modern servers would allow a company to reduce the number of servers necessary to perform a given amount of database work, thus lowering operational expenditures such as power and cooling and IT staff time for maintenance. The high-speed 100Gb Broadcom NICs in this solution also give companies better network performance and networking capacity to grow as they embrace emerging technologies such as AI that put great demands on networks.
Boost PC performance: How more available memory can improve productivityPrincipled Technologies
With more memory available, system performance of three Dell devices increased, which can translate to a better user experience
Conclusion
When your system has plenty of RAM to meet your needs, you can efficiently access the applications and data you need to finish projects and to-do lists without sacrificing time and focus. Our test results show that with more memory available, three Dell PCs delivered better performance and took less time to complete the Procyon Office Productivity benchmark. These advantages translate to users being able to complete workflows more quickly and multitask more easily. Whether you need the mobility of the Latitude 5440, the creative capabilities of the Precision 3470, or the high performance of the OptiPlex Tower Plus 7010, configuring your system with more RAM can help keep processes running smoothly, enabling you to do more without compromising performance.
Deploy with confidence: VMware Cloud Foundation 5.1 on next gen Dell PowerEdg...Principled Technologies
A Principled Technologies deployment guide
Conclusion
Deploying VMware Cloud Foundation 5.1 on next gen Dell PowerEdge servers brings together critical virtualization capabilities and high-performing hardware infrastructure. Relying on our hands-on experience, this deployment guide offers a comprehensive roadmap that can guide your organization through the seamless integration of advanced VMware cloud solutions with the performance and reliability of Dell PowerEdge servers. In addition to the deployment efficiency, the Cloud Foundation 5.1 and PowerEdge solution delivered strong performance while running a MySQL database workload. By leveraging VMware Cloud Foundation 5.1 and PowerEdge servers, you could help your organization embrace cloud computing with confidence, potentially unlocking a new level of agility, scalability, and efficiency in your data center operations.
Based on our research using publicly available materials, it appears that Dell supports nine of the ten PC security features we investigated, HP supports six of them, and Lenovo supports three features.
Increase security, sustainability, and efficiency with robust Dell server man...Principled Technologies
Compared to the Supermicro management portfolio
Conclusion
Choosing a vendor for server purchases is about more than just the hardware platform. Decision-makers must also consider more long-term concerns, including system/data security, energy efficiency, and ease of management. These concerns make the systems management tools a vendor offers as important as the hardware.
We investigated the features and capabilities of server management tools from Dell and Supermicro, comparing Dell iDRAC9 against Supermicro IPMI for embedded server management and Dell OpenManage Enterprise and CloudIQ against Supermicro Server Manager for one-to-many device and console management and monitoring. We found that the Dell management tools provided more comprehensive security, sustainability, and management/monitoring features and capabilities than Supermicro servers did. In addition, Dell tools automated more tasks to ease server management, resulting in significant time savings for administrators versus having to do the same tasks manually with Supermicro tools.
When making a server purchase, a vendor’s associated management products are critical to protect data, support a more sustainable environment, and to ease the maintenance of systems. Our tests and research showed that the Dell management portfolio for PowerEdge servers offered more features to help organizations meet these goals than the comparable Supermicro management products.
Increase security, sustainability, and efficiency with robust Dell server man...Principled Technologies
Compared to the Supermicro management portfolio
Conclusion
Choosing a vendor for server purchases is about more than just the hardware platform. Decision-makers must also consider more long-term concerns, including system/data security, energy efficiency, and ease of management. These concerns make the systems management tools a vendor offers as important as the hardware.
We investigated the features and capabilities of server management tools from Dell and Supermicro, comparing Dell iDRAC9 against Supermicro IPMI for embedded server management and Dell OpenManage Enterprise and CloudIQ against Supermicro Server Manager for one-to-many device and console management and monitoring. We found that the Dell management tools provided more comprehensive security, sustainability, and management/monitoring features and capabilities than Supermicro servers did. In addition, Dell tools automated more tasks to ease server management, resulting in significant time savings for administrators versus having to do the same tasks manually with Supermicro tools.
When making a server purchase, a vendor’s associated management products are critical to protect data, support a more sustainable environment, and to ease the maintenance of systems. Our tests and research showed that the Dell management portfolio for PowerEdge servers offered more features to help organizations meet these goals than the comparable Supermicro management products.
Scale up your storage with higher-performing Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS ...Principled Technologies
In our tests, Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS outperformed similarly configured solutions from Vendor A, achieving more IOPS, better throughput, and more consistent performance on both NVMe-supported configurations and configurations backed by Elastic Block Store (EBS) alone.
Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS supports a full NVMe backed configuration, but Vendor A doesn’t—its solution uses EBS for storage capacity and NVMe as an extended read cache—which means APEX Block Storage for AWS can deliver faster storage performance.
Scale up your storage with higher-performing Dell APEX Block Storage for AWSPrincipled Technologies
Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS offered stronger and more consistent storage performance for better business agility than a Vendor A solution
Conclusion
Enterprises desiring the flexibility and convenience of the cloud for their block storage workloads can find fast-performing solutions with the enterprise storage features they’re used to in on-premises infrastructure by selecting Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS.
Our hands-on tests showed that compared to the Vendor A solution, Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS offered stronger, more consistent storage performance in both NVMe-supported and EBS-backed configurations. Using NVMe-supported configurations, Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS achieved 4.7x the random read IOPS and 5.1x the throughput on sequential read operations per node vs. Vendor A. In our EBS-backed comparison, Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS offered 2.2x the throughput per node on sequential read operations vs. Vendor A.
Plus, the ability to scale beyond three nodes—up to 512 storage nodes with capacity of up to 8 PBs—enables Dell APEX Block Storage for AWS to help ensure performance and capacity as your team plans for the future.
Get in and stay in the productivity zone with the HP Z2 G9 Tower WorkstationPrincipled Technologies
We compared CPU performance and noise output of an HP Z2 G9 Tower Workstation in High Performance Mode to Dell Precision 3660 and 5860 tower workstations in optimized performance modes
Conclusion
HP Z2 G9 Tower Workstation users can change the BIOS settings to dial in the performance mode that best suits their needs: High Performance Mode, Performance Mode, or Quiet Mode. In good
news for both creative and technical professionals, we found that an Intel Core i9-13900 processor-powered HP Z2 G9 Tower Workstation set to High Performance mode received higher CPU-based benchmark scores than both a similarly configured Dell Precision 3660 and a Dell Precision 5860 equipped with an Intel Xeon w5-2455x processor. Plus, the HP Z2 G9 Tower Workstation was quieter while running CPU-intensive Cinebench 2024 and SPECapc for Solidworks 2022 workloads than both Dell Precision tower workstations. This means HP Z2 G9 Tower Workstation users who prize performance over everything else can do so without sacrificing a quiet workspace.
Open up new possibilities with higher transactional database performance from...Principled Technologies
In our PostgreSQL tests, R7i instances boosted performance over R6i instances with previous-gen processors
If you use the open-source PostgreSQL database to run your critical business operations, you have many cloud options from which to choose. While many of these instances can do the job, some can deliver stronger performance, which can mean getting a greater return on your cloud investment.
We conducted hands-on testing with the HammerDB TPROC-C benchmark to see how the PostgreSQL performance of Amazon EC2 R7i instances, enabled by 4th Gen Intel Xeon Scalable processors, stacked up to that of R6i instances with previous-generation processors. We learned that small, medium-sized, and large R7i instances with the newer processors delivered better OLTP performance, with improvements as high as 13.8 percent. By choosing the R7i instances, your organization has the potential to support more users, deliver a better experience to those users, and even lower your cloud operating expenditures by requiring fewer instances to get the job done.
Unlocking Productivity: Leveraging the Potential of Copilot in Microsoft 365, a presentation by Christoforos Vlachos, Senior Solutions Manager – Modern Workplace, Uni Systems
Observability Concepts EVERY Developer Should Know -- DeveloperWeek Europe.pdfPaige Cruz
Monitoring and observability aren’t traditionally found in software curriculums and many of us cobble this knowledge together from whatever vendor or ecosystem we were first introduced to and whatever is a part of your current company’s observability stack.
While the dev and ops silo continues to crumble….many organizations still relegate monitoring & observability as the purview of ops, infra and SRE teams. This is a mistake - achieving a highly observable system requires collaboration up and down the stack.
I, a former op, would like to extend an invitation to all application developers to join the observability party will share these foundational concepts to build on:
Pushing the limits of ePRTC: 100ns holdover for 100 daysAdtran
At WSTS 2024, Alon Stern explored the topic of parametric holdover and explained how recent research findings can be implemented in real-world PNT networks to achieve 100 nanoseconds of accuracy for up to 100 days.
GraphSummit Singapore | The Art of the Possible with Graph - Q2 2024Neo4j
Neha Bajwa, Vice President of Product Marketing, Neo4j
Join us as we explore breakthrough innovations enabled by interconnected data and AI. Discover firsthand how organizations use relationships in data to uncover contextual insights and solve our most pressing challenges – from optimizing supply chains, detecting fraud, and improving customer experiences to accelerating drug discoveries.
Encryption in Microsoft 365 - ExpertsLive Netherlands 2024Albert Hoitingh
In this session I delve into the encryption technology used in Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Purview. Including the concepts of Customer Key and Double Key Encryption.
“An Outlook of the Ongoing and Future Relationship between Blockchain Technologies and Process-aware Information Systems.” Invited talk at the joint workshop on Blockchain for Information Systems (BC4IS) and Blockchain for Trusted Data Sharing (B4TDS), co-located with with the 36th International Conference on Advanced Information Systems Engineering (CAiSE), 3 June 2024, Limassol, Cyprus.
Sudheer Mechineni, Head of Application Frameworks, Standard Chartered Bank
Discover how Standard Chartered Bank harnessed the power of Neo4j to transform complex data access challenges into a dynamic, scalable graph database solution. This keynote will cover their journey from initial adoption to deploying a fully automated, enterprise-grade causal cluster, highlighting key strategies for modelling organisational changes and ensuring robust disaster recovery. Learn how these innovations have not only enhanced Standard Chartered Bank’s data infrastructure but also positioned them as pioneers in the banking sector’s adoption of graph technology.
LF Energy Webinar: Electrical Grid Modelling and Simulation Through PowSyBl -...DanBrown980551
Do you want to learn how to model and simulate an electrical network from scratch in under an hour?
Then welcome to this PowSyBl workshop, hosted by Rte, the French Transmission System Operator (TSO)!
During the webinar, you will discover the PowSyBl ecosystem as well as handle and study an electrical network through an interactive Python notebook.
PowSyBl is an open source project hosted by LF Energy, which offers a comprehensive set of features for electrical grid modelling and simulation. Among other advanced features, PowSyBl provides:
- A fully editable and extendable library for grid component modelling;
- Visualization tools to display your network;
- Grid simulation tools, such as power flows, security analyses (with or without remedial actions) and sensitivity analyses;
The framework is mostly written in Java, with a Python binding so that Python developers can access PowSyBl functionalities as well.
What you will learn during the webinar:
- For beginners: discover PowSyBl's functionalities through a quick general presentation and the notebook, without needing any expert coding skills;
- For advanced developers: master the skills to efficiently apply PowSyBl functionalities to your real-world scenarios.
Climate Impact of Software Testing at Nordic Testing DaysKari Kakkonen
My slides at Nordic Testing Days 6.6.2024
Climate impact / sustainability of software testing discussed on the talk. ICT and testing must carry their part of global responsibility to help with the climat warming. We can minimize the carbon footprint but we can also have a carbon handprint, a positive impact on the climate. Quality characteristics can be added with sustainability, and then measured continuously. Test environments can be used less, and in smaller scale and on demand. Test techniques can be used in optimizing or minimizing number of tests. Test automation can be used to speed up testing.
zkStudyClub - Reef: Fast Succinct Non-Interactive Zero-Knowledge Regex ProofsAlex Pruden
This paper presents Reef, a system for generating publicly verifiable succinct non-interactive zero-knowledge proofs that a committed document matches or does not match a regular expression. We describe applications such as proving the strength of passwords, the provenance of email despite redactions, the validity of oblivious DNS queries, and the existence of mutations in DNA. Reef supports the Perl Compatible Regular Expression syntax, including wildcards, alternation, ranges, capture groups, Kleene star, negations, and lookarounds. Reef introduces a new type of automata, Skipping Alternating Finite Automata (SAFA), that skips irrelevant parts of a document when producing proofs without undermining soundness, and instantiates SAFA with a lookup argument. Our experimental evaluation confirms that Reef can generate proofs for documents with 32M characters; the proofs are small and cheap to verify (under a second).
Paper: https://eprint.iacr.org/2023/1886
Dr. Sean Tan, Head of Data Science, Changi Airport Group
Discover how Changi Airport Group (CAG) leverages graph technologies and generative AI to revolutionize their search capabilities. This session delves into the unique search needs of CAG’s diverse passengers and customers, showcasing how graph data structures enhance the accuracy and relevance of AI-generated search results, mitigating the risk of “hallucinations” and improving the overall customer journey.
GridMate - End to end testing is a critical piece to ensure quality and avoid...ThomasParaiso2
End to end testing is a critical piece to ensure quality and avoid regressions. In this session, we share our journey building an E2E testing pipeline for GridMate components (LWC and Aura) using Cypress, JSForce, FakerJS…
Enchancing adoption of Open Source Libraries. A case study on Albumentations.AIVladimir Iglovikov, Ph.D.
Presented by Vladimir Iglovikov:
- https://www.linkedin.com/in/iglovikov/
- https://x.com/viglovikov
- https://www.instagram.com/ternaus/
This presentation delves into the journey of Albumentations.ai, a highly successful open-source library for data augmentation.
Created out of a necessity for superior performance in Kaggle competitions, Albumentations has grown to become a widely used tool among data scientists and machine learning practitioners.
This case study covers various aspects, including:
People: The contributors and community that have supported Albumentations.
Metrics: The success indicators such as downloads, daily active users, GitHub stars, and financial contributions.
Challenges: The hurdles in monetizing open-source projects and measuring user engagement.
Development Practices: Best practices for creating, maintaining, and scaling open-source libraries, including code hygiene, CI/CD, and fast iteration.
Community Building: Strategies for making adoption easy, iterating quickly, and fostering a vibrant, engaged community.
Marketing: Both online and offline marketing tactics, focusing on real, impactful interactions and collaborations.
Mental Health: Maintaining balance and not feeling pressured by user demands.
Key insights include the importance of automation, making the adoption process seamless, and leveraging offline interactions for marketing. The presentation also emphasizes the need for continuous small improvements and building a friendly, inclusive community that contributes to the project's growth.
Vladimir Iglovikov brings his extensive experience as a Kaggle Grandmaster, ex-Staff ML Engineer at Lyft, sharing valuable lessons and practical advice for anyone looking to enhance the adoption of their open-source projects.
Explore more about Albumentations and join the community at:
GitHub: https://github.com/albumentations-team/albumentations
Website: https://albumentations.ai/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/100504475
Twitter: https://x.com/albumentations
In his public lecture, Christian Timmerer provides insights into the fascinating history of video streaming, starting from its humble beginnings before YouTube to the groundbreaking technologies that now dominate platforms like Netflix and ORF ON. Timmerer also presents provocative contributions of his own that have significantly influenced the industry. He concludes by looking at future challenges and invites the audience to join in a discussion.
SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930 QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage SC9000 all-flash array
1. JULY 2016
A PRINCIPLED TECHNOLOGIES TEST REPORT
Commissioned by Dell, Inc.
SQL SERVER 2016 DATABASE PERFORMANCE ON THE DELL POWEREDGE R930 WITH QLOGIC
16G FIBRE CHANNEL WITH STORFUSION TECHNOLOGY AND DELL STORAGE SC9000 ALL-FLASH
ARRAY
Is your company still using SQL Server 2005? If so, you likely need to migrate in
response to Microsoft’s discontinued extended support for that version in April 2016. If
your databases are running on older servers, upgrading your hardware at the same time
you move to a newer version of SQL Server is a smart move.
In the Principled Technologies datacenter, we found that running SQL Server
2016 in a modern Dell environment—a PowerEdge R930 server, powered by Intel Xeon
E7-8860 v4 processors, QLogic® QLE2692 16Gb Fibre Channel (FC) adapter with
StorFusion Technology, and Dell SC9000 all-flash storage—achieved more than six times
the database work of an older HP ProLiant DL580 G7 server with legacy HDD SAN
storage, while delivering a storage response time of less than 1 millisecond.
Being able to consolidate existing work onto fewer servers is essential to making
your datacenter more efficient.
2. A Principled Technologies test report 2SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
DELL MODERN ENVIRONMENT DELIVERS
Moving from large numbers of older servers using HDD storage arrays to fewer,
more powerful servers that leverage the advantages of all-flash storage is an excellent
way to modernize your datacenter. As you streamline your hardware, your company
could realize benefits in many areas. Some possible benefits include less physical space
needed, lowered power and cooling expenses, a lightened burden on IT admins who
have fewer servers to manage, and the potential for fewer costly software licenses.
For companies migrating their database workloads to SQL Server 2016 and
considering new servers to maximize the value of the move, the Dell PowerEdge R930 is
an excellent option. SQL Server 2016 features OS-maximum cores and memory as well
as in-memory OLTP, meaning that it is well poised to take advantage of the vast
resource pools new servers offer. The Dell PowerEdge R930 is a 4U, four-socket server
that features Intel Xeon processors E7-8860 v4, provides up to 96 cores and 192
threads, and supports up to 12 TB of DDR4 RAM, making it a perfect candidate to
provide large amounts of CPU and memory resources to SQL Server 2016 applications.
The all-flash Dell Storage SC9000 array, geared toward large-scale storage, high-
end workloads, and distributed enterprise environments, also helps speed up your SQL
Server applications by offering 16Gb Fibre Channel, 12Gb SAS, and hardware
redundancy to keep your data moving quickly and safely.
To quantify the benefits a company running SQL Server 2005 workloads on an
older server with HDD storage could experience by upgrading to SQL Server 2016 on the
modern PowerEdge R930-SC9000 platform, we set up virtual machines in both
environments and ran an online transaction processing (OLTP) workload. Figure 1
illustrates our test environment.
Figure 1: Our testbed.
3. A Principled Technologies test report 3SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
Our legacy environment, a 2010 HP ProLiant DL580 G7 using HDD-based storage
from 2012, ran 12 VMs, each handling an average of 9,159 orders per minute in our test
configuration. We configured the modern Dell environment to run 24 VMs, each
handling an average of 30,296 orders per minute. That’s twice as many VMs, each doing
more than three times the work than the original VMs. As Figure 2 illustrates, that
translates to 6.6 times the work that Dell PowerEdge R930 and Dell Storage SC9000
array could accomplish together.
Figure 2: The 24 SQL Server 2016 VMs running on the Dell modern environment performed more than 6 times the
work of the 12 SQL Server 2005 VMs running on the legacy environment.
For more information on components used in our testing, see Appendix A. For
detailed hardware configuration information, see Appendix B. For details on our test
procedure, see Appendix C.
OUR RESULTS IN DETAIL
On both the Dell PowerEdge R930 and legacy environments, we sized our VMs
to utilize the full amount of RAM each server offered. Each legacy VM had four vCPUs,
9,728 MB of RAM, and a 20GB SQL 2005 database. Each of the R930’s VMs had four
vCPUs, 9,216 MB of RAM, and a 20GB SQL 2016 database. The Dell PowerEdge R930
environment was able to support 24 VMs and the legacy environment was able to
support only 12 in this configuration.
Figure 3 shows the median number of orders per minute that the two solutions
were able to process in our testing. As it shows, each of the 24 VMs on the Dell solution
achieved more than three times as many orders per minute than each of the 12 legacy
VMs did, resulting in an overall difference of greater than six times the output on the
Dell solution.
4. A Principled Technologies test report 4SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
Dell PowerEdge R930 with Dell
Storage SC9000 array (SQL Server 2016)
HP ProLiant DL580 G7
with legacy HDD storage (SQL Server 2005)
VM 1 30,651 9,102
VM 2 30,882 9,125
VM 3 30,290 9,210
VM 4 29,967 9,065
VM 5 31,158 9,208
VM 6 29,366 9,080
VM 7 31,104 9,200
VM 8 29,559 9,215
VM 9 31,509 9,189
VM 10 29,476 9,094
VM 11 31,303 9,243
VM 12 29,804 9,177
VM 13 30,142
VM 14 29,889
VM 15 30,344
VM 16 30,455
VM 17 29,220
VM 18 29,409
VM 19 30,577
VM 20 29,701
VM 21 29,930
VM 22 30,864
VM 23 30,425
VM 24 31,082
Total 727,107 109,908
Figure 3: The 24 SQL Server 2016 VMs running on the Dell modern environment delivered more than 6 times the work of the
12 SQL Server 2005 VMs running on the legacy environment.
One of the most crucial metrics for determining consistent, fast database
performance is latency. In our tests, the applications running on the SC9000 storage
array were able to support over 700,000 orders per minute due, in part, to the fast
response times at the disk level. According to the esxtop data captured during the run,
the device latency on the SC9000 stayed below 1ms for the duration of the run. VMware
guidelines recommend that device latency be less than 20ms for best performance.
5. A Principled Technologies test report 5SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
CONCLUSION
As support ends for aging software and applications, such as SQL Server 2005,
migrating to a new, updated version is inevitable and necessary. This migration presents
a unique opportunity to upgrade the hardware running these applications, too—a real
change to your datacenter.
In our test, the modern four-socket Dell PowerEdge R930 powered by Intel Xeon
E7-8860 v4 processors working with the powerful Dell Storage SC9000 array and running
SQL Server 2016 got over six times the database performance of a legacy solution
running SQL Server 2005. The modern PowerEdge solution also delivered a faster
response time.
As you move to a more modern, fully featured database software, why not also
move to a powerful, modern server hardware solution as well? Consolidating your SQL
Server workloads from legacy servers onto Dell PowerEdge R930 servers powered by
Intel Xeon E7 v4 processors can let you do more with less, streamline your datacenter,
and reduce costs.
6. A Principled Technologies test report 6SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
APPENDIX A – ABOUT THE COMPONENTS
About the Dell PowerEdge R930
The Dell PowerEdge R930 is a 4U, four-socket server that features the latest from the Intel Xeon processor E7
series. It is a versatile system designed to handle demanding workloads such as large-scale virtualization and massive
databases— workloads that are becoming increasingly important for the day-to-day operations of enterprise
organizations.
Under the hood, the R930 boasts a bevy of high-class specifications that make it a powerful tool for the modern
datacenter. These specifications include:
96 DIMM slots—The ample number of slots help leverage cost with performance and capacity needs. It
accommodates a larger memory footprint which can be configured with smaller-capacity DIMMs for
potential cost-efficiency, or can support up to 6 TB for more memory- intensive use cases.
24 drive bays, configurable with a mix of SAS/SATA HDDs and SSDs as well as optional NVMe PCIe® SSDs
for expanded storage capabilities. Two chassis configurations—one with 24 HDD/SSD drive bays, and
one with 16 HDD/SSD drive bays and 8 PCIe SSD drive bays—allow you to configure the PowerEdge R930
however your business needs.
Optional NVMe PCIe SSD drives for data that requires the fastest- available I/O throughput.
To learn more about the Dell PowerEdge R930, visit www.dell.com/us/business/p/poweredge-r930/pd.
About the new Intel Xeon E7 v4 processor family
Intel designed the new Intel Xeon E7 v4 processor family to support demanding enterprise workloads—
particularly analytics workloads—by featuring up to 24 cores and 48 threads per socket to offer strong performance and
scalability. The Intel Xeon E7 v4 processor family supports up to 24TB DDR4 3DS LRDIMM memory per eight-socket
server, which, according to Intel, can provide flexibility and room to grow.
The Intel Xeon E7 v4 processor family supports all the previous reliability, availability, and serviceability features
of previous processor releases to support critical workloads. This processor family also includes a new version of Intel®
Run Sure Technology with more features, as well as other new security, virtualization, and orchestration features. For
more information about the Intel Xeon E7 v4 processor product family, visit www.intel.com.
About the Dell SC9000 storage array
Dell designed the SC9000 as an ideal solution for large-scale storage, high-end workloads, and distributed
enterprise environments. According to Dell, this latest flagship array offers all the capabilities of the SC Series line in a
fully upgraded, more scalable system leveraging the Dell 13G server platform.
16Gb Fibre Channel capability provides a massive network pipe for achieving the throughput needed to
take full advantage of the all-flash performance.
Quick, modular expansion to over 3PB raw SAN and/or NAS storage capacity per array, and the ability to
be interconnected with other SC Series arrays in larger federated systems under unified management.
Superior flash and hybrid performance. Comprehensive SSD integration plus a wide range of HDDs and
ultra-dense enclosures provide flexible performance.
7. A Principled Technologies test report 7SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
Always available storage with automated cost savings. Ideal for private cloud deployments, the SC Series
Live Volume feature now offers seamless disaster recovery with transparent auto-failover to fully
synchronized backup volumes on another SC series array.
Live Volume with auto-failover keeps workloads running continuously during unplanned outages and
repairs your high-availability environment automatically when an array comes back online. No extra
hardware or software is required.
Application Protection Manager Suite ensures server-side data integrity in Oracle, VMware and
Microsoft database environments. Optional FIPS-certified self-encrypting SSDs and HDDs protect against
data theft, loss or unauthorized access.
Built-in efficiencies include new block-level compression on all-flash arrays and pervasive “thin”
methods. Patented auto-tiering leverages the best attributes of diverse drive types to optimize your
data throughout its lifecycle.
Redundant, hot-swappable components make the SC9000 a resilient, easy-to-deploy and highly
available solution. Add capacity quickly with any of five supported expansion enclosures. Customize I/O
connections to multiprotocol SANs (FC, iSCSI and FCoE) and support file storage from the same pool via
the optional FS8600 NAS appliance.
Learn more at www.dell.com/us/business/p/storage-sc9000/pd
About the QLogic QLE269X series of FC adapters
QLogic provides Dell customers with future-ready I/O connectivity. According to QLogic, the QLE269x single and
dual-port 16Gb Fibre Channel host bus adapters (HBAs) boast industry-leading native FC performance with extremely
low CPU usage with full hardware offloads, and include the following advanced features:
Enhanced reliability, diagnostics, and accelerated deployment powered by StorFusion technology
Up to 1.3 million IOPS to fuel high performance in all-flash arrays and high-density virtualized
environments
Port isolation design that offers deterministic and scalable performance on each port
Learn more at www.qlogic.com/go/dell
About Microsoft SQL Server 2016
According to Microsoft, “SQL Server 2016 is the biggest leap forward in Microsoft data platform history. Gain
real time insights across your transactional and analytical data with a scalable database platform that has everything
built in, from unparalleled in-memory performance, new security innovations and high availability, to advanced analytics
that make mission-critical applications intelligent.”
Learn more at https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/server-cloud/products/sql-server/
About DVD Store Version 2.1
To create our real-world ecommerce workload, we used the DVD Store Version 2.1 benchmarking tool. DS2
models an online DVD store, where customers log in, search for movies, and make purchases. DS2 reports these actions
in orders per minute that the system could handle, to show what kind of performance you could expect for your
8. A Principled Technologies test report 8SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
customers. The DS2 workload also performs other actions, such as adding new customers, to exercise the wide range of
database functions you would need to run your ecommerce environment.
For more details about the DS2 tool, see www.delltechcenter.com/page/DVD+Store. To download DS2, go to
https://github.com/dvdstore.
9. A Principled Technologies test report 9SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
APPENDIX B – SYSTEM CONFIGURATION INFORMATION
Figures 4 and 5 provide detailed configuration information for the test systems. Figures 6 and 7 provide detailed
configuration information for the storage array.
System Dell PowerEdge R930
General
Number of processor packages 4
Number of cores per processor 18
Number of hardware threads per core 2
System power management policy Performance
CPU
Vendor Intel
Name Xeon
Model number E7-8860 v4
Socket type FCLGA2011
Core frequency (GHz) 2.20
Bus frequency 3x 9.6 GT/s
L1 cache 32KB + 32KB (per core)
L2 cache 256KB (per core)
L3 cache 45MB
Platform
Vendor and model number Dell PowerEdge R930
Motherboard model number 0Y4CNCX19
BIOS version 2.0.1
Integrated LOM Intel I350-t 4P Gigabit
Memory module(s)
Total RAM in system (GB) 256
Vendor and model number Samsung® M393A2K43BB1-CRC
Type PC4-19200
Speed (MHz) 2,400
Speed running in the system (MHz) 2,400
Size (GB) 16GB
Number of RAM module(s) 16
Chip organization Double-sided
Rank Dual
Fibre Channel adapter
Vendor and model number QLogic QLE2692 FC Adapter with StorFusion Technology
Number of ports 2
Speed 16G
RAID controller
Vendor and model number PERC H730P
Firmware version 25.2.2-0004
10. A Principled Technologies test report 10SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
System Dell PowerEdge R930
Firmware
Lifecycle Controller / iDRAC 2.13.13.10
Driver Pack 7.3.2.1
Figure 4: Configuration information for the Dell PowerEdge R930.
System HP ProLiant DL580 G7
General
Number of processor packages 4
Number of cores per processor 10
Number of hardware threads per core 2
System power management policy Performance
CPU
Vendor Intel
Name Xeon
Model number E7-4870
Socket type LGA1567
Core frequency (GHz) 2.40
Bus frequency 6.4 GT/s
L1 cache 32KB + 32KB (per core)
L2 cache 256KB (per core)
L3 cache 30MB
Platform
Vendor and model number HP ProLiant DL580 G7
Motherboard model number 583367-001
BIOS version P65
Integrated LOM HP NC375i 4P Gigabit
Memory module(s)
Total RAM in system (GB) 128GB
Vendor and model number Samsung M393B2K70CM0
Type PC3-8500
Speed (MHz) 1,066
Speed running in the system (MHz) 1,066
Size (GB) 16GB
Number of RAM module(s) 8
Chip organization Double-sided
Rank Dual
RAID controller
Vendor and model number Smart Array P410i
Firmware version V6.6.0
Figure 5: Configuration information for the legacy server.
11. A Principled Technologies test report 11SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
Storage array Dell Storage SC9000
Vendor and model number Dell Storage SC9000
OS version Storage Center 6.7.5
Connection type Fibre Channel 16Gb
Number of Fibre Channel cards 1 per controller (2 total)
Fibre Channel card model QLogic® QLE2662 16G Fibre Channel Adapter
Number of SAS cards 1 per controller (2 total)
SAS card model SAS9300-8E 12G SAS Dual-Ext Port Adapter
Number of expansion enclosures 1
Expansion enclosure model number SC420
Number of disks per shelf 24
Type of disk SSD
Disk capacity 400 GB
Volumes 1
Disks per volume 24
RAID level 10
Figure 6: Configuration information for the Dell Storage SC9000 storage array.
Storage array Legacy SAN
Connection type Fibre Channel 8Gb
Number of Fibre Channel cards 1
Number of SAS cards 1 per controller (2 total)
Number of expansion enclosures 1
Number of disks per shelf 24
Type of disk HDD 15k
Disk capacity 600 GB
Aggregates 1
Disks per aggregate 24
Volumes 3 (OS, data, and logs)
RAID level Dual Parity
Figure 7: Configuration information for the legacy storage system.
12. A Principled Technologies test report 12SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
APPENDIX C – HOW WE TESTED
Note: On May 30, 2016, we finalized the hardware and software configurations we tested. Updates for current and
recently released hardware and software appear often, so unavoidably these configurations may not represent the
latest versions available when this report appears. For older systems, we chose configurations representative of typical
purchases of those systems. We concluded hands-on testing on June 14, 2016.
Installing VMware vSphere onto the servers
Before installing VMware vSphere, we set the System Profile to Performance on both servers. We installed the
VMware vSphere 6.0 U2 hypervisor onto the servers’ local hard drives, which we placed in a RAID1 pair.
1. Insert the VMware vSphere 6.0 U2 installation media into the optical drive.
2. Boot the server to the VMware vSphere installer.
3. To begin the installation wizard, press F11.
4. As the installation location, select the RAID1 pair.
5. As the keyboard type and language, select US English.
6. Enter the root password for the host.
7. To start the installation, press Enter.
8. When the installation completes, to reboot the host, press Enter.
9. After the host reboots, set the management network IP address.
10. Add the host to vCenter, and enable SSH and ESXi shell.
Configuring the Fibre Channel networking
We used a Brocade 6505 16Gb Fibre Channel top-of-rack switch for the storage network. We left the switch
ports at factory settings and created zones for traffic isolation.
Configuring zoning on the Brocade M6505 switch
1. In a web browser, connect to the Brocade M6505 switch, and log in as the admin user.
2. Click Configure→Zone Admin.
3. In the Zone tab, create the following zones:
a. All visible physical ports on the SC9000
b. All visible virtual ports on the SC9000
c. Server Port 1 and all four visible virtual ports
i. Repeat Step C for remaining server ports.
4. In the Zone Config tab, click New Zone Config, and give it a name.
5. Add the newly created Zones to the Zone Config.
6. Click Save Config.
7. Click Enable Config.
8. Repeat the zoning process for the legacy server, creating one zone for all Fibre Channel ports associated
with the legacy environment.
13. A Principled Technologies test report 13SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
Configuring the storage
After initial cabling and configuration of the Dell Storage SC9000, we disabled the read and write cache and
created a single large volume for the VMDKs. On the legacy storage, we created separate volumes for OS, Data, and Log
VMDKs.
Creating a server cluster and connecting the volumes
1. In a web browser, connect to the Storage Center virtual IP address, and log in as the Admin user.
2. Click Storage Management→Servers→Create Server. Select the four HBA WWNs that correspond to the Dell
PowerEdge R930. Give the server a name, and click Continue.
3. Click Storage Management→Servers→Create Server Cluster. Click Add Existing Servers to Cluster. Select all
servers, and click Continue.
4. Click Storage Management→Volumes→Create Volume. When prompted to specify a size for the volume,
select Use All Space.
5. Click Storage Management→Volume→Map volume to server. Select the volume, and click Continue. Select
the server cluster, and click Continue.
6. Using VMware vCenter, ensure that the volume is showing as connected to the server. Rebooting the
servers and chassis may be necessary to propagate all changes.
Creating the workload virtual machines
We created and cloned out 12 Windows Server 2008 R2 VMs on the legacy environment, and 24 Windows
Server 2012 R2 VMs on the Dell PowerEdge R930 environment. We installed SQL Server 2005 on the legacy VMs and SQL
Server 2016 on the Dell PowerEdge R930 VMs. All VMs had the same virtual hardware specifications, with the exception
of VM memory. The legacy VMs had slightly more memory assigned to each VM in order to fully utilize the host
memory.
Creating the base VM
1. In VMware vCenter, navigate to Virtual Machines.
2. Click the icon to create a new VM.
3. Leave Create a new virtual machine selected, and click Next.
4. Enter a name for the virtual machine, and click Next.
5. Place the VM on a host with available CPUs, and click Next.
6. Select the Dell Storage SC9000 datastore for the 60GB OS VMDK, and click next.
7. Click Next.
8. Select the guest OS as Windows Server 2012 R2 for the Dell PowerEdge R930 environment, and Windows
Server 2008 R2 for the legacy environment, and click Next.
9. In the Customize Hardware section, make the following changes:
a. Increase the vCPUs to 4.
b. Increase the VM memory to 9,216 MB on the Dell PowerEdge R930 environment, and to 9,728 MB
on the legacy environment, in order to fully utilize the host memory.
c. Add a 100GB VMDK for SQL data, and select the VMware Paravirtual controller and Thick
Provisioned Eager Zeroed.
14. A Principled Technologies test report 14SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
d. Add a 20GB VMDK for SQL logs, and select the VMware Paravirtual controller and Thick Provisioned
Eager Zeroed. Place the VMDK in the LOGS datastore.
10. Connect the VM to the test network.
11. Click Next.
12. Click Finish.
13. Follow the instructions below to install the guest OS.
Installing Windows Server 2012 R2 onto the Dell PowerEdge R930 VMs
1. Attach the Windows Server 2012 R2 ISO to the virtual machine.
2. Open the VM console, and start the VM.
3. When prompted to boot from DVD, press any key.
4. When the installation screen appears, leave language, time/currency format, and input method as default,
and click Next.
5. Click Install now.
6. When the installation prompts you, enter the product key.
7. Select Windows Server 2012 Datacenter Edition (Server with a GUI), and click Next.
8. Check I accept the license terms, and click Next.
9. Click Custom: Install Windows only (advanced).
10. Select Drive 0 Unallocated Space, and click Next. This starts Windows automatically, and Windows will
restart automatically after completing.
11. When the Settings page appears, fill in the Password and Reenter Password fields with the same password.
12. Log in with the password you set up previously.
Installing .NET Framework 3.5
1. In the VM, open Server Manager.
2. Click Manage→Add Roles and Features.
3. Select Role-based or feature-based installation, and click Next.
4. Under Server pool, select the local server, and click Next. Click Next.
5. Under Features, select .NET Framework 3.5 Features, and click Next.
6. Click Install.
7. Upon completion, click Close.
Installing SQL Server 2016
1. Attach the installation media ISO for SQL Server 2016 to the VM.
2. Click Run SETUP.EXE. If Autoplay does not begin the installation, navigate to the SQL Server 2016 DVD, and
double-click it.
3. In the left pane, click Installation.
4. Click New SQL Server stand-alone installation or add features to an existing installation.
5. To accept the license terms, click the checkbox, and click Next.
6. Click Use Microsoft Update to check for updates, and click Next.
7. To install the setup support files, click Install.
15. A Principled Technologies test report 15SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
8. If there are no failures displayed, click Next.
9. At the Setup Role screen, choose SQL Server Feature Installation, and click Next.
10. At the Feature Selection screen, select Database Engine Services, Full-Text and Semantic Extractions for
Search, Client Tools Connectivity, Client Tools Backwards Compatibility, Management Tools – Basic, and
Management Tools – Complete.
11. Click Next.
12. At the Instance configuration screen, leave the default selection of default instance, and click Next.
13. At the Database Engine Configuration screen, select the authentication method you prefer. For our testing
purposes, we selected Mixed Mode.
14. Enter and confirm a password for the system administrator account.
15. Click Add Current user. This may take several seconds.
16. Click Next.
17. At the Error and usage reporting screen, click Next.
18. At the Installation Configuration Rules screen, check that there are no failures or relevant warnings, and click
Next.
19. At the Ready to Install screen, click Install.
20. Close the installation window.
Installing Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard Edition on the legacy VMs
1. Attach the installation media ISO to the VM.
2. Open the VM console, and boot to the DVD.
3. At the Language Selection Screen, click Next.
4. Click Install Now.
5. Select Windows Server 2008 R2 Standard (Full Installation), and click Next.
6. Click the I accept the license terms check box, and click Next.
7. Click Custom.
8. Click Drive options (advanced).
9. Delete all partitions, if they exist.
10. Click New.
11. Click Apply.
12. Click Next.
13. At the User’s password must be changed before logging on warning screen, click OK.
14. As the new password in both fields, type Password1. To continue, click the arrow.
15. At the Your password has been changed screen, click OK.
Installing SQL Server 2005
1. Attach the installation media ISO to the VM.
2. Inside the VM, if AutoPlay does not begin the installation, navigate to the SQL Server 2005 DVD, and double-
click Autorun.
3. If prompted with a .NET installation prompt, to enable the .NET Framework Core role, click Yes.
16. A Principled Technologies test report 16SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
4. At the SQL Server Installation Center screen, click Installation.
5. Click New installation or add features to an existing installation.
6. At the Setup Support Rules screen, click OK.
7. At the Product Key screen, specify the free Enterprise edition evaluation, and click Next.
8. At the License Terms screen, accept the license terms, and click Next.
9. At the Setup Support Files screen, click Install.
10. At the Setup Support Rules screen, click Next.
11. At the Setup Role screen, choose SQL Server Feature Installation, and click Next.
12. At the SQL Server 2005 Feature Selection screen, select the following features: Database Engine Services,
Full-Text Search, Client Tools Connectivity, Client Tools Backwards Compatibility, Management Tools – Basic,
Management Tools – Complete. Click Next.
13. At the Installation Rules screen, click Next.
14. At the Instance Configuration screen, leave the defaults, and click Next.
15. At the Disk Space Requirements screen, click Next.
16. At the Server Configuration screen, choose the service account, fill in a password if necessary, and click Next.
17. At the Database Engine Configuration screen, select Mixed Mode, fill in a password for the system
administrator (sa) account, click Add Current User, and click Next.
18. At the Error Reporting screen, click Next.
19. At the Installation Configuration Rules screen, click Next.
20. At the Installation screen, click Install.
21. At the Complete screen, click Close.
Enabling Lock pages in memory
1. Inside the VM, click Start, type gpedit.msc, and press Enter.
2. In the Local Group Policy Editor, expand Computer Configuration→Windows Settings→Security
Settings→Local Policies.
3. Select User Rights Assignment, and in the right pane, scroll down to Lock pages in memory.
4. Right-click Lock pages in memory, and click Properties.
5. Click Add User or Group, and add your SQL user account.
6. Click OK.
7. Repeat steps 1-6 for the legacy base VM.
Configuring the DVD Store 2 benchmark
Data generation overview
We generated the data using the Install.pl script included with DVD Store version 2.1 (DS2), providing the
parameters for our 20GB database size and the Microsoft SQL Server 2016 platform. We ran the Install.pl script on a
utility system running Linux®. The Install.pl script also generated the database schema.
After processing the data generation, we transferred the data files and schema creation files to a Windows-
based system running SQL Server 2005. We built the 20GB database in SQL Server 2005, then performed a full backup,
storing the backup file on the C: drive for quick access. We used that backup file to restore the server between test runs.
17. A Principled Technologies test report 17SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
In the SQL Server 2005 database build, we did not include the WITH(FORCESEEK) clause in the BROWSE_BY_ACTOR and
BROWSE_BY_TITLE stored procedures, as the feature did not exist in SQL Server 2005. When we restored the backups
for use in SQL Server 2016, we added those clauses back to the stored procedures.
The only modification we made to the schema creation scripts were the specified file sizes for our database. We
explicitly set the file sizes higher than necessary to ensure that no file-growth activity would affect the outputs of the
test. Apart from this file size modification, we created and loaded the database schema according to the DVD Store
documentation. Specifically, we followed the steps below:
1. Generate the data and create the database and file structure using database creation scripts in the DS2
download. Make size modifications specific to 20GB database and the appropriate changes to drive letters.
2. Transfer the files from the Linux data generation system to a Windows system running SQL Server 2005.
3. Create database tables, stored procedures, and objects using the provided DVD Store scripts.
4. Set the database recovery model to bulk-logged to prevent excess logging.
5. Load the data you generated into the database. For data loading, use the import wizard in SQL Server
Management Studio. Where necessary, retain options from the original scripts, such as Enable Identity
Insert.
6. Create indices, full-text catalogs, primary keys, and foreign keys using the database-creation scripts.
7. Update statistics on each table according to database-creation scripts, which sample 18 percent of the table
data.
8. On the SQL Server instance, create a ds2user SQL Server login using the following Transact-SQL (T-SQL)
script:
USE [master]
GO
CREATE LOGIN [ds2user] WITH PASSWORD=N’’,
DEFAULT_DATABASE=[master],
DEFAULT_LANGUAGE=[us_english],
CHECK_EXPIRATION=OFF,
CHECK_POLICY=OFF
GO
9. Set the database recovery model back to full.
10. Create the necessary full text index using SQL Server Management Studio.
11. Create a database user and mapped this user to the SQL Server login.
12. Perform a full backup of the database. Note: This backup allowed us to restore the databases to a pristine
state relatively quickly between tests.
13. We used the backup created in Step 12 in the legacy environment, as SQL Server 2005 does not support
FORCESEEK. To enable FORCESEEK on the database used in the Dell PowerEdge R930 environment, we
restored the backup from Step 12 in a SQL Server 2016 instance. We then edited the stored procedures
BROWSE_BY_ACTOR and BROWSE_BY_TITLE to use FORCESEEK. We then made a new backup of the
database in SQL Server 2016.
18. A Principled Technologies test report 18SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
Figure 8 shows our initial file size modifications.
Logical name Filegroup Initial size (MB)
Database files
primary PRIMARY 4
cust1 DS_CUST_FG 8,500
cust2 DS_CUST_FG 8,500
ind1 DS_IND_FG 5,120
ind2 DS_IND_FG 5,120
ds_misc DS_MISC_FG 500
orders1 DS_ORDERS 4,015
orders2 DS_ORDERS 4,015
Log files
ds_log Not applicable 16,384
Figure 8: Our initial file size modifications.
Configuring the database workload client
For our testing, we used a virtual client for the Microsoft SQL Server client. To create this client, we installed
Windows Server 2008 R2, assigned a static IP address, and installed .NET 3.5.
Running the DVD Store tests
We created a series of batch files, SQL scripts, and shell scripts to automate the complete test cycle. DVD Store
outputs an orders-per-minute metric, which is a running average calculated through the test. In this report, we report
the last OPM that each client/target pair reported.
Each complete test cycle consisted of general steps:
1. Clean up prior outputs from the target system and the client driver system.
2. Drop the database from the target.
3. Restore the database on the target.
4. Shut down the target.
5. Reboot the host and client system.
6. Wait for a ping response from the server under test and the client system.
7. Let the test server idle for 10 minutes.
8. Start the DVD Store driver on the client.
We used the following DVD Store parameters for testing:
ds2sqlserverdriver.exe --target=<target_IP> --ramp_rate=10 --run_time=30 --
n_threads=32 --db_size=20GB --think_time=0 --detailed_view=Y --warmup_time=15 --
report_rate=1 --csv_output=<drive path>
19. A Principled Technologies test report 19SQL Server 2016 database performance on the Dell PowerEdge R930
QLogic 16G Fibre Channel with StorFusion Technology with Dell Storage
SC9000 all-flash array
ABOUT PRINCIPLED TECHNOLOGIES
Principled Technologies, Inc.
1007 Slater Road, Suite 300
Durham, NC, 27703
www.principledtechnologies.com
We provide industry-leading technology assessment and fact-based
marketing services. We bring to every assignment extensive experience
with and expertise in all aspects of technology testing and analysis, from
researching new technologies, to developing new methodologies, to
testing with existing and new tools.
When the assessment is complete, we know how to present the results to
a broad range of target audiences. We provide our clients with the
materials they need, from market-focused data to use in their own
collateral to custom sales aids, such as test reports, performance
assessments, and white papers. Every document reflects the results of
our trusted independent analysis.
We provide customized services that focus on our clients’ individual
requirements. Whether the technology involves hardware, software, Web
sites, or services, we offer the experience, expertise, and tools to help our
clients assess how it will fare against its competition, its performance, its
market readiness, and its quality and reliability.
Our founders, Mark L. Van Name and Bill Catchings, have worked
together in technology assessment for over 20 years. As journalists, they
published over a thousand articles on a wide array of technology subjects.
They created and led the Ziff-Davis Benchmark Operation, which
developed such industry-standard benchmarks as Ziff Davis Media’s
Winstone and WebBench. They founded and led eTesting Labs, and after
the acquisition of that company by Lionbridge Technologies were the
head and CTO of VeriTest.
Principled Technologies is a registered trademark of Principled Technologies, Inc.
All other product names are the trademarks of their respective owners.
Disclaimer of Warranties; Limitation of Liability:
PRINCIPLED TECHNOLOGIES, INC. HAS MADE REASONABLE EFFORTS TO ENSURE THE ACCURACY AND VALIDITY OF ITS TESTING, HOWEVER,
PRINCIPLED TECHNOLOGIES, INC. SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIMS ANY WARRANTY, EXPRESSED OR IMPLIED, RELATING TO THE TEST RESULTS AND
ANALYSIS, THEIR ACCURACY, COMPLETENESS OR QUALITY, INCLUDING ANY IMPLIED WARRANTY OF FITNESS FOR ANY PARTICULAR PURPOSE.
ALL PERSONS OR ENTITIES RELYING ON THE RESULTS OF ANY TESTING DO SO AT THEIR OWN RISK, AND AGREE THAT PRINCIPLED
TECHNOLOGIES, INC., ITS EMPLOYEES AND ITS SUBCONTRACTORS SHALL HAVE NO LIABILITY WHATSOEVER FROM ANY CLAIM OF LOSS OR
DAMAGE ON ACCOUNT OF ANY ALLEGED ERROR OR DEFECT IN ANY TESTING PROCEDURE OR RESULT.
IN NO EVENT SHALL PRINCIPLED TECHNOLOGIES, INC. BE LIABLE FOR INDIRECT, SPECIAL, INCIDENTAL, OR CONSEQUENTIAL DAMAGES IN
CONNECTION WITH ITS TESTING, EVEN IF ADVISED OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH DAMAGES. IN NO EVENT SHALL PRINCIPLED TECHNOLOGIES,
INC.’S LIABILITY, INCLUDING FOR DIRECT DAMAGES, EXCEED THE AMOUNTS PAID IN CONNECTION WITH PRINCIPLED TECHNOLOGIES, INC.’S
TESTING. CUSTOMER’S SOLE AND EXCLUSIVE REMEDIES ARE AS SET FORTH HEREIN.