SCPHCA SAN Presentation

Enterprise SAN Storage
Planning\Design Considerations
Availability
No Single Points of Failure

RAID Redundancy

Upgrades Expansions

Array Availability
Single Points of Failure
Dual PS
Dual HBA
MultiPath
Dual Switches
Active\Active or Active\Passive
Dual Storage Processors
Drive Shelves
Performance Considerations
Peak Workloads

Resource Allocation

IOPS Requirements

Protocol & Fabric
Enterprise Storage Design Considerations

Andy Patel, Stephen Balogh | HillSouth
RAID Redundancy
RAID Levels

Hot Spares

Rebuild Time\Impact

RAID design by Workload
Sizing
Platform Options

Misc. Considerations
Backup\DR
Upgrades\Expansion

Array Availability
Resource Allocation
Protocol & Fabric

Big Box
New Options
Software
VSAN
Licensed Features
Addon Capacity
Hardware Open\Proprietary
Fabric Options
Inclusive Pricing
N+1

Sync\Async

Restore Options

Standby: Identical\Low Performance?
How will IOPs be Distributed
VM to Datastore Distribution
Compliance
RDMs
Single VMFS per LUN
FC:
Lowest Host Overhead, SCSI data encapsulated into FC Frames
FCoE
: Requires 10Gb-e, Requires Jumbo Frames, no IP encapsulation = lower overhead
i
SCSI
: flexible, can cause additional host CPU overhead due to IP encapsulation, 1Gb or 10Gb-e
NFS
: don't do it
IOPs Distribution
VM\Datastore Distribuition
large IO equals low IOPs and high throughput

small IO equals high IOPs and low throughput
Compliance
Application
Availability: RDM
Physical\Virtual RDM's: Pros vs Cons
VMFS per LUN
Stick with single VMFS per LUN to avoid metadata locks.
Distribute and "Mix" High IO workloads with Low IO
Logical DataStore Seperation: Masking, Zoning, etc

Hardware Disk Encryption
File\Disk
Direct SAN Integration
Backup Window
Fabric
Replication\Offsite
Target Size\Throughput
Plan for Growth
Snaps, Swap, Logging
Thin\Thick - Pros & Cons
RAID by workload: dedicated\shared\RPM\Spindle Count
Availability
Performance Considerations
Sizing
Platform Options
Misc. Considerations
Backup\DR
Questions\Discussion
UPS: Stop IO and have Time to Commit Writes

Replication Bandwidth Requirements: On\Off Site, Sync vs. aSync, Array\Off Array Based, RPO & RTO

Advanced Technology: Caching, Auto\Sub-LUN Tiering, Storage IO Control: SIOC, vStorage API's for Array Integration: VAAI


Redundancy: Parity, HotSpares

Spindle Count: IOPs, Size, licensing impact

Workload Characteristics:
Read Heavy
Write Heavy: RAID 6 calculates
parity twice leading to a write
penalty
LUNs per Group\Workload per group
5 vs 6 vs 10; there's no place for 0.


Set Appropriate Queue Depth


Misc. Considerations: Queue Depth, BUS, IOPS
Misc. Considerations Contd.
Misc. Considerations: RAID.
Consider Impact on Consolidation Ratios

Too High can have a negative performance impact
System BUS
Ensure all host and storage node HBA are in the same lane PCI slots
IOPs
Sustained vs Burst requirements

Caching vs Actual


Misc. Considerations: Compliance
PCI, DIACAP, HIPPA/HHS, FISMA/NIST, SOC/COBIT
Physically Separate Compute Clusters
Lockdown Mode
Host Profiles
Dedicated Management Subnet
Logical Datastore Separation: masking\zoning
Seperate vSwitches
vLAN Pruning
Hardware Disk Encryption
Complete Role Based Access Control

Questions
Comments
Conversation
Corrections?
Andy Patel
CTO | HillSouth
andy@hillsouth.com

DR Connectivity & Automation
DNS - Internal
IP - External
Remote Access
VPN
BGP
Email
Failover\Failback
Seeding\re-Seeding
Backup Features
Agent\Agentless
Direct Guest\VM Integrated\SAN Integrated
VM Image\File Level
BareMetal Restore
Instant-On
Dedupe
WAN Replication
Staging
Encryption

Datacenter in a Box Solutions
Emerging Trends
Focus shifting from performance hardware to Software derived benefits

Commodity x86 Hardware gaining substantial market share in enterprise storage

SMB Friendly Price Points for enterprise features as these features become software driven and "baked in":

Migrations
VAAI
Backups with Direct SAN Integration
VMware Replication vs Array Based
Flexible RTO and RPO Planning
Lower HW Maintenance...
Perspective
Storage
Virtualization
Many of these features didn't exist a few years ago
Storage was about expensive Hardware requirements to meet demanding workloads
A few years ago key factors in the appeal to the small and mid-size organization was Resource Utilization\Consolidation Ratios, Redundancy, Replication and Deployment Time
It was still a substantial investment
Then
Now
Storage is infinitely more complex with attractive new features which dramatically reduce capital and operational expense for a scaled up, high Performance Infrastructure.
These same complexities and features often distract and deter the small environment (20-50 Server..ish).
At the leading edge of the Virtualization conversation today is All SSD Arrays, VDI, Multi-Tenancy, Self Service, Software Defined Networking, Unified Workspaces...
It's all sexy, and as many a men do I often find myself chasing complex and attractive features, even if I can't have them....
For Most Small and Medium Environments, if we stick to the original conversation about storage that performs and virtualization for consolidation, redundancy, replication and agility; a virtual environment with solid shared storage costs less than a classic physical deployment with countless additional benefits.
Can it sprawl out of control? Absolutely, if you chase complex and attractive. It can also be controlled if you stick to critical needs and actively manage capacity.
Stephen Balogh
Advanced Infrastructure Engineer | HillSouth
stephen@hillsouth.com