Flash Storage: Trust, But Verify

Flash Storage: Trust, But Verify

A better, vendor-independent

way to analyze flash performance

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

Leah Schoeb

Senior Partner at Evaluator Group

▸ Leah Schoeb brings expertise ranging from cloud

infrastructure and virtualization to system performance. Over 20 years of experience in the computer industry with performance engineering and optimization, market positioning, benchmark evidence creation, and guiding industry standards development for server, virtualization, and storage solutions.



Peter Murray

Senior Product Specialist at Load DynamiX

▸Expert with more than 25 years of experience in storage and network testing. Peter has been extensively involved with the architecture and design of networked testing products for both vendors and global 2000 customers.

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

Why All Flash Arrays (AFAs) Are Different



Challenges in Measuring Modern Flash Array

Performance



A New Methodology for Measuring AFA

Performance



The Load DynamiX AFA Performance Validation Solution

Why All Flash

Arrays are Different

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Landscape for Solid State Storage

Solid State Storage (Flash) Arrays

Traditional Storage Systems Disk replace Hybrid Dynamic Tiering Re-Architect Controller  Disk Replace  Dynamic Tiering Architected for Flash  Virtual Tiering Flash Optimized Controller  Disk Replace  Dynamic Tiering

SSD SSD Flash Module Flash DIMM

(or SSD)

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Considerations for Solid State Storage Arrays

Data Services Management Data Reduction  Deduplication  Compression  Thin Provisioning Replication  Local (writable)  Remote (Future) Management  Non-disruptive upgrades  REST APIs 8 Investment Protection Self-healing techniques (Reliability) Hardware Redundancy (Availability) Serviceability Support Hypervisor  VMware vSphere  MS Hyper V Scale out and Clustering

Measuring Accurate Performance

All Flash Arrays



The Problem

▸ Traditional I/O load generation tools don’t work



Flash has a unique behavior ▸ Very different from hard disk drives



Built-in data services

▸ Inline data reduction technologies



Different performance curve ▸ Flash arrays perform very differently

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Inadequate Tools to Validate Flash Storage

Performance



Measuring new technology based on old assumptions

▸ Don’t Do It!



Result – Inflated

performance results,

inaccurate measurements



Causes poor purchasing and deployment decisions



The key is setting accurate expectations

Modern AFAs Are Different from HDD Arrays

Modern Flash Arrays Traditional HDD Arrays



Wear leveling



Garbage collection



Metadata management



Self-healing techniques



Inline data deduplication

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Measuring with Inline Data Reduction



Data content patterns and data streams

▸ Patterns written to disk as part of pre-conditioning

▸ Patterns presented to an array during steady state



Repeating and non-repeating

▸ Random patterns

▸ Compressible patterns



Varying pattern lengths



Most I/O load generators are inadequate

Steady State

Ramp up

Traditional Disk Performance Curve

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6/13/2014 14

Pre-conditioning

(SNIA SSSI Specification)

Write Cliff

Many Flash Vendors

Flash Storage Methodology White Paper &

SNIA Submission Pending



We are submitting this new performance methodology to SNIA SSSI



White paper providing more details is available at

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New Performance Measurement Solutions are

Required for All Flash Arrays



How can we set correct expectations?



What modern tool set can be used for measuring

performance?



How can vendors and test sponsors that provide

inaccurate results be held accountable?

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Who is Load DynamiX?

Leader in Storage Performance Validation Provide insight into storage infrastructure

behavior to assure performance & optimize cost Market entry March 2009; Privately-held

Santa Clara, CA

 Software: Load DynamiX Enterprise

 Hardware: LDX Series load generation appliances

Products Who we are

Mission

Performance Analytics Workload Modeling Workload Characterization

How Load DynamiX Works

4 Steps to Validate Storage Performance

20 Switch Load DynamiX Validation Appliance Solution A Solution B

Load DynamiX Helps You Evaluate New

Storage Technologies

Any protocol

FC, iSCSI NFS, SMB Object/HTTP

Any application mix

Load DynamiX

Workload Modeling GUI

IOPS Comparison for 3 Groups of Data Patterns & R/W Ratios

Methodology In Action

Actual results comparing 2 leading AFAs

IOPS 0% Reducible 50% Reducible 100% Reducible Winner?

Depends on your workload.

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Highly realistic and consistent modeling

▸ Data patterns for complex content generation



Unbeatable performance

▸ Scales to emulate the largest production workloads



Unmatched usability

▸ Hides test configuration complexity, no scripting required



Small footprint

▸ Single 2RU appliance for block, file and object testing

Load DynamiX Advantages



Flash has disrupted the storage industry



Creates new challenges in measuring performance



New testing methodologies are required



Load DynamiX solves these challenges

Summary

Evaluator Group Learn more! www.EvaluatorGroup.com Load DynamiX

See a product demo!