Embed Size (px)
Citation preview
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDIDesigns for Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops on VxBlockSystem 1000September 2019
H17872
Validation Guide
Abstract
This validation guide describes the architecture and performance of the integration ofCitrix Virtual Apps and Desktops components for virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI)and hosted shared desktops on Dell EMC VxBlock System 1000 convergedinfrastructure.
Dell EMC Solutions
Copyright © 2019 Dell Inc. or its subsidiaries. All rights reserved.
Dell believes the information in this publication is accurate as of its publication date. The information is subject to change without notice.
THE INFORMATION IN THIS PUBLICATION IS PROVIDED “AS-IS.” DELL MAKES NO REPRESENTATIONS OR WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND WITH
RESPECT TO THE INFORMATION IN THIS PUBLICATION, AND SPECIFICALLY DISCLAIMS IMPLIED WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS
FOR A PARTICULAR PURPOSE. USE, COPYING, AND DISTRIBUTION OF ANY DELL SOFTWARE DESCRIBED IN THIS PUBLICATION REQUIRES AN
APPLICABLE SOFTWARE LICENSE.
Dell Technologies, Dell, EMC, Dell EMC and other trademarks are trademarks of Dell Inc. or its subsidiaries. Other trademarks may be the property of their
respective owners. Published in the USA.
Dell EMCHopkinton, Massachusetts 01748-91031-508-435-1000 In North America 1-866-464-7381www.DellEMC.com
2 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
Introduction 5Executive summary.............................................................................................6Document purpose..............................................................................................6Audience............................................................................................................. 7We value your feedback...................................................................................... 7
Test Environment Configuration and Best Practices 9Validated hardware resources........................................................................... 10Validated software resources............................................................................ 12Validated system version matrix........................................................................ 12Virtual networking configuration........................................................................12Management server infrastructure.................................................................... 13
SQL Server databases.......................................................................... 13DNS...................................................................................................... 13
High availability..................................................................................................13Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops architecture................................................... 14
Solution Performance and Testing 17Testing process................................................................................................. 18
Resource monitoring.............................................................................18Load generation....................................................................................18Profiles and workloads..........................................................................19Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops Machine Creation Services................21Virtual Desktop Profile..........................................................................21
Login VSI test results and analysis.....................................................................21Login VSI Test Results Summary.......................................................... 21Knowledge worker, 124 users per host, ESXi 6.7, Citrix XenDesktop 7.15 LTSR ............................................................................22
Conclusion 29Density recommendations.................................................................................30Summary.......................................................................................................... 30
References 31Dell EMC documentation.................................................................................. 32VMware documentation....................................................................................32Citrix resources.................................................................................................32
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
CONTENTS
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 3
Contents
4 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
CHAPTER 1
Introduction
This chapter presents the following topics:
l Executive summary................................................................................................................. 6l Document purpose.................................................................................................................. 6l Audience..................................................................................................................................7l We value your feedback.......................................................................................................... 7
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 5
Executive summary
Virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) plays a crucial role in today's business transformationinitiatives. VDI is the most efficient way to present Microsoft Windows applications to end users intheir digital workspaces and provides a consistent user experience across user devices for themodern-day mobile workforce. Organizations increasingly rely on VDI to provide the agile, secure,and centrally managed desktops that are so important for their workforce.
It can be challenging for organizations to set up VDI infrastructure. This challenge is mainlybecause typical VDI infrastructure involves the integration of multiple data center componentssuch as storage, network, and compute. The multivendor profile of these components oftencreates deployment and performance challenges if a system is not optimized for VDI. Toconsistently maintain a multicomponent and multivendor environment with a specialized skill set isoften challenging for organizations and the effort to maintain a stable VDI infrastructure can havea negative impact on total cost of ownership (TCO).
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI based on Dell EMC VxBlock System 1000 is a perfectsolution for your high-performing VDI workloads. VxBlock is the proven leader in convergedinfrastructure, providing enterprises worldwide with the simplicity of a turnkey experience thatenables them to focus on innovation rather than maintenance. The VxBlock 1000 combinesindustry-leading technologies—including powerful Dell EMC storage and data protection options,Cisco UCS blade and rack servers, Cisco LAN and SAN networking, and VMware virtualization—into one fully integrated system.
VxBlock 1000 is engineered according to your needs and takes the complexities out of componentintegration. It simplifies upgrades and daily operations, comes with converged management, and asimplified path to a cloud operating model—and all with single-call support. VxBlock System 1000converged infrastructure is a future-proof design that ensures your system can support next-generation technologies and meet performance, scalability, and simplicity requirements.
Dell EMC recommends VxBlock System 1000 converged infrastructure to run Citrix Virtual Appsand Desktops infrastructure. Citrix provides a complete VDI and virtual application solution to meetall your business needs. Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops deliver virtualization solutions that give ITcontrol of virtual machines, applications, and security while providing users with access from anydevice, anywhere. VxBlock 1000 provides a highly scalable and agile platform to run yourenterprise level VDI workloads. You can also run your VDI workloads in a VxBlock System 1000 incombination with high-value applications or workloads such as SAP, Oracle, Microsoft SQL, andEpic.
At Dell EMC, the Ready Architectures for VDI team tests the VDI solutions to ensure their validity.As part of the testing process, engineers tune the system to maximize performance and efficiency,and document best practices. Finally, a separate team of experts evaluate the test results toensure that the systems can be properly configured and sized for customers. In the validationeffort described in this guide, we have used the Login VSI tool, which is an industry standard toolfor benchmarking VDI workloads. We tested the Login VSI workload Knowledge Worker with adesktop virtual machine (VM) profile that was tagged to that workload. This document includes adetailed analysis based on the test results and recommends user density figures for this workloadthat prioritizes the best end-user experience (EUE).
Document purpose
This validation guide details the architecture, components, testing methods, and test results forDell EMC VxBlock System 1000 with Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops. It includes the testenvironment configuration and best practices for systems that have undergone testing.
Introduction
6 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
Audience
This guide is intended for architects, developers, and technical administrators of IT environments.It provides an in-depth explanation of the testing methodology and basis for VDI densities. It alsovalidates the Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI solution that deliver Microsoft Windows virtualdesktops to users of Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops on Dell EMC VxBlock System 1000converged infrastructure.
We value your feedback
Dell EMC and the authors of this document welcome your feedback on the solution and thesolution documentation. Contact the Dell EMC Solutions team by email or provide your commentsby completing our documentation survey.
Authors: Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI Team.
Note: The following page on the Dell EMC Communities website provides links to additionaldocumentation for VDI Ready Solutions: VDI Info Hub for Ready Solutions.
Introduction
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 7
Introduction
8 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
CHAPTER 2
Test Environment Configuration and BestPractices
This chapter presents the following topics:
l Validated hardware resources................................................................................................ 10l Validated software resources.................................................................................................12l Validated system version matrix.............................................................................................12l Virtual networking configuration............................................................................................ 12l Management server infrastructure.........................................................................................13l High availability...................................................................................................................... 13l Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops architecture........................................................................ 14
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 9
Validated hardware resourcesValidation of the architecture is limited to the specific hardware listed in this section.
Enterprise platforms
We used the Dell EMC VxBlock System 1000 converged infrastructure for this validation effort.The VxBlock 1000 offers the latest storage arrays from Dell EMC together with compute andnetworking equipment from Cisco Systems and the Advanced Management Platform (AMP)management infrastructure. The compute layer includes both Cisco UCS B-Series and C-SeriesServers. The storage layer includes multi-array support from Dell EMC VMAX All-Flash, Unity,PowerMax, XtremIO, and Isilon storage to fulfill both block and file storage needs. The VxBlock1000 comes with Cisco UCS Gen 3 and Gen 4 LAN and SAN networking options and can easily beexpanded by adding additional compute, network, and storage resources.
The testing completed for this document used a single-node Cisco Rack Mount server, the C240M5. This server is a 2-socket, 2 rack unit (2RU) rack server offering industry-leading performanceand expandability. It is well-suited for a wide range of enterprise workloads, including virtualization,high-performance applications, Big Data and Analytics. Cisco UCS C-Series Rack Servers can bedeployed as standalone servers or as part of a Cisco Unified Computing System (Cisco UCS)managed environment. Cisco's standards-based unified computing innovations help customersreduce their TCO and increase their business agility. The server supports GPU configurations thatrun graphic-intensive workloads.
We called the server configuration for this testing "C7". It is based on Intel's Xeon ScalableProcessors (codenamed "Skylake") with 768 GB of RAM. Configuration details are given in thefollowing table:
Table 1 Validated server hardware configurations for Cisco UCS C240 M5
Serverconfig
Enterpriseplatform
CPU Memory Storage BIOS HD config Network
C7 Cisco C240M5
2 x IntelXeon Gold6138 (20Core, 2.0GHZ)
768 GB @2666 MT/s(24 x 32 GBDDR4)
Cisco UCSVIC 1457Quad Port10/25GSFP28CNAMLOM(FibreChannel)
C240M5.4.0.2a.0
2 X 64 GB Cypressmirrored SD cards forhost hypervisor
Cisco UCSVIC 1457Quad Port10/25GSFP28CNAMLOM(FibreChannel)
Network hardware
The following network hardware was used in our test environment:
The Cisco UCS C240 M5 rack mount server is connected to the UCS Fabric Interconnects (FI).The FIs are connected northbound to Cisco Nexus switches for outside network connectivity. Forstorage connectivity, the FIs are connected to fabric switches with ports that also connect to theXtremIO SAN storage. The FIs are managed using Cisco UCS manager software. With Cisco UCSmanager, administrators can manage a multi-workload environment that includes infrastructure forVDI workloads.
l Two Cisco UCS FI 6454 Fabric Interconnects
l Two Cisco Nexus 9336C-FX2 switches for network connectivity
l Two Cisco MDS 9148S Multi-layer Fabric Switch for storage connectivity
Test Environment Configuration and Best Practices
10 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
Storage hardware
The following storage hardware was used in our test environment:
l XtremIO SAN with an X-Brick X2 all-flash storage array provided the storage for the VDIdesktops. The storage array had RAID 1 configuration with a LUN size of 10 TB.
l Two 64 GB mirrored SD cards were used for hypervisor hosting on the Cisco UCS C240 M5host server.
The XtremIO X2 storage platform is designed to support all modern virtual datacenter objectives.It provides up to 80 percent better response times for VDI without compromising efficiency andfour to 20 times data reduction using inline deduplication, compression, XtremIO Virtual Copies,and thin provisioning. XtremIO is well suited for mixed workloads, virtualized applications and VDI.With multi-dimensional scalability, in-memory metadata, unmatched storage efficiency, richapplication integrated copy services, metadata-aware replication, and unprecedented managementsimplicity, XtremIO delivers a simple, agile, scalable, fully virtualized datacenter while minimizinginfrastructure footprint and TCO. With a scale-out design, it is ideal for data reduction and copy-friendly workflows, such as VDI and test and development environments.
Test Environment Configuration and Best Practices
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 11
Validated software resources
Dell EMC validated this solution with the software components listed in the following table.
Table 2 Validated software component versions
Component Description/version
Hypervisor VMware ESXi 6.7
Broker technology Citrix XenDesktop 7.15 LTSR
Broker database Microsoft SQL Server 2016
Management VM operatingsystem
Microsoft Windows Server 2016 (Connection Server and DB)
Virtual desktop operatingsystem
Microsoft Windows 10 Enterprise
Office application suite Microsoft Office Professional 2016
Login VSI test suite Version 4.1.32.1
Platform VxBlock 1000
Validated system version matrix
Validation of the architecture is limited to the specific version matrix listed in the following table.
Table 3 Version matrix for tested system
Serverconfig
NvidiavGPUversion
Hypervisorversion
Hypervisorbuild
Bios VxBlockversion
Windows 10version
Windows 10patches
C7 n/a ESXi 6.7 1032608 C240M5.4.0.2a.0 RCM 6.5.1.1 1803 -17134.523
KB100347
Virtual networking configuration
The network configuration for the testing used two 25 GB ports on the Virtual Interface Card(VIC) 1457 that is connected to the Cisco Fabric Interconnects (FI). All required VLANs traversethrough a 25 Gbps VIC from the servers to the Fabric Interconnects.
We used the following VLAN configurations for the compute and management hosts in ourvalidation testing:
l Management VLAN: Configured for hypervisor infrastructure traffic—L3 routed via coreswitch.
l VDI VLAN: Configured for VDI session traffic—L3 routed via core switch.
Test Environment Configuration and Best Practices
12 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
Management server infrastructure
The management server component sizing recommendations for VxBlock 1000 are listed in thefollowing table. All management infrastructure VMs were hosted in an AMP-3S, a single systemmanagement infrastructure platform used to manage a single platform like VDI in a datacenter.
Table 4 Sizing for management server in VxBlock 1000
Component vCPU RAM (GB) NIC Operating system +data vDisk (GB)
VMware vCenter Appliance 4 16 1 250
Citrix XenDesktop Delivery Controller 2 8 1 40
Storefront web server 2 8 1 60
Citrix License Server 2 8 1 60
SQL Server Standard 2 8 1 40+80
Remote File Server 2 8 1 40+100
SQL Server databases
During validation, a single dedicated SQL Server 2016 VM hosted the VMware databases in themanagement layer. We separated SQL data, logs, and tempdb into their respective volumes, andcreated a single database for Desktop Delivery Controller and License Server.
DNSDNS is the basis for Microsoft Active Directory and also controls access to various softwarecomponents for VMware services. All hosts, VMs, and consumable software components musthave a presence in DNS. We used a dynamic namespace integrated with Active Directory andadhered to Microsoft best practices.
High availability
Although we did not enable high availability (HA) during the validation that is documented in thisguide, we strongly recommend that HA be factored into any VDI design and deployment. Thisprocess follows the N+1 model with redundancy at both the hardware and software layers. Thedesign guide for this architecture provides additional recommendations for HA and is available atthe VDI Info Hub for Ready Solutions.
Test Environment Configuration and Best Practices
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 13
Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops architectureWhen designing the architecture for a successful VDI deployment, understand the underlyingnetwork traffic flows, ports, and components. The following figure, which shows the Citrix VirtualApps and Desktops communication flow, can be used as a starting reference for understanding theinterdependencies of the different components within this infrastructure:
Figure 1 Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops architecture
Test Environment Configuration and Best Practices
14 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
The number of ports and protocols that are required varies depending on the size of thedeployment and the external connectivity requirements. Undertake careful planning and design toallow these ports and protocols in the corporate network firewall policies.
Test Environment Configuration and Best Practices
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 15
Test Environment Configuration and Best Practices
16 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
CHAPTER 3
Solution Performance and Testing
This chapter presents the following topics:
l Testing process......................................................................................................................18l Login VSI test results and analysis......................................................................................... 21
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 17
Testing processTo ensure good EUE and cost-per-user, we conducted our testing on this solution using Login VSI,a load-generation tool that monitors both hardware resource utilization parameters and EUEduring load-testing.
For each user scenario, we ran the tests four times, once to validate data capture and three timesto collect metrics and analyze variance.
Our EUE validation consisted of logging into a session while the system was under a load createdby the Login VSI tool and completing tasks from the workload definition. While this test issubjective, it helps to provide a better understanding of the EUE in the desktop sessions,particularly under high load. It also helps to ensure reliable data gathering.
Resource monitoring
To ensure that the user experience was not compromised, we monitored the following importantresources:
l Compute host server resources—VMware vCenter (for solutions based on VMwarevSphere) or Microsoft Performance Monitor (for solutions based on Hyper-V) gather key data(CPU, memory, disk, and network usage) from each of the compute hosts during each testrun. This data was collected for each host and consolidated for reporting. We do not report anymetrics for the management host servers. However, they were monitored manually duringtesting to ensure that no bottlenecks impacted the test.
l Utilization thresholds—Resource overutilization can cause poor EUE. We monitored therelevant resource utilization parameters and compared them to relatively conservativethresholds. The thresholds were selected based on industry best practices and our experienceto provide an optimal trade-off between good EUE and cost-per-user while also allowingsufficient burst capacity for seasonal or intermittent spikes in demand.The following table shows the pass/fail thresholds that we set for our testing process:
Table 5 Pass/fail thresholds
Parameter Pass/fail threshold
Physical host CPU utilization 85% a
Physical host memory utilization 85%
Network throughput 85%
Storage I/O latency 20 milliseconds (ms)
Login VSI Failed Session 2%
a. The Ready Solutions for VDI team recommends that steady-state average CPU utilizationon the host not exceed 85 percent in a production environment. Average CPU utilizationsometimes exceeded our recommended percentage. Because of the nature of automatedtesting tools like Login VSI, a 5 percent margin of error was accepted and it does not impactour sizing guidance.
Load generationLogin VSI from Login VSI, Inc. is the industry-standard tool for testing VDI environments andRDSH environments.
Login VSI installs a standard collection of desktop application software (including Microsoft Officeand Adobe Acrobat Reader) on each VDI desktop testing instance. It then uses a configurable
Solution Performance and Testing
18 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
launcher system to connect a specified number of simulated users to available desktops within theenvironment. When the simulated user is connected, a login script configures the user environmentand starts a defined workload. Each launcher system can launch connections to several VDIdesktops (target machines). A centralized management console configures and manages thelaunchers and the Login VSI environment.
We used the following login and boot conditions:
l For most of our tests, new user sessions were logged in at a steady rate over a one-hourperiod. During tests of low-density solutions such as GPU and graphic-based configurations,users were logged in every 10 seconds.
l All desktops were started before users logged in.
l All desktops ran an industry-standard anti-virus solution. Windows 10 machines used WindowsDefender.
Profiles and workloadsThe combination of virtual desktop profiles and simulated user workloads determines the totalnumber of users (user density) that the VDI solution can support. Specific metrics and capabilitiesdefine each virtual desktop profile and user workload. Understand these terms in the context ofthis document.
Profiles and workloads are defined as follows:
l Profile—The configuration of the virtual desktop: the number of vCPUs and the amount ofRAM that is configured on the desktop and available to the user
l Workload—The set of applications and tasks that are defined to be used by a simulated user inthe test
Load-testing on each machine profile is carried out using an appropriate user workload that isrepresentative of the relevant use case. Typical profiles and their associated workloads aresummarized in the following table:
Table 6 Virtual desktop profile to workload mapping
Profile name Workload name
Knowledge worker Login VSI Knowledge worker
Power worker Login VSI Power worker
Graphics multimedia worker Login VSI Multimedia
Solution Performance and Testing
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 19
Typical Login VSI workloads are summarized in the following table. For additional information, seethe Login VSI website.
Table 7 Login VSI workloads
Workload name Workload description
Login VSIKnowledge Worker
Designed for virtual machines with 2 vCPUs. This workload includes the following activities:
l Microsoft Outlook—Browse messages.
l Internet Explorer—Browse websites and open a YouTube style video (480p movie trailer)three times in every loop.
l Word—Start one instance to measure response time and another to review and edit adocument.
l Doro PDF Printer and Acrobat Reader—Print a Word document and export it to PDF.
l Excel—Open a large randomized sheet.
l PowerPoint—Review and edit a presentation.
l FreeMind—Run a Java-based Mind Mapping application.
l Other—Perform various copy and zip actions.
Login VSI PowerWorker
The most intensive of the standard Login VSI workloads. The following activities areperformed with this workload:
l Begin by opening four instances of Internet Explorer and two instances of Adobe Readerthat remain open throughout the workload.
l Perform more PDF printer actions than in the other workloads.
l Watch a 720p and a 1080p video.
l Reduce the idle time to two minutes.
l Perform various copy and zip actions.
Login VSIMultimedia Worker(Graphicsperformanceconfiguration)
A workload that is designed to heavily stress the CPU when using software graphicsacceleration. GPU-accelerated computing offloads the most compute-intensive sections ofan application to the GPU while the CPU processes the remaining code. This modifiedworkload uses the following applications for its GPU/CPU-intensive operations:
l Adobe Acrobat
l Google Chrome
l Google Earth
l Microsoft Excel
l HTML5 3D spinning balls
l Internet Explorer
l MP3
l Microsoft Outlook
l Microsoft PowerPoint
l Microsoft Word
l Streaming video
Solution Performance and Testing
20 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops Machine Creation Services
For this validation, we used the Virtual Apps and Desktops Machine Creation Services (MCS)linked clones provisioning method. MCS is a collection of services that work together to createvirtual desktops from a master image on demand, optimizing storage utilization, and providing apristine virtual machine to users each time they log in.
Virtual Desktop Profile
The following table summarizes the configuration of the Knowledge worker profile that we tested.
Table 8 Desktop VM specifications
Profile name Workload name vCPUsa Configuredmemoryb
Reservedmemoryc
Screenresolution
Operating system
KnowledgeWorker
Login VSIKnowledgeWorker
2 4 GB 2 GB 1920 x1080
Windows 10Enterprise 64-bit
a. The number of virtual CPUs assigned to the desktop virtual machineb. Memory configured or assigned to the desktop virtual machinec. Amount of memory reserved for the virtual machine. Reserved memory is guaranteed
Login VSI test results and analysis
We used the Login VSI test suite to simulate the user experience for several profile types underthe typical workload for that type. We performed the testing on a single node C240 M5 rackmount server on VxBlock System 1000 converged infrastructure using the C7 host hardwareconfiguration shown in the following table.
Table 9 Configuration details
Serverconfiguration
Enterpriseplatform
CPU Memory Storage BIOS HD config Network
C7 Cisco C240M5
2x IntelXeon Gold6138 (20Core, 2.0GHZ)
768 GB@2666MT/s(24x32 GBDDR4)
Cisco UCSVIC 1457Quad Port10/25GSFP28 CNAMLOM(FibreChannel)
C240M5.4.0.2a
2 X 64 GBCypress mirroredSD cards for hostHypervisor
Cisco UCSVIC 1457Quad Port10/25GSFP28 CNAMLOM(FibreChannel)
Login VSI Test Results Summary
Before we look at a detailed analysis of the test results, let us look at a summary of the results asshown in the following table.
Solution Performance and Testing
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 21
Table 10 Login VSI test results summary
Serverconfiguration
Profile name RemoteDisplayProtocol
Workloadname
Userdensity
AverageCPU
Averageactivememory
AverageIOPS peruser
C7 Knowledgeworker
Thinwire Login VSIKnowledgeworker
124 85.84percent
148 GB 20.93
The table headings are defined as follows:
l Server configuration—The configuration used for this validation effort. See Table 9 forconfiguration details.
l Profile name—The configuration of the virtual desktop, including the number of vCPUs andthe amount of RAM that is configured on the desktop and available to the user.
l Workload name—The set of applications and tasks defined to be used by a simulated user. SeeTable 7 for the details of workloads tested in this testing.
l User density—The number of users per compute host that successfully completed theworkload test within the acceptable resource limits for the host. For clusters, this numberreflects the average per server density achieved for all compute hosts in the cluster.
l Average CPU—The average CPU usage over the steady-state period. For clusters, thisnumber represents the combined average CPU usage of all compute hosts. On the latest Intelprocessors, the ESXi host CPU metrics exceed the rated 100 percent for the host if TurboBoost is enabled (the default setting). An additional 35 percent of CPU is available from theTurbo Boost feature, but this additional CPU headroom is not reflected in the VMware vSpheremetrics where the performance data is gathered.
l Average active memory—For ESXi hosts, the amount of memory that is actively used, asestimated by the VM kernel based on recently accessed memory pages. For clusters, this is theaverage amount of guest physical memory that is actively used across all compute hosts overthe steady-state period.
l Average IOPS per user—IOPS calculated from the average disk IOPS over the steady stateperiod divided by the number of users.
Knowledge worker, 124 users per host, ESXi 6.7, Citrix XenDesktop 7.15 LTSRThe following metrics were collected and analyzed for this test case:
CPU usage
We tested on a single VxBlock compute host that was populated with 124 desktop VMs. The VMswere created from a nonpersistent, pooled random, machine catalog using Citrix XenDesktop MCSprovisioning technology. We used the Citrix HDX display protocol for the testing.
The following figure shows the performance data for 124 user sessions on the VxBlock computehost when tested with the Login VSI knowledge worker workload. All VMs were powered on in theboot storm phase. The CPU usage was approximately 6 percent before users started to log in.During the login phase, CPU utilization increased steadily until all logins were complete.
During the steady state phase, the CPU utilization reached a steady state average of 85.84percent on the compute host. This value is close to the pass/fail threshold we set for average CPUutilization—see Table 5. To maintain a good EUE, we recommend not exceeding the threshold limitthat we set for CPU utilization. You can load more user sessions while exceeding this threshold,but may experience a degradation in user experience. CPU utilization was reduced during the logout phase.
Solution Performance and Testing
22 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
Figure 2 CPU utilization on compute node
Memory
As shown in the following figure, consumed memory was recorded at 511 GB before the testingstarted because of the memory allocated to the VMs. Consumed memory remained almostconstant during user login and the steady state phase. During the steady state phase, consumedmemory reached an average of 511 GB on the compute host. With a total memory of 768 GBavailable on the compute host, memory was not a constraint during the testing.
Figure 3 Consumed memory utilization on compute node
Active memory usage spiked during the boot-storm phase when all VMs were powered on anddecreased gradually to 37 GB at the end of the boot storm phase. Active memory usage increasedsteadily during the login phase. During the steady state phase, active memory remained almost
Solution Performance and Testing
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 23
constant and recorded an average steady active memory of 148 GB. With 768 GB available on thehost, active memory usage was not a concern during the steady state phase and there was enoughmemory available in the ESXi host cluster to meet requirements. No memory ballooning orswapping occurred on any of the hosts during the testing process, indicating that there were nomemory constraints in the cluster.
Figure 4 Active memory utilization on compute node
Network usage
Network bandwidth was not an issue during testing. Network bandwidth usage steadily increasedduring the login phase and recorded a peak of 196 Mbps. The compute host recorded an averagenetwork usage of 150 Mbps during the steady state operations. The steady state peak value was189 Mbps. With an available bandwidth of 2 x 25 Gbps on the VIC, network bandwidth usage waswell under the 85 percent threshold set for network throughput.
Solution Performance and Testing
24 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
Figure 5 Network usage on the compute host
IOPS
The following figure shows disk IOPS for the Dell EMC XtremIO storage datastore. Cluster IOPSreached a peak of 54,594 during the boot storm phase. The steady state IOPS maximum value was7,713. Average cluster disk IOPS during the steady state phase was 2,596. Based on thesenumbers, the average disk IOPS per session during the steady state phase was 20.93. You canselect your disk specifications in accordance with this IOPS figure in your sizing exercise. Asshown in the following figure, I/O latency during the steady state phase was 0.16 milliseconds. Thislow latency figure indicates that storage resources were not a bottleneck during steady-stateoperations.
Solution Performance and Testing
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 25
Figure 6 Datastore IOPS utilization
Storage I/O latency
The XtremIO datastore I/O latency reached a peak of 0.66 milliseconds during the boot stormphase. Peak latency recorded during the steady state phase was 0.2 milliseconds and averagecluster latency during the phase was 0.16 milliseconds. This value is well below the pass/failthreshold of 20 milliseconds set for storage I/O latency. Overall, storage resources did not appearto be a bottleneck during testing.
Figure 7 Latency in XtremIO datastore
Solution Performance and Testing
26 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
Login VSI user experience summary
The baseline score for the Login VSI test was 950. This score falls in the 800–1199 range that israted as "Good" by the Login VSI tool. For more information about Login VSI baseline ratings andbaseline calculations, see this Login VSImax article. The Login VSI test was run for 124 usersessions for the Login VSI knowledge worker workload. As indicated by the dark blue line in thefollowing figure, the system reached a VSImax average score of 1159 when 124 sessions wereloaded. This value is well below the VSI threshold score of 1950 set by the Login VSI tool. Duringthe duration of testing, VSImax was never reached, which generally indicates a stable system anda better user experience. See Table 11 for an explanation of the Login VSI metrics.
During testing, we noted that there were no failed sessions, which indicates that the log in and logout process was smooth. When manually interacting with the sessions during the steady statephase, the mouse and window movement was responsive, and video playback was good. Moreover,all of the parameters we monitored were within the pass/fail threshold limit as outlined in Table 5.This result indicates that there were no resource constraints on the system and systemperformance was good.
Figure 8 Login VSI Graph Summary
The following table describes the Login VSI metrics.
Table 11 Login VSI metrics
Login VSI metrics Description
VSImax VSImax shows the number of sessions thatcan be active on a system before the systemis saturated. It is the point where the VSImaxV4 average graph line meets the VSImax V4threshold graph line. The intersection isindicated by a red X in the Login VSI graph.This number gives you an indication of thescalability of the environment (higher isbetter).
VSIbase VSIbase is the best performance of thesystem during a test (the lowest responsetimes). This number is used to determinewhat the performance threshold will be.
Solution Performance and Testing
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 27
Table 11 Login VSI metrics (continued)
Login VSI metrics Description
VSIbase gives an indication of the baseperformance of the environment (lower isbetter).
VSImax v4 average VSImax v4 average is calculated on thenumber of active users that are logged intothe system but removes the two highest andtwo lowest samples to provide a moreaccurate measurement.
VSImax v4 threshold VSImax v4 threshold indicates at which pointthe environment's saturation point is reached(based on VSIbase).
The following table shows the Login VSI score summary for the Knowledge worker workload.
Table 12 Login VSI score summary
VSIbase VSImax average VSImax threshold VSImax reached
950 1,159 1,950 No
Solution Performance and Testing
28 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
CHAPTER 4
Conclusion
l Density recommendations..................................................................................................... 30l Summary...............................................................................................................................30
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 29
Density recommendations
We tested all configurations with Microsoft Windows 10 and Microsoft Office 2016. Therecommended user density for this testing performed on VMware vSphere 6.7 with Citrix VirtualApps and Desktops is shown in the following table:
Table 13 User density recommendations
Server configuration Profile Workload User density
C7 Knowledge worker Login VSI Knowledgeworker
124
Summary
The VxBlock System 1000 converged infrastructure platform provides a highly scalable andresilient system for VDI workloads along with exceptional user experience. Analysis of the resultshave shown that storage, network and memory were not a bottleneck during the testing weperformed with the C7 configuration. However, CPU utilization was close to the threshold we setand was a decisive factor in recommending the user densities outlined in this document. The LoginVSI results shows that VSI Max never reached the VSI threshold for the knowledge workerworkload tested, which indicates a stable system with excellent EUE.
The configurations for the VxBlock System 1000 converged infrastructure have been optimized forVDI. We selected the memory and CPU configurations that provide optimal performance. You canchange these configurations to meet your own requirements, but you should be aware thatchanging the memory and CPU configurations from those that have been validated in thisdocument will affect the user density per host.
With the introduction of the six-channels-per-CPU requirement for Skylake processors, the C7memory configuration recommendation has increased from the previous guidance of 512 GB to768 GB. This change was necessary to ensure a balanced memory configuration and optimizedperformance for your VDI solution. The additional memory is advantageous, considering theresulting increase in operating system resource utilization and the enhanced experience for userswhen they have access to additional memory allocations.
With a flexible choice of fully integrated Dell EMC storage and data protection, Cisco UCS serversand networking options backed by VMware virtualization, the VxBlock 1000 platform provides thecapability to run an enterprise-level VDI environment. VxBlock 1000 is also capable of running amultiworkload environment that includes VDI and high-value applications, data analytics and so on.
Conclusion
30 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
CHAPTER 5
References
This chapter presents the following topics:
l Dell EMC documentation.......................................................................................................32l VMware documentation........................................................................................................ 32l Citrix resources..................................................................................................................... 32
Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI 31
Dell EMC documentationThe following Dell EMC documentation provides additional and relevant information. Access tothese documents depends on your login credentials. If you do not have access to a document,contact your Dell EMC representative. Also see the VDI Info Hub for Ready Solutions for acomplete list of VDI resources.
l Dell EMC Virtual Desktop Infrastructure
This document is part of the documentation set for this architecture, which includes the following:
l Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI Designs for Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops on VxBlockSystem 1000 Design Guide
l Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI Designs for Citrix Virtual Apps and Desktops on VxBlockSystem 1000 Validation Guide
VMware documentationThe following VMware resources provide additional and relevant information:
l VMware vSphere documentation
l VMware Compatibility Guide
Citrix resourcesThe following Citrix resources provide additional and relevant information:
l XenDesktop and XenApp 7.15 LTSR: System Requirements
l Citrix VDI Handbook and Best Practices
l Citrix deployment guides
l Citrix StoreFront Proof of Concept Implementation Guide
l Install and Configure
References
32 Dell EMC Ready Architectures for VDI
