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RED HAT ENTERPRISE VIRTUALIZATION:SCALING SAP

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The goal

To demonstrate that SAP workloads can be effectively

virtualized using Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization, allowing

organizations to take advantage of the benefits of

virtualization without compromising on performance andscalability.

Why should I care?

SAP is the world's leading provider of business software,

 with over 85,000 customers depending on SAP solutions to

manage their business operations.

What was tested?

What was the result?

Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization scaled well, with low

overhead costs of virtualizing multiple hosts and multiple

virtual CPUs. Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization exhibited

up to 95% of bare metal performance with SAP. SAP is

designed to make use of memory and multiple CPUs, and

therefore any loss of performance due to consolidation

reflects both the efficiency of the hypervisor platform as

 well as the efficiency of the SAP code. In Red Hat's testing,

performance nearly comparable to bare metal (up to 95%)

can be achieved by scaling the number of guests and

vCPUs.

SAP SCALES UP LINEARLY FROM 1-4 X 2 VCPUGUESTS. VIRTUALIZATION EFFICIENCY UP TO 95% OFBARE METAL PERFORMANCE.

The performance of SAP Server was measured on the Red

Hat Enterprise Virtualization hypervisor running on an Intel

server with 16 logical CPUs. Red Hat Enterprise

Virtualization exhibited excellent scaling and performance

across multiple configurations.

Scale-up of a single VM with 2, 4, or 8 vCPUs yields up to

100% of expected maximum performance. Scaling up

multiple VMs with multiple vCPUs on a single host also

exhibits minimal loss of performance due to virtualization

overhead.

Scale-out of multiple virtual guests on a single host

demonstrated up to 95% of bare metal performance using 8

x 2 vCPU guests or 4 x 4 vCPU guests and 86% of bare

metal with 2 x 8vCPU guests.

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WHAT WAS THE GOAL?

Red Hat tested the performance of the SAP LinuxLab

Certification Suite (SLCS) on Red Hat Enterprise Linux

guests running on Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization. The

results of Red Hat's SAP testing are scalability and

performance measurements that support the production-

readiness of Red Hat Enterprise Virtualization for hosting

multiple virtualized SAP workloads.

WHAT WAS TESTED?

Testing was performed on an Intel server with two Intel Xeon

X5570 processors. These are 2.93 GHz quad-core

processors that support Hyper-Threading Technology, so

there are 8 physical cores, but 16 logical CPUs through

hyperthreading. The host system has 48 GB of memory.

Storage was hosted on fibre channel storage arrays.

Scaling Up the VMs

First, the performance of SLCS was measured by loading a

single VM on the server, and assigning it 2, 4, or 8 vCPUs in

the VM. As shown in the graph “Scaling vCPUs and Memory

of a Single Guest” above, the performance scales linearly

from 2 to 4 vCPUs, and then shows better than linear scaling

from 4 to 8 vCPUs.

Scaling Out the VMs

A second series of tests involved scaling out multiple VMs of

2 or 4 vCPUs to total the 16 logical CPUs available in the

server. The performance of the application shows good

scalability and linearity. For example, the scaling of multiple

2 vCPU guests is nearly linear up to 4 guests (see below).

Beyond four guests, scalability is slightly lower with

increased reliance on hyperthreading.

Near-Bare Metal Performance

SAP has been engineered to be highly scalable, and thus

lends itself well to consolidation. Any loss of performance

due to consolidation therefore reflects both the efficiency of

the hypervisor platform as well as the efficiency of the SAP

code. In Red Hat's testing, performance nearly comparable

to bare metal (up to 95%) can be achieved by scaling the

number of guests, with the best performance at 8 x 2 vCPUand 4 x 4 vCPU guest levels. See the graph “Virtualization

Efficiency: Consolidation” on the front page.

WHAT NEXT?

For more information, please go to http://www.redhat.com/

rhev/server or contact your local Red Hat Enterprise

Virtualization reseller.

Copyright © 2009 Red Hat, Inc. “Red Hat,” Red Hat Linux, the Red Hat “Shadowman” logo, and the products listed aretrademarks of Red Hat, Inc., registered in the U.S. and other countries. Linux® is the registered trademark of Linus Torvaldsin the U.S. and other countries. All other names and marks may be trademarks of their respective companies.

RHEVS026R3-20091030 October 30, 2009

 www.redhat.com