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Symmetrix Performance SPA Lab Solutions

April 2012

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1.4 SPW_lab_solutions.docx March 2012

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Lab Exercise 1: Tools

Purpose:

To become familiar with the use of Symmetrix Performance

Analyzer and Performance Manager

Tasks: In this lab, you will perform the following tasks:

Use Symmetrix Performance Manager to examine workload

characteristics

Map and open archives in Performance Manager

Use Views and Metrics to explore the archive

Create new views, change the appearance of graphs, and export

data

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Lab 1: Part 1 – Using Symmetrix Performance Analyzer

Step Action

1 Launch Symmetrix Performance Analyzer by double-clicking the desktop icon URL, or by

entering this URL in Internet Explorer:

https://hostname:8443/spa

If it warns you about security or certificate issues, just confirm in a way that continues the

program launch.

Log in using the user and password your instructor has provided, or with the default:

Login: smc Password: smc

It may take up to a minute after the initial launch for the program to become active. Be

patient.

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Step Action

2 Explore the default Dashboard.

Note that the default view when you log in to SPA is the default Dashboard – Heat Map.

Examine the Dashboard and identify the components that are actively performing work.

a. Record any components that are color coded red – indicating 100% utilization.

b. Click on the components identified above and record their utilization.

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Step Action

3 Overall Symmetrix Performance.

Select the Snapshot view and click on the local Symmetrix in the left.

Use the “Utilization Distribution” to find out what the overall condition of the Symmetrix

components is. Do any of the components have greater than 25% utilization? If so, which

components (Hint: click on the bar in the snapshot to show more details)?

Use the “Throughput Distribution” to determine the Front end MB/s.

Are there any Device and/or Storage groups listed in the Snapshot view. Use the “Device

Groups – I/Os Per Second & Response Time Distribution” to find the device group (do not

include ungrouped devices) having the highest utilization. What rating is the group’s

response time?

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Step Action

4 Symmetrix Storage Group Snapshots(1).

Use the navigation panel on the left to locate and click on the Storage Group that you

identified in the previous part. Make sure you are still viewing Snapshots.

Use the “Storage Group Profile” to find IO profile for this Group:

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Step Action

5 Symmetrix Storage Group Snapshots(2).

Use the navigation panel on the left to locate and click on the Storage Group that is Virtually

Provisioned. Make sure you are still viewing Snapshots.

Use the “Storage Group Profile” to find IO profile for this Group:

Record the information relevant to VP for this Storage Group:

IO Density by Tier: _____________________________

Symmetrix Tier Capacity Allocation %: _________________________

BE IOs by Tier: ____________________________

BE Throughput by Tier: _______________________

IOs Per Second to this Storage Group:_________________________

6 Symmetrix Front-End Directors Snapshots(1).

Open the sub-folders under the Symmetrix array in the navigation pane on the left and click

on the “FE Directors” folder. Make sure you are still viewing Snapshots.

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Step Action

7 Symmetrix Front-End Directors Snapshots(2).

Open the “FE Director” folder and choose just one front-end director identified in step(6).

Make sure you are viewing Snapshots.

8 Symmetrix Back-End Directors Snapshots.

Click on the “BE Directors” folder, and make sure you are viewing Snapshots. Use the

Snapshot views to monitor the balance of the back-end directors.

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Step Action

9 Symmetrix Disks Snapshots.

Click the “Disks” folder, and make sure you are viewing Snapshots. Use the Snapshot views

to determine if any of the disk groups have an average utilization of more than 25%:

Drill down under the “Disks” folder to click on a single disk group. Are the disks in the group

being utilized fairly evenly? __________________________________________

Compare a few of the disks in your group to see if they have similar traffic patterns.

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Step Action

10 Diagnostic view.

Select Diagnostic view. Observe the overall dashboard that is presented for the Symmetrix.

Double-click on the Symmetrix and all the available Diagnostic view tabs are presented.

Explore the different components.

Select the FE Director tab. Then select the FE identified as busy in the earlier part of this

exercise. Switch to the Explore tab. Select both the Average Read Response Time and

Average Write Response Time and plot the graph.

Is there any abrupt change in the response times: ________________________

Diagnostic view can help in quickly identifying changes that have occurred recently.

Explore the other components for which Diagnostic view is available.

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Step Action

11 Real Time view (1).

Select Real Time view. The overall metrics for the Symmetrix in the past hour with finer

granularity is displayed.

Select the Symmetrix. Then select FE Reqs/sec and CTRL select BE Reqs/sec. Plot the graph.

Which of the two is consistently higher: ______________________________

We will discuss the reason for these later in the course.

12 Real Time view (2).

Double-click on the Symmetrix. This will provide three tables for FE, BE and RDF Directors.

Take some time to explore the metrics available for these components in the Real Time

view.