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SPEC SFS®2014 Performance Report SilvertonConsulting,Inc.StorInt™Dispatch ThisStorageIntelligence(StorInt™)dispatchonlycoversSPECsfs2014benchmark1results.TherehavebeennonewSPECsfs2014submissionssinceourlastreport.So,belowweshowsomechartswedidn’texplorelasttime.

SPECSFS2014_swbuild(softwarebuild)resultsAsyoumayrecall,theSWBUILDworkloadsimulatessoftwarereleasebuilds,essentiallyonebuildisaUnix“make”processagainsttensofthousandsofsourcefilesandisametadataintensiveworkload.Figure1showstheSWBUILDconcurrentbuildcounts.

Figure1SPECSFS2014_swbuildnumberofconcurrentsoftwarebuilds

Figure1showsthenumberofsoftwareconcurrentbuilddoneduringthemaximumloadonasystem.TheonlysolutionabovethatusedAFAstoragewastheIBMSpectrumScalewithFlashSystem900.TheOracleZFSsolutionuseddisk-SSDhybridstoragewith13610Krpm300GBdiskdrivesand873GBSSDsandtheflashstoragewasusedforawritecache(orwritelog).TheSWBUILDworkloadis~87%metadataoperations(70%forSTAToperationsalone)andtherestread(6%)andwrite(7%)sequentialfileoperations.WearenotexactlysurewhattheSTAToperationdoesbutourguessisitfollowsdirectorytreesandreadfileinodesto

1AllSPECSFS2014informationisavailableathttps://www.spec.org/sfs2014/asof27Jun2017

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determinethestatusofeachfiletoseeifithasbeenchanged(usingmodification/creationdate-timestamps)TheIBMSpectrumScale4.2.1,CiscoUCSwithFlashSystem900had2FlashSystem900swith12-2.9TBflashmoduleseach,withoneflashmodulewasusedasaspareperFlashSystem.FortheOracleZFSstorage,it’ssomewhatsurprisingthatarelativelysmallamountofflash(~2.8%oftotalcapacity)couldprovideanalmostequivalentperformanceinconcurrentbuildoperationstotheAFAstorage.Yes,there’sprobablyseveralotheroptimizationsinOracleZFSZS3-2storagebutwithonly20.8TBoftotalstoragecapacityitseemedtodoverywell.TheIBMSpectrumscale4.2withElasticStorage(diskonly)had3822TBdiskdevicesandstillmanagedtodoonly~34%lessconcurrentbuildoperationsthantheAFAandthehybridsystem.

SPECSFS2014_vda(videodataacquisition)resultsInFigure2weshowthemaximumnumberofconcurrentVDAstreams.

Figure2SPECSFS2014_swbuildminimumandtotalops/secresults.

InFigure2,boththeIBMSpectrumScale4.2.1solutions(withDeepFlash140andFlashSystem900)wereAFA.BoththeOracleZFSandIBMSpectrumScale4.2ElasticStoragesolutionswerediskonly.UnclearwhyOracledecidedtodeployaZFSZS3-2diskonlysolutionforVDAvs.ahybridsolutionforSWBUILDbuttheydidn’tdonearlyaswellherewiththeirdisk-onlyversion.

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ThealldiskIBMSpectrumScalewithElasticStoragedidsurprisinglywellachieving~93%ofthemaximumconcurrentVDAstreamsastheFlashSystem900basedSpectrumScaleversion.TheVDAworkloadappearstobea10:90R:WworkloadandthewritestreamsapproximateHighDefvideostreams(running@36Mb/s).Giventheaboveresults,itseemsthataproperlyconfiguredfilesystemwithdisk-onlystoragecanperformalmostequivalenttoallflashstoragesolution.Thiscouldbeentirelyduetotheheavywriteworkload.

SignificanceWestillhaven’tseenwidespreadadoptionofthenewSPECsfs2014benchmark.Unclearwhatthereluctanceisbasedonbutit’sourguessthatthebenchmarkreportednumbersaren’tnearlyashighastheoldSPECsfs2008metrics.StilltryingtofigureoutthebestwaytoreportSPECsfs2014results.Atsomepoint,whenthere’senoughsubmissions(ifever)weplantoshowtoptenchartslikeweuseforotherperformancereports.Butinthemeantime,wemayexperimentwithafewvariantsoftheabovecharts.Anyideasonothermetricsofinteresttoreport,pleasedoletusknowAnysuggestionsonhowtoimproveanyofourperformanceanalysesarealwayswelcomed.Additionally,ifyouareinterestedinmorefileperformancedetails(Top20SPECsfs2008results)andourNFSv3andCIFS/SMB(SPECsfs)ChampionsCharts™,pleaseconsiderpurchasingourrecentlyupdated(June2017)NASBuyingGuide,availableonSCI’swebsite(seeQRcodebelowleft).Thisreportwassentouttosubscribersaspartourfree,monthlyStorageIntelligencee-newsletter.Ifyouareinterestedinreceivingfuturestorageperformanceanalysesalongwithrecentproductannouncementsummaries,pleaseusetheQRcode(belowright)tosignupforyourowncopy.

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