SPECsfs2008_nfs.v3 Result

Throughput (ops/sec) Response (msec) 18835 0.4 37722 0.6 56599 0.7 75503 0.8 94484 0.9 113576 1.0 132569 1.4 151514 1.7 172860 2.4 190675 3.6

Tested By	NetApp, Inc.
Product Name	FAS6240
Hardware Available	Nov 2010
Software Available	Nov 2010
Date Tested	Sept 2010
SFS License Number	33
Licensee Locations	Sunnyvale, CA USA

The NetApp FAS6240 is high performing storage system that combines performance with scalability, and availability to satisfy the most demanding needs of today's applications and storage consolidation. The FAS6200 series is built on the NetApp industry-leading unified storage architecture for ease of management, increased efficiencies, and reduced storage costs. The FAS6200 series delivers extensive amounts of integrated, high-bandwidth connectivity; multiprotocol support; and range of capacities, performance, and density choices that empower customers to deliver optimized storage now and in the future. The FAS6240 storage system support end-to-end high-speed connectivity, including 10GbE and 8Gb FC to hosts and 6Gb SAS on the storage side.

Item No	Qty	Type	Vendor	Model/Name	Description
1	2	Storage Controller	NetApp	FAS6240	FAS6240 SW-6240-ONTAP8-C
2	4	SAS 4 port Host Adapter	NetApp	SAS Host Adapter X2065A-R6	4 port SAS Host adapter
3	288	Disk Drives w/Shelf	NetApp	DS4243-1511-24S-QS-R5	SAS 24x450GB,15K,HDD
4	2	Non-volatile Flash Cache Module	NetApp	Flash Cache module 512GB	Flash Cache Module 512GB
5	2	Software license	NetApp	SW-6240-NFS	NFS Software license SW-6240-NFS

OS Name and Version	Data ONTAP 8.0.1
Other Software	None
Filesystem Software	Data ONTAP 8.0.1

Name	Value	Description
vol options 'volume' no_atime_update	on	Disable atime updates (applied to all volumes)

Server Tuning Notes

N/A

Description	Number of Disks	Usable Size
450GB SAS 15K RPM Disk Drives	288	97.9 TB
Total	288	97.9 TB

Number of Filesystems	2
Total Exported Capacity	85.8 TB
Filesystem Type	WAFL
Filesystem Creation Options	64-bit aggregate option was selected during creation of the aggregates that housed the SFS filesystems on each controller.
Filesystem Config	Each filesystem was striped across 136 disks
Fileset Size	22047.5 GB

The storage configuration consisted of 12 shelves, each wth 24 disks. (4 stacks of 3 shelves) Each of the 4 stacks were attached to two SAS ports on each storage controller. Each storage controller was the primary owner of 144 disks, with 136 disks in those shelves placed into a single 64-bit aggregate. Each aggregate was composed of 8 RAID-DP groups, each RAID-DP group was composed of 15 data disks and 2 parity disks. Within each aggregate, a flexible volume (utilizing Data ONTAP FlexVol (TM) technology) was created to hold the SFS filesystem for that controller. Each volume was striped across all disks in the aggregate where it resided. Each controller was the owner of a single volume, but the disks in each aggregate were dual-attached so that, in the event of a fault, they could be managed by the other controller via an alternate loop. A separate flexible volume residing in a three-disk root aggregate on each controller was created to hold the Data ONTAP operating system and system files. The remaining disks owned by each controller were reserved for spares.

Item No	Network Type	Number of Ports Used	Notes
1	Jumbo Frame 10 Gigabit Ethernet	8	Quad port 10 gigabit ethernet (built-in)

Network Configuration Notes

There were four ports from the quad-port 10 gigabit ethernet network adapter configured on each storage controller. The active interfaces were configured to use jumbo frames (MTU size of 9000 bytes). All network interfaces were connected to a Cisco 5020 switch, which provided connectivity to the clients.

An MTU size of 9000 was set for all connections to the switch. Each load generator was connected to the network via a single 10 GigE port.

Item No	Qty	Type	Description	Processing Function
1	4	CPU	2.53GHz Intel Xeon(tm) Processor E5540	Networking, NFS protocol, WAFL filesystem, RAID/Storage drivers

Processing Element Notes

Each storage controller has two physical processors, each with four cores.

Description	Size in GB	Number of Instances	Total GB	Nonvolatile
Storage controller mainboard memory)	48	2	96	V
Non-volatile memory on NVRAM PCIe adapter	4	2	8	NV
Non-volatile memory on Flash Cache module	512	2	1024	NV
Grand Total Memory Gigabytes			1128

Memory Notes

Each storage controller has main memory that is used for the operating system and for caching filesystem data. A separate, battery-backed RAM module on a separate PCIe adapter is used to provide stable storage for writes that have not yet been written to disk.

The WAFL filesystem logs writes and other filesystem modifying transactions to the NVRAM adapter. In an active-active configuration, as in the system under test, such transacations are also logged to the NVRAM on the partner storage controller so that, in the event of a storage controller failure, any transactions on the failed controller can be completed by the partner controller. Filesystem modifying CIFS/NFS operations are not acknowledged until after the storage system has confirmed that the related data are stored in NVRAM adapters of both storage controllers (when both controllers are active). The battery-backed NVRAM ensures that any uncommitted transactions are preserved for at least 72 hours.

The system under test consisted of two FAS6240 storage controllers and 12 storage shelves, each with 24 450GB SAS disk drives. The two controllers were executing Data ONTAP 8.0.1 software operating in 7G mode. They were configured in an active-active cluster failover configuration, using the high-availability cluster software option in conjunction with an InfiniBand cluster interconnect provided on the NVRAM adapter. The storage shelves were connected to SAS ports on two of the 8 SAS adapter ports in each controller. The system under test was connected to a 10 gigabit ethernet switch via 8 built-in network ports.

All standard data protection features, including background RAID and media error scrubbing, software validated RAID checksumming, and double disk failure protection via double parity RAID (RAID-DP) were enabled during the test.

Item No	Qty	Vendor	Model/Name	Description
1	12	IBM	IBM 3650M2	IBM 3650M2 with 16GB RAM and Linux operating system
2	1	Cisco	5020	Cisco Catalyst 5020 Ethernet Switch

LG Type Name	LG1
BOM Item #	1
Processor Name	Intel Xeon X5570
Processor Speed	2.93 GHz
Number of Processors (chips)	2
Number of Cores/Chip	4
Memory Size	16 GB
Operating System	RHEL5.3 Kernel 2.6.18-128.el5
Network Type	10 Gigabit Ethernet

Benchmark Parameters

Network Attached Storage Type	NFS V3
Number of Load Generators	12
Number of Processes per LG	56
Biod Max Read Setting	8
Biod Max Write Setting	8
Block Size	AUTO

Testbed Configuration

LG No	LG Type	Network	Target Filesystems	Notes
1..12	LG1	1	/vol/vol1 /vol/vol2	N/A

Load Generator Configuration Notes

All filesystems were mounted on all clients, which were connected to the same physical and logical network.

Each load-generating client hosted 56 processes. The assignment of processes to filesystems and network interfaces was done such that they were evenly divided across all filesystems and network paths to the storage controllers. The filesystem data was striped evenly across all disks and SAS adapters and on to the storage backend.

Other test notes: None.

NetApp is a registered trademark and "Data ONTAP", "FlexVol", and "WAFL" are trademarks of NetApp, Inc. in the United States and other countries. All other trademarks belong to their respective owners and should be treated as such.

• Config Diagram