Xp-storage Essentials Performance Edition-best Practices-rev1!0!0906xx

7/27/2019 Xp-storage Essentials Performance Edition-best Practices-rev1!0!0906xx

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HP StorageWorks XP Disk Array with HP Storage EssentialsPerformance Edition

Revision History

Version Change Date

1.0 Original version

Note: Verify that you have the latest version of th is paper. It is updated whenever the product isenhanced.Executive Summary

HP Storage Essentials 6.1 includes the ability to manage an HP StorageWorks XP disk array, and displayits performance characteristics. Previous versions of SE did not fully realize all of the nuances within theXP, which limited SEs usability in an XP environment. Now SE has made great strides to become more XPaware. The new changes for virtualization include THP V-VOL to Pool mapping, listing of Pool LDEVs thatcomprise the Snapshot/THP Pool, and reports V-VOL capacity utilization. Improvements were made inprovisioning LUNs, and creating new Volumes (LUSE) by adding more XP centric details. New detailsinclude the RAID Level of the LDEV, its replication status (P-VOL or S-VOL), command device status, and ifits a virtual or journal volume. Additionally, you can zoom in on the volume details to see the RAID Group itbelongs to, and the disks that make up the group. Performance Manager will allow you to graph theperformance of your LUN from the application on the host to the disk on the array. Long term performancemetrics are aggregated hourly, daily, weekly, monthly and yearly. Real Time performance is available at a20sec interval. With Storage Essentials 6.1 not only can you fully manage and monitor your XP, but it alsocontinues to provide heterogeneous support for virtually all of your arrays in the SAN.


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Revision History...............................................................................................................................................1Executive Summary.........................................................................................................................................1Target Audience..............................................................................................................................................3Related Documentation...................................................................................................................................3Storage Essentials Overview........................................................................................................................... 3Storage Essentials and its value with the XP...................................................................................................4Storage Essentials does not replace RWC ......................................................................................................4System Manager.............................................................................................................................................. 5

Storage Pools ...............................................................................................................................................5Create a New Volume..................................................................................................................................6Create Host Security Group ..........................................................................................................................8

Volume Details............................................................................................................................................10Host to Array Details ..................................................................................................................................16

Provisioning Manager....................................................................................................................................18Five easy steps to provision your XP ...........................................................................................................18

Performance Manager...................................................................................................................................19Setup ..........................................................................................................................................................19End to End Performance .............................................................................................................................20

Array Centric Performance .........................................................................................................................20Diagnose Performance Bottlenecks .............................................................................................................26Optimize Your Performance........................................................................................................................27External Storage and Continuous Access Link Performance.........................................................................27THP/Snapshot Pool Performance ................................................................................................................28

Reporter.........................................................................................................................................................28Array Usage Reports ..................................................................................................................................28Performance Reports...................................................................................................................................29

Capacity Manager..........................................................................................................................................30Glossary ........................................................................................................................................................32


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Target Audience

The document is intended for customers who are considering using Storage Essentials to manage their XPdisk array and have experience with the general setup and use of the XP disk array using the Remote WebConsole.

Related Documentation

This paper is not intended to replace or substitute for the installation, configuration and troubleshootingguides. Therefore in addition to this paper, please refer to other documents for this product:

HP StorageWorks Storage Essentials Installation Guide HP StorageWorks Storage Essentials User Guide HP StorageWorks Storage Essentials Release Notes HP StorageWorks RWC Guide

These and other HP documents can be found on an HP web site: Hhttp://www.hp.com/supportH.

Storage Essentials Overview

Traditionally storage administers use each arrays unique Device Manager to provision heterogeneousstorage arrays. Storage Essentials allows the administrator a much lower cost alternative that allows allarrays in the SAN to be managed using a single common interface. Additionally, Storage Essentials helpsthe administrator troubleshoot their SAN by monitoring the performance of applications, hosts, switches,and arrays from this common interface.

System Manager Allows the user to view the SAN Topology and make provisioning changes to their XPdisk array. New for 6.1 are more volume centric details such as RAID level, RAID group, replication status,

command device status, and if its a virtual or journal volume.

Provisioning Manager A plug-in that gives the user a simple tool to provision their array in 5 Steps. Newat a glance details include the RAID level, command device status, replication status, and whether its avirtual or journal volume.

Performance Manager The user can fully monitor the performance of their XP disk array. Data is archivedfor long term review, and the user can view the current performance in real time. Performance metricsinclude global resources such as cache and shared memory, front end and back end controllers, ports,storage pools and their constituent volumes, Thin Provisioning/Snapshot Pools and V-VOLs, and the arraygroups. Additionally, performance metrics are available for the Hosts and Switches in the SAN.

Reporter Allows the user to run summary reports on the XPs configuration and performance. Any or all ofthe metrics available in System Manager and Performance Manager are displayed in an HTML or PDFreport.

Capacity Manager Itemizes capacity usage statistics for the array. New for 6.1 are Thin Provisioning andSnapshot usage reports.


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Storage Essentials and its value with the XP

Storage Essentials allows the user to manage all XP disk arrays, monitor the XPs performance, managethe hosts and switches, and generate complete reports about the SAN from a single user interface.

Storage Essentials does not replace RWC

Storage Essentials is not a low level provisioning tool. Tasks that are considered a one time operation arenot configurable through Storage Essentials. One time tasks include carving up RAID Groups into LDEVs,creating THP/Snapshot Pools and Journal Groups, creating/attaching V-VOLs to the pool, setting MCU andRCU paths, and configuring external storage. The storage administrator must use the RWC to completethese one time tasks. Additionally, SE does not have the ability to configure replication. However, SE 6.1has been enhanced to allow the user to determine which volumes are used in replication pairs

Advantage Description Notes

Single interface tomanage all arrays,switches, and hosts

System Manager provides all of the tools necessary toconfigure common tasks within the arrays, hosts, andswitches. Plus, Provisioning Manager gives theAdministrator a quick 5 step procedure for configuringtheir storage within the SAN.

XP Command View AEmanages multiple XP diskarrays, but it does notmanage hosts andswitches. RWC managesone XP disk array at a time.

Ability to monitorperformance ofarrays, switches andhosts

Performance Manager allows the user to monitorapplications running on hosts, the hosts themselves, aswell as switches and arrays connected to the hosts. Theadministrator can use this data to troubleshoot their SAN,and optimize performance.

XP Performance Advisor isXP disk array focused. Itprovides deep reporting, ahistorical DB, andperformance estimation.

Topology Map andReports

Both the System Manager and Performance Managerdraw a SAN map that clearly shows connections from thehosts to the arrays. Report Manager will generate reportsfor host, switches, array and array performance.

SE is the only tool that

displays the entire SANtopology, and generatesconfiguration andperformance reports forarrays, hosts, andswitches.

Function Remote Web Console Storage Essentials

Create new LDEVs and THP/SnapshotPools

Yes No

Provision LUNs Yes Yes

Configure CA/External Storage Links Yes No

Configure replication pairs Yes No

Configure Auto-Lun Yes No


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System ManagerIn this section we will describe the System Managers components and how they relate to the XP disk array.Additionally, we will walk through common provisioning steps for the XP.

Storage Pools

SE Storage Pools are purely a concept within the application itself. The XP disk array uses the termpool to describe volumes that are used for Thin Provisioning and Snapshot. SE will automatically

create a logical storage pool to group volumes that could be used in a LUSE volume together, inaddition to reflecting internal XP pools used for Thin Provisioning and Snapshot. Continuous Access

J ournal Groups are not show in version 6.1, but journal group volumes are identified with thevolume flag.

Note: THP and Snapshot V-VOLs cannot be in a LUSE volume; therefore, THP and Snapshotstorage pools show up in SE to allow the user to view which LDEVs are virtual. The user does nothave the ability to create a new virtual volume using SE. RWC must be used instead.

Figure 1

Translation of the Storage Pools name into XP concepts (See Figure 1):

1. Free Space Array Group : These pools show the sum of available freespace in the RAID group that has not been allocated to a LDEV id. The only purpose it serves inSE is to inform the user of available capacity not yet useable by SE until the free space isassigned a LDEV id through RWC or the SVP. You cannot map free space to a Port/HostStorage Group until it is assigned a LDEV id.

2. Open-V External: Groups all of the E-LUNs into a single storage pool so the user will know whichLDEVs are from external arrays. It is not recommended to try to LUSE these volumes using theNew Volume tool because SE does not show which external array to which the LDEV maps.Instead, use the RWC Custom Volume screen.


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3. Open-V RAID#: On the XP 24000 you can LUSE all volumes that have the same RAID type andemulation mode; therefore, SE groups all of these LDEVs into a single pool. Older arrays havemore restrictions on the types of volumes that could be in a LUSE together, but SE will reflect therestrictions when it generates the storage pools.

4. Snapshot Pool : Shows all of the Snapshot volumes connected to the pool . Usedcapacity and Size will always match because you cannot delete the volume to create a newLUSE. The capacity reflects the total virtual capacity sum of the snapshot V-VOLs.

5. THP Pool : Shows all of the V-VOLs connected to the pool . Used capacity and Sizewill always match because you cannot delete the volume to create a new LUSE. The capacityreflects the total virtual capacity sum of the Thin Provision V-VOLs.

Create a New Volume

Currently, creating a new volume will only create an XP LUSE volume. From System Manager youcan navigate down the tree menu right click on the array and select Provision->Volumes. Or, doubleclick on the array from the topology map and then click the Volumes button.

Storage Essentials uses the concept of a volume and a storage pool purely as a logical mappingwithin SE, it does not necessarily reflect a pool in the array. Do not confuse SE storage pools with

Thin Provisioning or Snapshot pools. For the XP, SE groups all volumes into a storage pool basedon their LUSE ability. Volumes that can be LUSEd together belong to the same storage pool. Bydefault, all LDEVs are considered volumes. In order to create a new LUSE, you must first delete theSE volumes you would like to LUSE together. Deleting a volume does not mean that the LDEV wilbe returned to free space in the array, it is simply a logical mapping to the SE storage pool that isremoved. After volumes are deleted, you can view the storage pool to see how much availablespace exists for creating a new volume.

Steps:

1. From the Volumes screen, filter on the storage pool from which you would like to create a newvolume. Also, choose Unmapped Volumes from the filter. The storage pool name will indicatethe RAID type of the volumes it contains.


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Figure 2

2. Select the LDEVs that you would like to LUSE together (See Figure 2). You can also use thefilter to narrow down your search to specific LDEV capacity and/or LDEV id.

3. Press Delete Volume button to release the LDEVs so they can be LUSEd together. By default,all LDEVs are considered used volumes so you must delete their association before creating aLUSE (think of it as all LDEVs are a LUSE of size 1 initially).

4. Click the New Volume button to group together the deleted volumes.


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Figure 3

5. Now you should see your storage pools, and the pool from which you deleted the LDEVs youwant to LUSE together (see Figure 3). The storage pool will show the total size of the LDEVsyou have made available for LUSEing in the Available column. Select the storage pool, type inthe total size of the LUSE you want to create, and click next.

6. Select the volume capabilities for your LUSE, for the XP disk array default capabilities are thesame as Storage Pool Default Settings.

7. Click finish to create the new volume. You new volume will be at least the size you specified.You may get a larger volume if your available LDEVs sum up to be greater than your specifiedsize. Ex: 2 volumes of 50 GB each were deleted. The user specified a new volume of 70GB.

The result will be a new volume of 100GB because the two LDEVs available add up to 100GB.

8. Your new volume will show up in the storage pool as a Group volume with the first (master)LDEV in its name. At this point, it is still not a LUSE. The group volume is only a logicalgrouping within SE.

9. Next you need to map you new volume (group) to a port, which will submit the transaction to thearray and create your LUSE. Additionally, your new LUSE will be mapped to the port youselected, making it a LUN.

Create Host Security Group

Steps:

1. From the Host Security Groups tab click on the New Host Security Group button or select anexisting host security group and click the edit button.


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Figure 4

2. Edit the name, select the port where to map it, choose your host mode options, and click Next toadd WWNs or directly click the LUNs tab to add/delete LUNs (see Figure 4).

3. From the Initiators tab click the Add button to add host HBA WWNs and click Next to continue.

4. A list of existing LUNs mapped to the Host Storage Group (HSG) is displayed. Click the Addbutton to add new luns.


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Figure 5

5. From the Add Luns screen you can enter in a Unit Number, also known as LUN id, or use theAuto Select check box to let the array select the next available LUN id (see Figure 5). Filter onthe storage pool to which your new volume belongs, and select the volume. If its going to

become a LUSE, the LDEV id will be prefixed with GROUP. Click the Add button to continue.Best practice when provisioning a LUN is to consider the performance characteristics yourapplication/host needs. Use the filter to narrow down your search results, and then click on theLDEV itself to confirm its properties such as drive speed.

6. Repeat step 5 for all of the volumes you want to add to your host storage group.

7. From the Create Host Storage Group screen, click on Finish to submit the transactions to thearray. At this time your GROUP volume will become a LUSE and it will be mapped to theport/host security group as a LUN.

Volume Details

Selecting a volume from any screen in SE will display its details. SE uses what they call a CIMmodel for each element within the array. The elements are composed of other elements; as a resultyou can navigate from one element to another if they are related, and view their details. Forexample, when you select a volume it will display its details such as size, CLPR/SLPR, StoragePool, Disk Drives, and additional Storage Extents.


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Figure 6

The Volumes screen will show all of the LDEVs at a glance (see Figure 6). The table indicates thesize of the volume, the pool to which it belongs, the SLPR/CLPR and its Volume Flag. The VolumeFlag displays the type of volume it is and how it is being used (such as a replication pair volume,

journal group volume, command device, etc.). In figure 6 we can see THP Volumes and normalvolumes that are replication S-VOLs in replication. Since, none of these volumes are LUSEable,they cannot be deleted back to usable storage pool space.


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Figure 7

Click on the volume (LDEV id) within any SE screen to display its details such as its type, itsCLPR/SLPR, size in blocks, RAID Level, Storage Pool, the Disk Drives in the RAID group (seeFigure 7), and additional storage extents. The LDEV itself shows up as a Storage Extent becausethe CIM model uses this element to link to additional details such as the RAID Group from which ithas been allocated.


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Figure 8

Selecting a disk drive will display its details, its RAID Group, and other Storage Volumes (LDEVs)that are allocated to that RAID Group (see Figure 8). The RAID Group shows up as a Storage

Extent, meaning that in the CIM model the RAID Group is composed of drive elements of which thisdrive is one example. You can click on the RAID Group to view its details.


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Figure 9

Selecting a THP V-VOL may at first glance appear not to reveal much information other than basicinformation and the THP pool (see Figure 9). However, the storage extent link will display moredetails about the V-VOL.


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Figure 10

The THP V-VOL group is displayed in the storage extent screen (see Figure 10). Selecting, the V-VOL group will then show the other V-VOLs that belong to the same group. A general best practicefor THP is to only create one V-VOL per V-VOL group to allow for easy V-VOL expansion.Currently, you can only create a V-VOL group and V-VOL using the RWC. The storage pool link willshow the details concerning the THP Pool.


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Figure 11

The Storage Pool shows all of the LDEVs that are elements connected to this pool as either internalPool LDEVs or V-VOLs (see Figure 11). In the Storage Extents section you can see all of the

LDEVs that make up the pool, as well as the V-VOLs connected to the pool (suffixed with and X).Selecting the pool LDEV will link to that LDEVs details such as Capacity and RAID Groupinformation.

Host to Array DetailsThe Topology view allows a complete mapping from host devices to XP disks.


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Figure 12

The main navigation screen shows the entire SAN, but if you want to focus on a particular node suchas a host or array, you can right click on it and choose Go to Element Topology (see Figure 12).

The tree menu on the left gives you a complete end-to-end picture from you application data path onthe host all the way to the LDEV and its constituent disks. Click on any of the items in the menu tozoom in on the node within the topology picture, and then double click the item from the picture toview its details.


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Provisioning Manager

Provisioning Manager is an optional plug-in into the SE suite. It allows the user to quickly navigate throughthe SAN and select components to provision. Currently, it lacks some necessary at-a-glance details suchas RAID Type and SLPR/CLPR information for selecting an LDEV to provision.

Five easy steps to provision your XP

Figure 13

Steps (see Figure 13):1. Select the array from which you want to provision LDEVs.

2. Select the host you want to map the LDEVs to, and its HBAs.

3. Choose your LDEVs. You can view Mapped and Unmapped LDEVs, and select as many as youwant to provision simultaneously. The LDEV will show its capacity, and Volume Flag to indicate ifits a command device, THP/Snapshot V-VOL, or replication status.

4. Choose the array port and host storage group. You can click on Create New Host Storage Groupicon just above the table to setup a new group.

5. Choose the zone to which you would like to add your mapping. You can also click on the CreateNew Zone icon just above the table to setup a new switch zone.


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Performance Manager

Performance Manager allows the user to diagnose and optimize their entire SAN. Performance metrics arecollected from devices within the SAN that have the appropriate CIMextension or SMI-S agent installed.Metrics are collected and aggregated over time in order to save disk space on the management station.Data can be collected in real time (20 sec intervals), but only for the chart(s) visible on the screen. All otherperformance data is collected on a 10 minute interval by default. After one day the data is aggregated to

one hour intervals, after a week its aggregated to one day intervals, etc The values are aggregatedaccording to the weighted average for the sample period. The user can configure the collection frequencyfor the SAN components.

We will cover the following use cases in detail: End to End Performance Analyze your applications performance from host to array Array Centric Performance Detailed view all of the array performance characteristics Diagnose Performance Bottlenecks Common rules to help diagnose performance bottlenecks on

the XP

Optimize Your Performance Best practice for optimizing your performance External Storage and Continuous Access Link Performance for viewing link performance THP/Snapshot/Continuous Access J ournal Pool Performance for viewing pool/group performance

Setup

Figure 14

XP performance data collection works by collecting data in-band from a command device. You need tosetup at least one host in the SAN with a command device from the array, with a CIMExtension installed.

The CIMExtension will automatically detect the command device. After running Discovery GAED (Get AllElement Details) view the Arrays properties then click the Edit Proxy Host button to select the host thatwill be used to collect performance data (see Figure 14).


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End to End Performance

Performance Manager allows you to analyze your applications performance from host to array. From thehost application, you can probe through the HBA into the switch and finally down to the disk on the array toview all of their performance characteristics in a single screen.

Figure 15

All devices that have a CIMExtension and/or supported SMI-S agent will show up in the navigationmap as an icon with graph symbol. Click on any of these devices to view their performance metrics(see Figure 15).

Host Metrics:From the host you can view processor and memory utilization, HBA status, transmission

metrics, and application path metrics. The application path maps from the mount point all the way tothe array LDEV. Along the path you can choose any device to view its performance.

Switch Metrics:Selecting the switch will allow you to view the aggregated bytes transmitted/received, and the

individual switch port metrics including CRC errors and link failures. Additionally, you can navigateto other switches, hosts and arrays connected to the switch and view their metrics.

Array Metrics:The array view will show every performance metric available. You can view front/back end

controllers, ports, storage groups and their volumes, and RAID groups.

Array Centric Performance

Performance manager will allow to deep dive into the array and view all of the components performancecharacteristics.


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Available Components:

Array Memory Cache and Shared Memory statistics Front End Controllers CHA processors and Port statistics Back End Controllers DKA processor statistics Storage Pools Volume statistics Array Groups RAID Group statistics

Figure 16

Selecting the array will allow the user to view shared memory and cache usage statistics. Thecache statistics are itemized per CLPR. It is important for the user to observe how the array isutilizing its memory and cache in order to help determine the root cause of a performancebottleneck. The user has the option to filter on CLPR by selecting the Filter Performance Data

button in the top left hand corner of the graph (see Figure 16).

Best practice: As IO is running, view the Cache Writes Pending for the CLPR your host/applicationLUN(s) belong in Real Time (select Real Time from the Period drop down box). Write Pendingindicates the amount of IO waiting to be de-staged to disk. As cache writes pending approaches70%, the array will begin to hold back IO, which will affect your hosts response time.

From the array tree, you can traverse down into the Controllers section and view front and back endperformance metrics.


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Figure 17

Front-End Controllers route IO to/from hosts to their disk cache slots (See Figure 17):

The front end view will show all of the channel adapters (CHA) and their constituent ports. Selectingthe CHA will allow you to view the processor (MP) utilization. You can filter on the MPs by clickingthe Filter Performance Data button in the top left hand corner of the graph. Continue to traversedown the CHA tree to the individual port metrics.

Best Practice: Graph CHA MP Utilization and Port data rate simultaneously to determine if the portis the bottleneck. If MP utilization is less than 90%, and the port data rate is near its maximum, thenyou know that data is being de-staged to disk normally assuming the host(s) is running at its peak. Ifnot, check the DKA and RAID Group utilization.


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Figure 18

Back-End Controllers route IO from cache slots to the disk (see Figure 18):

The back end view will show all the disk controller adapters (DKA). Selecting the DKA will allow youto view the processor utilization (MP). You can filter on the MPs by clicking the Filter PerformanceData button in the top left hand corner of the graph.

Best Practice: Graph DKA MP Utilization and RAID Group(s) IOPs in order to determine whetherthe controller is acting as a bottleneck. If MP utilization at around 90% and the RAID Groups datarate is much lower than expected for the RAID level and disk type, there could be a back groundprocess such as replication that is over-utilizing the DKA. Generally, you want your back up diskson a different RAID Group than your production disks, and the backup disks should be connected toa different DKA.


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Figure 19

Volume performance is monitored by selecting the Storage Pool containing the Volume (see Figure

19). The pool will show all of the volumes such as LDEVs, LUSEs, and V-VOLs associated with it.Select each volume to view its performance.

Best Practice: The customer is usually most concerned with response time, and then data rate.From the volume you can view its response time to the host, and its data rate. When diagnosing aperformance bottleneck, first graph the applications volume response time and data rates. Ifresponse time is high, and data rate is low, then there could be a problem with any of the stages in-between (switch, CHA, DKA, etc). If response time is low/normal and data rate is high, storage isnot the source of your applications performance problem. If the application is using more than oneLUN, you can graph metrics that have the same units on the same graph, but not in real time.


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Figure 20

The Array Groups section lists all of the RAID Groups in the array (see Figure 20). Select the array groupto view its performance (e.g. Utilization). The user can distinguish the IO types and determine how theRAID group is being utilized, in order to determine whether data should be migrated to another group.

Best Practice: Simultaneously, graph the percentage of Reads and Writes, Random and Sequential IO,average Read and Write size, and total Utilization. You can see how the RAID group is being used, bycomparing the percentage of Reads and Writes, the IO types, and Utilization. If there is excessive Randomaccess, it could affect your sequential performance; therefore, you might want to move your LUNs used forRandom IO to another RAID group (use Auto LUN, or Business Copy).


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Diagnose Performance Bottlenecks

Every administrator has been bothered with the same question from customers Why is my applicationrunning so slowly? SE has all of the tools necessary to diagnose the source of application performanceissues.

Figure 21

Many factors that could affect your applications performance. In this example we will cover the mostcommon factors (see Figure 21).

Steps:1. Navigate to the host running your application and bring up its performance by clicking on it.

2. Check the hosts processor utilization and physical/virtual memory consumption. If your processor isrunning near 100% and virtual memory consumption is greater than physical memory, the problem ismost likely with the host not having enough resources to process the IO for the application.

3. Select the application path where the application is running, and expand its members.

4. Check the LDEVs read/write response time. The LDEV may have an extremely high response time(above 20ms) or zero response. When the response time is higher than expected, there may be a


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resource contention problem within the array. In the case of zero response, there could be a linkfailure.

5. Chart the HBA, switches, and array port Bytes Transmitted/Received metrics on the same graph toverify that traffic is passing through to the array without problems. If you see large differencesbetween the HBA, switch and array port, the problem could be a bad SFP or fiber link.

6. Chart the array port and LDEV Total Data Rate. The array port should have at least the same datarate as the LDEV. If the array port data rate is lower than LDEV that could mean you have too much

write pending in cache.

7. Select the array and chart its cache write pending percentage. The array will begin to hold back IOIf the write pending is at or above 70%. Some of the causes for excessive write pending could betoo much IO from other devices in the CLPR, replication processing, and external storage (unlessyou have cache write-through mode enabled).

Optimize Your Performance

RAID group utilization will let you know what kind of IO is affecting performance. Some disk types and

RAID levels work faster with Sequential vs. Random IO, and/or Reads vs. Writes. The storage adminshould optimize the array to satisfy the customers Service Level Agreement (SLA) while minimizing thecost of the array. The user will also need to know the origin of the IO is (the volumes in use), the data path,and array resource usage.

Steps to Optimize Performance:1. Chart RAID Group utilization metrics and check to see what kind of IO is most prevalent.2. Determine the Volumes connected to the RAID Group and chart their IO type and response

times.3. Verify that the response times meet the customers SLA.4. Determine which volumes are candidates for optimization based on their IO type and response

times.

5. Check the ports to which the volumes are mapped and graph their throughput.6. Verify that the port is not a bottleneck based on its max rated throughput vs. actual.7. Determine the host to which the volumes are mapped, and make sure its resources are not

excessively utilized.8. Determine which applications are using the Volumes in the RAID group.9. Locate new volumes to use as candidates for migration.10. Check the candidates current RAID Group utilization to verify that resources are available.

External Storage and Continuous Access Link Performance

Currently, you must use the RWC to determine which ports are used for Continuous Access and/or ExternalStorage connectivity. Plot the ports you suspect may have a failure, and the switches used to interconnectthe arrays. The port charts will show you how well the port is being utilized, and the switch chart will showany link failures between the arrays.

Steps to diagnose your links:1. Navigate to front-end controllers and chart the IOPs from initiator or target Port. If you want

to see performance from all arrays simultaneously you will need to launch another browsersession for each array.

2. Chart the backend processor (XP DKA) metrics for the external arrays.


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3. Chart cache write pending for all arrays. Your XP disk array should have cache pass-through enabled for external storage; therefore, you will see minimum impact on the CLPRmetrics assigned to the external LUNs.

4. Monitor the switches to determine the link failures. You will need to launch another browsersession to view switches and arrays simultaneously.

5. Assuming there are no link failures, determine which external array connections areexcessively utilized by checking the cache writes pending versus link IOPs. If cache writespending on the external array is low and link IOPs are high, then you could add anotherexternal link path to improve performance.

THP/Snapshot Pool Performance

XP Pools are composed of LDEVs from RAID Groups. In order to fully analyze your Pool, you mustdetermine the RAID Groups to which the LDEVs belong. Best practice for creating a Pool is to dedicate theentire RAID Group to that Pool, which makes the performance more predicable, since no external sourcesof IO and disk utilization will affect the Pool.

Steps to diagnose your Pool:1. Select Storage Pools and right click on the Pool in question, then choose Show Properties. Select

the pool volumes to determine the RAID Groups they belong to.2. Chart the V-VOL Performance from the Storage Pool.3. Navigate to Array Groups and find the RAID Groups to which the Pool LDEVs belong. Chart the

RAID Group utilization.4. If your RAID Groups utilization is high, focus your search down to IO type. Chart Percent

Reads/Writes for the RAID Group(s) and V-VOL(s) connected to the Pool.5. Look for patterns in IO type vs. V-VOL usage to determine which V-VOLs are most responsible for

RAID Group utilization.

Reporter

The Reporter allows the user to run summary reports on the XPs configuration and performance. Detailedreports are provided in HTML, PDF, Excel, and XML formats. Additionally, reports can be scheduled andsent out as email.

Array Usage Reports

Navigate to Storage Systems and select the XP array for which you would like to see the usage reports.The usage reports list the capacity and utilization.


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Figure 22

Asset Summary - Shows detailed asset management information for the storage system. Available Volumes - Shows which unmapped volumes are available for provisioning. Dependency - Shows every storage switch port on which the storage system depends. Details - Shows detailed configuration information of the storage system. Events - Shows all non-cleared events received for the storage system. LUN Mount - Shows the details of the volumes, which are mounted on discovered hosts. Array Overhead Utilization - Shows the Array utilization capacities over time. Array Utilization - Shows the Array utilization over time.

Unmapped LUNs per Fabric Adapter - Shows information about the volumes, which are assigned tothe Fabric Adapters, but do not have any initiators associated with them.

Utilization - Shows the capacity statistics for the storage array. This report also shows the list ofhosts connected to the array and their storage consumption within the array.

Performance Reports

Reporter includes a set of most commonly requested Performance Reports such as Top N volumes byResponse Time and Bottom N Array Groups by Random Read Utilization.


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Figure 23

Storage System Report Types for Array Groups, Volumes, Ports, and Storage Controllers:

Utilization Percentage Cache Usage Request Rate Read and Write I/O rates and percentage Response Time I/O response from the array point of view Throughput Read and Write MB/s for sequential and random IO

Capacity Manager


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Capacity Manager displays usage reports of your arrays storage. New for SE 6.1 is THP and SnapshotPool capacity usage.

Figure 24

Selecting the Post-RAID tab will bring up a summary screen that lists out all of the arrays capacity usagedetails (see Figure 24). The table itemizes all of the arrays storage pools, and their usage statistics.

Usage Statistics:

Total Capacity Sum of the capacity of all LDEVs assigned to the storage pool.

Mapped Total LUN capacity from the pool available to be mapped, or is currently mapped to a host. Thisvalue includes the total virtual volume size presented to the port.

Unmapped Remaining unmapped LUN capacity in the pool.

Total Allocated The sum of all volumes available for provisioning.

Total Unallocated The sum of all deleted volumes from the storage pool; the space available to create anew volume for use in provisioning to hosts.

% Allocated Percentage of storage available to the host. In a THP situation, this value could exceed100% because the V-VOL size could exceed the pool size.


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Glossary

These terms used throughout the white paper aid in understanding the innovative solutions provided by HP servers andstorage.

Term Definition

Array Group 4 Disk drives in a purchase order

BC Business Copy

CHA Channel Host Adapter

CHP Channel Host Processor

CLI Command Line Interface

CLPR Cache Logical Partition

CM Cache Memory

CSW Cache Switch

CV AE Command View Advanced Edition

CVS Custom Volume SetDCR Data Cache LUN Residence

Disk Group See RAID Group

DKA Disk Control Adapter

DKC Disk control frame

DKU Disk array frame

DR Disaster recovery

DWL Duplex Write Limit

FC Fibre Channel

FC AL Fibre Channel Arbitrated Loop

SSID Subsystem ID

GB Giga byte

Gb Giga bit

GUI Graphical user interface

HA High availability

HBA Host bus adapter

HDU Hard Disk box

IOPS I/Os per secondLDEV Logical device

LDKC Logical Disk Control Frame

LUN SCSI Logical Unit Number

MCU Main Control Unit

MP Micro Processor

nPar HP nPartition (hard partition)

OLTP Online Transaction Processing


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Parity group See RAID Group

PCR Partial Cache Residence

PSA Partition Storage Administrator

P-Vol Primary Volume

QoS Quality of Service

RAID Group The set of disks that make up a RAID set

RCU Remote Control UnitRWC Remote Web Console

SA Storage administrator

SAN Storage area network

SLA Service Level Agreement

SLPR Storage Management Logical Partition

SM Shared Memory

SPOF Single point of failure

SS SnapShot

S-Vol Secondary volume

SVP XP array Service Processor

TB Tera Byte

THP Thin Provisioning

UPS Uninterruptible power supply

V-Vol Virtual volume

WWN World Wide Name, a unique 64-bit device identifier in a Fibre Channelstorage area network

Xp-storage Essentials Performance Edition-best Practices-rev1!0!0906xx

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