Delivering Excellence and Innovation in Advanced
Computing
Introduction
• Founded in 1991 – Headquarters in Bloomington, MN – Office in Reston, VA
• Core team of professionals – System Analysts and Architects – Broad experiences with challenging problems
• Focused on technology – Performance-based Professional Services – HPC computation, storage & networking
• UNIX, Linux and Windows
Professional Services
• Instrumental delivers performance – Specializing in helping customers achieve a
sustainable, competitive advantage – Our Mission - “To deliver excellence and
innovation in advanced computing environments”
• With proven capabilities – Computation, storage, networking and usability – Architecture, design and integration services
• Performance management • System analysis and optimization • Modeling and simulation
Instrumental Expertise
• Complex Challenges – Exploding costs & tighter budgets – Liability and reputation issues
• Rigid Requirements – Not always performance based
• Control and usability
• Scalable Solutions – CPUs, memory, I/O and networking
• 10,000s of processors • 100s of TB/sec for the file system • 10s of Petabytes in the file system
Vendor Neutral
• We do not resell anything – Hardware or Software
• Nor are we compensated – No finder’s fees – No commissions
• Direct support of many agencies – Trusted partner
• Vendors respect us and sometimes fear us !
• Support for Prime contractors – Sometimes we are asked to be the integrators
for complex architectures
Global Relationships
• US Government – HPC Modernization Office – Defense Community – Intelligence Community – Library of Congress
• Vendors – Imation, Corp. – Sun Microsystems, Inc. – Seagate, Inc. – And others…
Why Instrumental?
• Excellent Reputation – Highly talented people – Known on a world-wide basis – Trusted partner
• Cleared facility – Access elsewhere – Special access clearances
– Key relationships • End Users • Vendors
• Vendor Neutrality – Delivering unbiased objectivity
Fact Based Decisions
• Performance – It is never fast enough
• More and More Data – Double digit growth rates
• RAS – Reliability, availability & serviceability
• Technology – What claims should you believe?
• Costs – Tight budgets
Cost RAS
Performance
Balanced Computing
Delivering Performance
• Performance Engineering – Maximizing investments in H/W and S/W
• Systems and applications performance analysis • Benchmarking and optimization • Capacity planning
• Systems Design & Management – Reliability – Availability – Serviceability – Reduced costs
Delivering Performance
• Modeling & Simulation – Predictive performance analysis
• Capacity planning – Architectural validation
• Design and procurement risk reduction
• Custom Development – Kernel development
• IRIX, Solaris & UXP/V – Driver development
• HIPPI & FC-AL – HPC file systems
• US Government, LSC/Sun, Fujitsu, Cray & SGI
Delivering Performance
• Scientific Visualization – Hardware Upgrades
• Needs assessment • Vendor offerings
– Software Upgrades • General packages • Training
– Visual Collaboration • Immersadesk™ • PowerWalls • Caves™ • Networking • Security
Instrumental’s Approach
• Architecture • SMP, PVP or MPP? • SAN, NAS or Direct Attached storage? • RAID or JBOD?
• Performance & Scalability – Systems & applications characterization – Capacity planning
• Availability – Backup, restore and disaster recovery
• Budgets
Instrumental’s Approach
• Specifications – Define the requirements
• Performance • Functionality • Budget Limitations
• Simulation – Physical limitations dictate simulation
• Go beyond what can be done in a lab • Evaluate proposed solutions • Evaluate enhancements • Influence future products
Instrumental’s Approach
• Emulation – Characterization of systems & applications
• Testing the limits thru benchmarking and analysis – Subsystem emulation – Proof of concept
• Validation – Proving the model correct – Establishes known reference point – Extend model beyond existing configuration
• Integration
Instrumental’s Services
• System Analysis – Complete workload, performance and utilization
analysis of systems, storage and networking • Performance Management
– Anticipates performance based on trends identified from separate analyses
• System Optimization – Tuned to perform at highest capability
• System Management – A rational and comprehensive program
Instrumental’s Services
• Modeling & Simulation – Questions about sizing, performance and
scaling can be analyzed and answered from a number of perspectives
• Benchmarking & Evaluation – Our vendor independence equips our clients
with an unbiased resource • Capacity Planning
– Effective capacity planning requires flexible, accurate system and workload models
Instrumental’s Services
• Project Management • Detailed Installation Plans
– H/W & S/W component lists – Detailed diagrams
• Installation Services – Configuration – Problem resolution – Performance optimization – CONOPS (Concept of Operations)
• On-going Support
Boeing Project
• Hired by The Boeing Company – Architect the ground solution – Quarterback the integration team
• Requirements – I/O
• Real time data capture & archive – Computational demands
• Sustained TFLOPS – COTS solution
• Limited budget – High availability
Sonora Project
• Instrumental - “Chief Architect” – Major defense contractor is the Prime – Sun awarded the integration contract – On-site Technical Project Engineer
• Sub-contractor to STK
• Leverage the Boeing experience – Leverage critical relationships – Architect “new” solutions
• Leadville & Sun Cluster – Overcome new issues
• QFS/SANergy with AIX & IRIX
Recent Engagements
• DoD HPCMO – Chenega Federal Systems
• Architecture & Design – Computation
» TI-0X Benchmarks – Storage
» Multi-site storage architecture – Workload Management and Job Scheduling
• NAVOCEANO – Disaster Recovery Project
Recent Engagements
• Library of Congress – Performance analysis – Assessment, architecture and design
• Panasas – Storage Benchmarking – Market analysis
• Intelligence Community – SAN solutions – Performance analysis – Consolidation
Recent Engagements
• Product Evaluations – Operating systems – File systems – HSM – SAN – NAS – RAID – JBOD – FC Switches & HBAs – SSD
System Modeling & Simulation
• Modeling and Simulation – Models enable predictive analysis of system
behavior • Under varying configurations and workloads
– Simulation combines system and workload models • To automate the performance analysis and prediction
process
– Models provide data collection & analysis facilities • To quantify and substantiate cause and effect behaviors
– Models deliver clarified predictive knowledge • For rational, unbiased analysis
Modeling Engagements
• Architectural Design & Validation – Commercial customers – The Boeing Company – Others
• NAVOCEANO – Advanced storage solution
• HPC Vendor – Internal architectural assessment
• DoD – Performance predictions
Summary
• Instrumental delivers – World class understanding of systems and I/O – Broad technology depth – Unique development capabilities – High performance engineering roots
• And the customer benefits – Systems with high performance and high
reliability – Systems that meet requirements at time of
production – Better ROI for their IT dollars
Thank You
Contact Info: Instrumental, Inc.
2748 East 82nd Street Bloomington, MN 55425
952-345-2820
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