SearchFAQMemberlist Log in
Reply to topic Page 1 of 1
LTO4 Performance Recommendations - backup, restore, and aux
Author Message
Post LTO4 Performance Recommendations - backup, restore, and aux 
I have raised this with CommVault support twice and with PS resources to try and get some assistance; no major progress.

With the Aux copy performance I am doing cross-site with several different storage policies, so I don't really have the option of running more than one device stream for each aux copy (and that would only be hiding the real issue anyway).

Here's something interesting:
I actually cut a backup over on the weekend from network to SAN attached tape (client as media agent for itself). Linux box - 5TB of user data with lots of files. The backup ran the previous weekend over the network (1Gb) to a dedicated windows MA < at > 320GB/hr (1.1:1 software compression). After cutting over to FC attached tape direct I get 250GB/hr! 4 readers used for both backups. I am guessing this has to do with the stream of compressed data being sent with client side compression and/or how the buffering happens on the media agent.

JJ

--- In commvault < at > yahoogroups.com ([email]commvault%40yahoogroups.com[/email]), George Haddad <georgeh < at > ...> wrote:

I've been trying everything to improve throughput. I've been
experimenting with different multiplex factors, different chunksizes,
and for AUxes I've enabled stream randomization. I've re-configged the
Qlogic 2462s per some (rather dated) IBM Redbook settings. I have seen
improved performance at times, but cannot sustain it regularly. Looking
at the actual throughput to the Tape Drives I've seen as high as 85-100
MB/sec. I'd be happy to get that regularly. But that's when the
Commserve and Media Agents involved are otherwise idle. Mostly I see
20-50MB/sec ... but at times as low as 1-5MB/sec. Usually the 1-5 is
when the Commserve and MAs are going full-tilt with primary disk copies
while simumultaneously running AUXes to tape. Maybe that's the best I
can expect under those circumstances? One thing I've noticed is that
tape throughput usually falls off when a single MA is writing to more
than 1 tape. We have tapes distributed across 2 HBA ports (via separate
switches). But Commvault will often allocate 2 drives on the same HBA. I
don't know if splitting the tapes into different pools would help.


William Morris wrote:

JJ

You are doing better than we are. DELL PB 2950 Win 2003 R < at > Comcell.
Dell ML600 Library with LT04. Max

I have ever rec'd is 280 mb/hr and that's an AUX copy..

Bill

*From:* commvault < at > yahoogroups.com ([email]commvault%40yahoogroups.com[/email]) [mailto:commvault < at > yahoogroups.com ([email]commvault%40yahoogroups.com[/email])]
*On Behalf Of *J J
*Sent:* Wednesday, February 03, 2010 10:34 PM
*To:* commvault < at > yahoogroups.com ([email]commvault%40yahoogroups.com[/email])
*Subject:* [SPAM] [commvault] LTO4 Performance Recommendations -
backup, restore, and aux copies

Hi,

Anyone out there driving LTO4 tape drives in anger with CommVault? We
are v8 SP4. HP ESL tape libraries with HP LTO4 FC drives.

I am struggling to get the performance I am expecting (I got almost
500GB/hr to a single LTO4 drive with h/w compression and 8 concurrency
a.k.a multiplexing out of our old HP DataProtector software).

CommVault Backup to tape, h/w compression only, large file backup
(database flat file snapshot) - maximum throughput I get is about
375GB/hr with 8xreaders, 8 Multiplexing to one drive, 16G chunk size,
256K block size (the client/media agent in question - 6xCPU 16G Mem
HPUX server doing nothing but this backup). TapeTool or similar can
push to the 410GB/hr approx theoretical limit with compression off, so
I know the infrastructure is capable.

Even though I would class this backup performance as "adequate" for
LTO4, I am worried about the implications of such a configuration on
our restore times. If multiplexing is reduced, we don't get much more
than low 200's (GB/hr).

Tape-to-Tape aux copies are also terrible performance - about 200GB/hr
max. I expect these should flow through at close to double that (near
raw speed limit of LTO4), as if I understand it correctly a
synchronous aux copy is purely reading and writing chunks of data and
should be able to get the tapes streaming+screaming.

Anyone have any experience with this? Helpful tips particularly on
speeding up the Aux copies? Achieved throughputs/speeds that I could
use as a comparison?

Any help on performance recommendations/own in-house tuning around
items such as: tape block size, chunk size, multiplexing factor,
CommVault memory buffering registry settings etc?

The slow aux copies are killing us as we do cross-site tape copies and
after a weekend's full backups we are running the cross-site tape copy
for a couple of days.

Thanks!

J





__._,_.___
Reply to sender ([email]?subject=Re: LTO4 Performance Recommendations - backup, restore, and aux copies[/email]) | Reply to group ([email]commvault < at > yahoogroups.com?subject=Re: LTO4 Performance Recommendations - backup, restore, and aux copies[/email])
Messages in this topic (5)
Recent Activity: Visit Your Group Start a New Topic

Commvault Documentation here:
http://documentation.commvault.com/
MARKETPLACE

[url=http://us.ard.yahoo.com/SIG=14kg5td15/M=493064.13814333.13821539.13298430/D=groups/S=1707277520:MKP1/Y=YAHOO/EXP=1265613332/L=/B=Aq.3BkSO5.8-/J=1265606132364246/K=52HDpw7ggTvjFG8wsufhYA/A=5922843/R=0/SIG=11ckn2mo6/*http://advision.webevents.yahoo.com/green/]Going Green: Your Yahoo! Groups resource for green living[/url]


Text-Only ([email]commvault-traditional < at > yahoogroups.com?subject=Change Delivery Format: Traditional[/email]), Daily Digest ([email]commvault-digest < at > yahoogroups.com?subject=Email Delivery: Digest[/email]) &bull; Unsubscribe ([email]commvault-unsubscribe < at > yahoogroups.com?subject=Unsubscribe[/email]) &bull; Terms of Use




.

[img]http://geo.yahoo.com/serv?s=97359714/grpId=7450851/grpspId=1707277520/msgId=3332/stime=1265606131/nc1=4507179/nc2=4025321/nc3=5922735[/img]
__,_._,___

Post LTO Tape Write Speed 
CommVault default block size is set too small for LTO4 tape drives, try changing the block size to 16384 or 32768 and see if that will fix your issue. We run Simpana 8 SP5 here and it fixed most of our speed issue.

View user's profile Send private message
Display posts from previous:
Reply to topic Page 1 of 1
You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
  


Magic SEO URL for phpBB