GPA Manual

Using GPA Information
Guardian Performance Analyzer (GPA) Manual—135081
4-3
System Performance Summary
You can get a picture of the overall health of the system from some of the data in the
Node Characteristics subsection of the report as well as from the Global Performance
Indicators.
From the Node Characteristics subsection, you can tell the following:
•
How many page swaps per second are taking place on the node (NODE SWAP
RATE). This is the total of the swap rate for all CPUs. If the report shows a node
swap rate greater than 1.0, it usually indicates that the system is having a memory
shortage problem or that the disk processes are not properly distributed among the
CPUs on the node. Example 4-1 shows that \NODEA has a swap rate of
2.3 pages/second due to a shortage of memory. Although the swap rate does not
exceed 1 swap/second for \NODEC, GPA has analyzed the swap rate and shows that
a lack of memory is the cause for the value of 0.5 swaps/second.
•
How many processors, if any, are out of balance. That is, how many processors are
being relatively over- or underutilized. For proper system performance, there should
be none. Example 4-2 shows that on \NODEB, one processor is out of balance. Both
\NODEA and \NODEC have two processors that are out of balance.
•
To what degree the system resources are being utilized. In the \NODEA example,
the node utilization level (AVG CPU BUSY) is 36.2 percent which, at 55.7 percent
of the maximum recommended level, is well below the acceptable limit.
•
How many transient processes are running on the node. Since transient processes are
relatively costly in terms of CPU utilization, the number should be as low as
possible, ideally zero. In our examples, the figures for transients (DYNAMIC PCBS)
are not considered problematic. Note, however, that excessive page swapping
without a memory shortage usually indicates excessive transient processing.
Example 4-3. Node Characteristics for \NODEC
I. NODE CHARACTERISTICS MEASURED MAX VALUE
VALUE EXPECTED
CPU TYPE : CYCLONE
CPU COUNT : 4 16
TOTAL MEMORY : 256 512
VOLUME COUNT : 28 512
STATIC PCBS : 639 1024
DYNAMIC PCBS : 5
OUT OF BALANCE CPU COUNT : 2
MOST BUSY CPU : 2
LEAST BUSY CPU : 1
AVG CPU BUSY : 58.6 85.00
AVG DISK VOLUME BUSY : 11.6 24 %
AVG DISK PROCESS BUSY : 2.5 24 %
% - RECOMMENDED RESOURCES: 69.0 100
NODE SWAP RATE : .5 1 CAUSE:MEMORY