HP SmartCache technology

Technical white paper | HP SmartCache
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HP SmartCache for SAN Storage
Future HP SmartCache solutions will support external storage configurations, including SAN storage products such as the
HP 3PAR StoreServe solutions. HP SmartCache will also support additional accelerators like the HP IO Accelerator. For SAN
implementation, the HP SmartCache control layer moves into the host memory with the operating system above the device
drivers and beneath the file system. This allows caching to be independent of the underlying hardware controller. With HP
SmartCache running in the host operating system, this allows support of various devices such as both bulk storage devices
as well as accelerators. For example, cache devices may be either HP IO Accelerators or SSDs connected to Smart Array
controllers. The initial versions of HP SmartCache for SAN Storage utilize host memory for metadata to support both read-
only and write-through caches.
The HP SmartCache architecture adapts as future technology changes. Initial releases of HP SmartCache for SAN will
support Windows, Linux and VMware operating systems.
Management and analytics
To configure HP SmartCache, use the HP Smart Array configuration utilities: the Array Configuration Utility (ACU) or its
command-line version (ACUCLI).These utilities will also incorporate analytics to provide more visibility into the disk storage
subsystem to show what is happening within HP SmartCache, as well as detailed information on both the physical and
logical disks. In addition, integration with HP Insight Control comes standard, providing information and alerts about HP
SmartCache status.
Future capabilities may allow customers to profile their application and then model the HP SmartCache performance
through a simulator allowing various accelerator substitutions by capacity and performance capability.
Case study: OLTP workload
Data integrity is the most important characteristic for a disk storage subsystem. HP SmartCache technology provides a
reliable, enterprise class solution. Performance, which is dependent upon the application, and the price:performance ratio
are the characteristics that generate interest in HP SmartCache. HP SmartCache improves performance when applications
produce the following conditions:
• There is more read traffic than write traffic
• Data is referenced repeatedly, which is common in many applications
For our OLTP workload case study, we ran a Transaction Processing Performance Council type E (TPCe)-like
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benchmark on
a ProLiant DL380 server with 48 GB of memory, a Smart Array P421 controller, and a 2-GB FBWC module configured as
100% write cache.
Figure 4. This shows the configuration used for the TPCe-like case study.
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Modified TPCe workload as defined in presentation “Using Solid State Drives As a Mid-Tier Cache in Enterprise Database OLTP Application” by Badriddine
Khessib, Microsoft for TPC Technology Conference 2010 – Singapore, (http://www.tpc.org/tpctc2010/TPCTC2010-12.pdf)
ProLiant DL380p with 48 GB memory
Boot
72 GB
RAID 1
Logs
900 GB
RAID 5
Metadata
in FBWC memory
Database
1.8 TB
RAID 1+0
SmartCache SSD
100 GB RAID 0
SmartCache
elements