Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity

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Intel® Ethernet Server Adapters deliver excellent results for SANs, without proprietary components

OVERVIEW

Data-driven business operations and regulatory data-retention requirements have

driven up data-storage needs among businesses of all sizes, making SANs a standard

component of IT infrastructures. In particular, virtualized servers benet dramatically

from SAN functionality, in areas such as virtual machine (VM) storage and live migration.

Alongside traditional Fibre Channel networks, a growing proportion of SAN adopters

nd iSCSI connectivity compelling, particularly because it uses Ethernet, which is a

standardized, widely deployed, and well-understood technology. Using iSCSI to transmit

block-level storage commands over Ethernet networks adds benets in terms of cost

and simplicity, and Intel is committed to providing the most advanced solutions in the

industry for iSCSI and other unied networking technologies.

Intel is the industry’s leading supplier of Ethernet adapters, and the broad product line

of Intel Ethernet Server Adapters provides the state of the art in simple, reliable, cost-

effective iSCSI connectivity. Optimizations for the native iSCSI support provided by the

OS help ensure stability and simplicity by eliminating the need for proprietary hardware

and software. At the same time, hardware-based acceleration features speed iSCSI

trafc, and assists in the Ethernet controller increase throughput in virtualized servers.

Simplify iSCSI Connectivity

The broad range of Intel® Ethernet

Server Adapters provides the easiest

and most cost-effective way to

connect servers to iSCSI SANs.

Intel Ethernet Server Adapters

use the native iSCSI initiators

integrated in the operating system,

are optimized for virtualized

environments, and include

hardware acceleration features

across the entire product line.

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

Intel® Ethernet Server Adapters offer compelling value to IT organizations because they

are designed to meet the growing requirements for server connectivity to storage area

networks (SANs). This paper examines some of the trends that have led to that growth

of Internet small computer system interface (iSCSI) SANs and the standards-based

technologies that make Intel Ethernet Server Adapters ideally suited to connect

servers to them.

Next, the paper demonstrates key performance-oriented features of Intel Ethernet

Server Adapters, such as the use of operating system (OS)-native iSCSI initiators and

hardware-based acceleration. It then introduces optimizations throughout the hardware

and software virtualization stack that complete the picture of Intel® Ethernet as the

iSCSI connectivity solution-of-choice for IT.

Finally, the paper introduces the outstanding throughput that Intel has achieved using

this hardware without the expense and complexity of proprietary iSCSI ofoads. In sum,

the paper demonstrates how using Intel Ethernet Server Adapters for iSCSI presents a

superior solution over proprietary solutions.

January 2010

Version 1.0

WHITE PAPER

Intel® Ethernet Server Adapters

SANs and Virtualization

Summary of content (8 pages)

PAGE 1
WHITE PAPER Intel® Ethernet Server Adapters SANs and Virtualization Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity Intel® Ethernet Server Adapters deliver excellent results for SANs, without proprietary components January 2010 Version 1.0 Simplify iSCSI Connectivity The broad range of Intel® Ethernet Server Adapters provides the easiest and most cost-effective way to connect servers to iSCSI SANs.
PAGE 2
Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity Table of Contents Executive Summary. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Overview. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Intel® Ethernet Server Adapters: Ideal for iSCSI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Native OS Support for Dependable Simplicity and Lower Costs . . . . . . . . 2 Extending the Value of Centralized Data Storage with Remote Boot. . . . 3 Consistent, Reliable Performance across the Product Family . . . . . . . . .
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Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity The majority of server iSCSI connections today use the integrated native OS initiators, and the integration of the initiator with the OS greatly simplifies the establishment of an iSCSI connection. For example, these are the simple setup steps required to use iSCSI connections in Microsoft Windows Server* 2008: 1. Install Windows Server 2008. 2. Set up your target(s). 3. From Control Panel, launch the iSCSI Initiator utility. 4.
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Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity Hardware-based Native iSCSI Initiator Acceleration Intel Ethernet Server Adapters include a number of hardware features that accelerate iSCSI traffic and improve data processing on multicore processor-based servers. Intelligent hardware offloads deliver iSCSI performance that exceeds the performance demonstrated by leading iSCSI HBAs that offload iSCSI processing to a proprietary engine.
PAGE 5
Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity Platform Advancements 10GbE Intel Ethernet Server Adapters support data center bridging (DCB) in hardware to provide the lossless or nodrop Ethernet fabric needed for storage traffic. This set of standards enables better traffic prioritization over a single interface as well as an advanced means for shaping traffic on the network to decrease congestion.
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Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity In addition, Intel Ethernet Server Adapter assists such as receive-side coalescing and TCP segmentation offload help reduce processor utilization. Platform features including receive-side scaling and MSI-X help accelerate throughput. In real-world implementations, typical IOPS performance is much lower than these benchmarks and is limited by a number of factors, including application threading, as well as storage target processor and disk speeds.
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Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity Conclusion Intel remains committed to providing industry-leading support for unified networking. With its support for native initiators, hardware acceleration features, and optimizations for virtualized I/O, Intel Ethernet Server Adapters are the most reliable, cost-effective, and easy- to-use solutions for iSCSI connectivity.
PAGE 8
Simple, Reliable Performance for iSCSI Connectivity 1 Test Configuration: Iometer v. 2006.7.27, number of managers = 10 (1/VM), number of workers/manager = 5, (total number of workers) = 50, number of LUNs/worker = 1, number of outstanding I/Os = 90, IO size = 512B-1MB, MTU = 1500. SUT: Intel® Shadycove, Intel® Xeon® processor W5580 (8 M Cache, 3.20 GHz, 6.40 GT/s Intel® QPI), Memory - 24 GB DDR3, BIOS - S5500.86B.01.10.0038, Windows Server* 2008 R2 x64, 10 VMs with 2 GB allocated RAM.