Best practices for deploying iSCSI SANs in DSS database solutions
Date
:
10/1/2010
Effective decision support systems (DSSs) or data warehousing (DW) database solutions require scalable storage platforms that offer high levels of performance and capacity. DSS applications are typically designed to support long-running, complex analytical query activities using very large data sets. The data I/O pattern from storage to server is predominantly sequential and usually consists of large blocks—typically 512 KB or 1 MB in size. When designing such a system, IT administrators must consider the availability, scalability, and performance of each component layer within the solution stack, as well as how these characteristics affect the overall solution.
This article describes best practices for deploying DSS or DW solutions based on the Microsoft® SQL Server® 2008 database platform using Dell™ EqualLogic™ PS Series Internet SCSI (iSCSI) storage area network (SAN) arrays. To demonstrate these practices, Dell engineers deployed and tested two DSS configurations with two design goals: to test a heavy DSS workload with high I/O requirements against Dell EqualLogic PS Series 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE) arrays, Dell PowerEdge™ servers, and Dell PowerConnect™ 10GbE switches, and to maximize end-to-end solution performance to confirm best practices for system configuration in each component layer. As the results demonstrate, following best practices and taking advantage of flexible EqualLogic storage can help organizations design and deploy scalable, high-performance DSS or DW solutions in their own environments.
This article describes best practices for deploying DSS or DW solutions based on the Microsoft® SQL Server® 2008 database platform using Dell™ EqualLogic™ PS Series Internet SCSI (iSCSI) storage area network (SAN) arrays. To demonstrate these practices, Dell engineers deployed and tested two DSS configurations with two design goals: to test a heavy DSS workload with high I/O requirements against Dell EqualLogic PS Series 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10GbE) arrays, Dell PowerEdge™ servers, and Dell PowerConnect™ 10GbE switches, and to maximize end-to-end solution performance to confirm best practices for system configuration in each component layer. As the results demonstrate, following best practices and taking advantage of flexible EqualLogic storage can help organizations design and deploy scalable, high-performance DSS or DW solutions in their own environments.