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Power Tools 1993 November - Disc 2
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Power Tools Plus (Disc 2 of 2)(November 1993)(HP).iso
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laddis.txt
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1993-04-28
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Hewlett-Packard HP 9000
Network File System Performance
White Paper
Version 1.0 (3/18/93)
On March 18th, SPEC (the Standard Performance Evaluation Corp.)
announced its latest benchmark, 097.LADDIS Release 1.0, the first in a
series of benchmarks collectively called the SFS (System-level File
Server) Benchmark Suite. The results show that the HP 9000 Series 800
Model H50 and HP 9000 Series 700 Model 755 are the fastest server
systems tested and available today! In fact, the model H50 is even
faster than any of the currently available specialized NFS (Network
File System) file servers as well.
What is 097.LADDIS?
-------------------
Originally called LADDIS for the names of the companies -- Legato
Systems, Auspex, Digital Equipment, Data General, Interphase, and Sun
-- that originated the metric, the benchmark is a measure of NFS file
server performance and is the successor to the NHFSStone benchmarks.
While not an originator of the benchmark, Hewlett-Packard fully
supports the SPEC, SPEC/SFS, and 097.LADDIS efforts.
The 097.LADDIS benchmark is an excellent measure of total system
performance and, more specifically, the system's ability to handle
multiple NFS clients.
Because 097.LADDIS executes the NFS protocol directly from within the
benchmark and uses load generators, the typical impact of client
performance on the server's performance is minimized, resulting in a
vastly improved measure of actual server performance. In the SFS
Suite, a single load generator is used to simulate many NFS clients.
097.LADDIS measures file server performance in Peak NFS Operations per
Second (IOPS) or what SPEC calls SPECnfs_93 Operations per Second.
What is actually being measured is the number of Remote Procedure Calls
(RPC) per second handled by a server at a given workload on a given
system. While appropriate for many file server environments,
097.LADDIS specifically represents a server-supported software
development environment with heavy network and disk traffic.
The Numbers
-----------
=======================================================================
System Name Peak Single LANs CPU Information Response
NFS Figure # MHz Type Time
IOPS Of (ms)
Merit
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
HP
HP 9000 Model 755 859 85 1 FDDI 1 99 PA-RISC 7100 36.9
HP 9000 Model H50 1014 101 1 FDDI 1 96 PA-RISC 7100 47.9
Auspex
NS/5500-2* 466 46 2 Ethernet 1 25 Mot. 68030 44.0
NS/5500-4* 933 93 4 Ethernet 2 25 Mot. 68030 44.0
NS/5500-8* 1703 170 8 Ethernet 4 25 Mot. 68030 49.0
*Not available today;
For every 68030 file processor, each system also has a 68030 network
processor and a 68020 I/O processor
DEC
3000 Model 500S AXP 595 59 1 FDDI 1 150 AXP 21064 22.3
IBM
RS/6000 560 408 40 3 Ethernet 1 50 POWER 5064 45.8
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Key:
Peak NFS IOPS is SPEC's measure of the number of Remote Procedure Calls
(RPC) per second handled by a server at a given workload on a given
system in heavy network and disk traffic.
The Single Figure of Merit is SPEC's measure of the number of users
that the server can support.
LANs is the number and type of Local Area Network used by the system
benchmarked.
The CPU information includes the number of CPUs, the clock speed in MHz
of the processor, and the type of the processor used by the benchmarked
system.
Response Time is SPEC's measure of the average response time, in milli-
seconds, for all RPC calls. Anything under 50 milliseconds is
considered reasonable.
=======================================================================
097.LADDIS is an I/O intensive benchmark; its performance is affected
by CPU performance and network and disk I/O efficiency. Faster CPUs
generally yield higher IOPS. To maximize system performance,
additional hardware can be added to relieve the I/O bottleneck,
including additional network interfaces, memory for additional buffer
cache, and extra disk drives and controllers. SFS and 097.LADDIS
results will influence load planning, system configuration, and
equipment-buying decisions.
The HP Edge
-----------
The HP 9000 Series 800 Model H50 and HP 9000 Series 700 Model 755 are
the fastest general purpose NFS server systems tested. HP announced
two results that are 44% to 70% faster than the next best results for
general purpose systems.
HP 9000 Series 800
* Series 800 systems are the server platform of choice from HP. They
provide excellent overall performance and the best scalable, reliable
NFS server performance of any system available today. The Series 800
is the preferred HP server solution when either:
- the system will be used as a dedicated file server or as a
dedicated multipurpose server (e.g. print, database, license)
- expandability and scalability from workgroup to departmental and
data center environments are important
- high availability is important
HP 9000 Series 700
* Series 700 systems provide excellent NFS performance and superior
SPECint92 (integer) and SPECfp92 (floating point) performance. The
Series 700 is the preferred HP server platform when either:
- the system will be used for both technical compute applications and
file serving in a technical environment
- an additional graphics seat is important
- budget is limited
The HP 9000 Series 800 Model H50 is clearly HP's server model of
choice. It's scalability from smaller F-series systems to larger
I-series systems makes it ideal for environments that may be
consolidating workgroup file servers into departmental file servers,
now or in the future. Because of a very efficient FDDI implementation
for server platforms, the H50 has a highly efficient I/O system and is
able to provide superior NFS performance.
The HP 9000 Series 755, with performance that exceeds all available
competitive products, excellent pricing, and excellent NFS, integer
and floating point performance, provides the best price/performance
for HP today.
Comparing the two HP models tested, the H50 provides the best
performance and the Series 755 provides the best price/performance.
The introduction of fast and wide SCSI later this year will greatly
improve Series 800 price/performance, and future enhancements (e.g. MP
scaling) that HP is planning will result in dramatic NFS performance
increases across the HP product line.
The Competitive Situation
-------------------------
AUSPEX
* Auspex builds specialized NFS servers with only minimal ability for
general processing. If all you need is a file server with minimal
general computing capabilities (that can't be later redeployed for
another use), cost is not an issue, and you can wait until August
1993, then Auspex may be an alternative.
If you want a fast file server that is available today, can use an
FDDI backbone (which is 10-12 times faster than an Ethernet
backbone), provides excellent performance, scalability, and because
it is a general purpose system, enables you to minimize the number of
dedicated specialized servers in your network, then HP provides the
best solution.
DIGITAL EQUIPMENT
* Digital benchmarked their DEC 3000 Model 500S AXP Server. The two HP
results are 44% to 70% faster than the DEC results. Remember that
NFS performance is affected primarily by the CPUs ability to manage
I/O.
Other limiting factors:
- Today the 500S has limited expandability in memory and disk space
while the HP systems have more expandability.
- The H50 and Series 755 have better SPECint92 and SPECfp92
performance than the 500S.
- Alpha isn't available in volume yet, the H50 and Series 755 are.
- DEC's Unix operating system, OSF/1 is only available in a
developer's version today; HP-UX is an available, proven and mature
OS.
IBM
* IBM benchmarked their RS/6000 Model 560. The HP 9000 Series 755,
with a base price 12% higher than the IBM 560, provides 2 times the
NFS performance than the 560. The HP 9000 Series 8000 Model H50,
with a base price 50% higher than the IBM 560, provides 2.5 times the
NFS performance than the 560. In addition, in overall performance,
the 755 and H50 have better SPECint92 and SPECfp92 numbers than the
IBM 560. So, for a superior general computing system with the best
NFS performance and price/performance, HP provides the best
solutions.
OTHERS
* Absent from the SPEC announcement were Data General and Sun, two of
the originators of the 097.LADDIS benchmark.
Summary
-------
HP delivers the best NFS server performance of any systems tested and
available today! The HP 9000 platforms are excellent general computing
systems for commercial and technical applications, compute servers,
database servers, and file servers. HP 9000 systems provide the
services and performance that enable solutions for the widest range of
business needs.