HP LeftHand P4000 HP LeftHand SAN Solutions Support Document - Application Not - Page 3

SQL Performance on the NSM4150 Introduction The NSM 4150 from LeftHand Networks offers SQL administrators a highly available, reliable, and scalable storage solution for their SQL environment while delivering a new level of performance at a reasonable price point. This paper describes the performance characteristics of the NSM 4150 storage platform in a SQL Server 2005 environment with the Microsoft iSCSI initiator. Benchmark Tool: SQLIO SQLIO is a tool developed by Microsoft to determine the Input/Output (I/O) capacity of a disk subsystem. Using the SLQIO tool before implementing a SQL Server environment can help to validate the system hardware to ensure the hardware meets the performance requirements of SQL Server application environment. SQLIO does not simulate the specific I/O patterns of SQL Server application, but rather tests the disk's ability to handle specific workloads, and then reports on those results Storage Platform: LeftHand Networks NSM 4150 The LeftHand Networks NSM 4150 is an enterprise-class storage node built on industry-standard Intel architectures and chipsets. Powered by the SAN/iQ storage software platform, the NSM 4150 can utilize either Serial Attached SCSI (SAS) or Serial ATA II (SATA) disk drives. The solution is available in multiple disk configurations yielding between 4.5 to 11.2 Terabytes (TB) of raw storage. The LeftHand Networks NSM 4150 provides enterprise-class reliability, high availability and performance, all at a reasonable price point. Specific product highlights include: Fifteen hot-swappable disk drives, dual Gigabit NIC connectivity with bonding and failover, redundant power supplies, efficient power and cooling, and battery-backed write cache. 3