Performance Comparisons
Comparisons are made using standard benchmarks that are publicly available.
Two benchmarks, dbench and postmark, are used to broadly represent the typical
workload of storage system using RAID5. One measures file server workload and
the other measures application workload consisting of small file operations such
as emails, e-commerce, etc.
dbench Benchmark
- Measures file system performance of the Netbench file server
benchmark
- Version 1.3
- References
and Source code
- Results are averaged over 3 runs.
Postmark Benchmark
- Measures performance of small file operations, e.g., email,
e-commerce applications, etc.
- Version 1.4
- 20,000 files; 50,000 transactions; default file sizes
- Reference
and Source code
SR5 RAID5 is compared against
3ware
ATA RAID 7500 series controller and the Linux software RAID5 distributed
with Redhat Linux. For SR5 and Linux software RAID5, drives are connected to
Promise Ultra100 TX2 ATA controllers. Each Promise controller provides two
master ATA channels. For the SR5 and Linux software RAID5 experiments below, 4 drives are
connected to 2 ATA controllers.
(1) Pentium 4 system
Configurations:
- Pentium 4 1.8GHz
- Asus P4T-E motherboard
- 512 MB RDRAM
- 4 x Maxtor 80G 5400 RPM ATA Drives
- Redhat 7.3: default kernel 2.4.18-3, EXT3
- System tuning:
- ATA drives:
hdparm -X66 -d1 -u1 -m16 -c3 -W1 /dev/hd{e,g,i,k}
- Read ahead tuning:
Add to /etc/sysctl.conf
vm.max-readahead=256
vm.min-readahead=128
- Controllers:
- 3ware experiments: 3ware 7500-4 4 port controller
- SR5 and Linux RAID5 experiments: 2 x Promise Ultra100 TX2 ATA
controllers
dbench Benchmark
| |
MB/sec |
| 8 clients |
16 clients |
32 clients |
64 clients |
| SR5 |
Auto write caching |
60.3 |
50.3 |
34.3 |
18.7 |
| 3ware
7500 |
Write caching on* |
25.7 |
22.0 |
12.7 |
7.3 |
| Write caching off |
18.3 |
15.0 |
11.7 |
6.0 |
| Linux
RAID5 |
Write caching on* |
62.0 |
46.0 |
26.3 |
15.0 |
| Write caching off |
35.7 |
29.0 |
18.0 |
12.0 |
* Running with caching on may lead to data corruption during
power failure.
Postmark Benchmark
| |
|
Transactions
/sec |
Data read
(KB/sec) |
Data written
(KB/sec) |
| SR5 |
Auto write caching |
174 |
459 |
867 |
| 3ware
7500 |
Write caching on* |
109 |
300 |
567 |
| Write caching off |
94 |
249 |
471 |
| Linux
RAID5 |
Write caching on* |
155 |
419 |
790 |
| Write caching off |
108 |
302 |
571 |
* Running with caching on may lead to data corruption during
power failure.
(2) Xeon system
Configurations:
- Intel Xeon 1.8GHz
- Supermicro P4DCE+ motherboard
- 512 MB RDRAM
- 4 x Maxtor 80G 5400 RPM ATA Drives
- Redhat 7.3: default kernel 2.4.18-3, EXT3
- System tuning:
- ATA drives:
hdparm -X66 -d1 -u1 -m16 -c3 -W1 /dev/hd{e,g,i,k}
- Read ahead tuning:
Add to /etc/sysctl.conf
vm.max-readahead=256
vm.min-readahead=128
- Controllers:
- 3ware experiments: 3ware 7500-4 4 port controller
- SR5 and Linux RAID5 experiments: 2 x Promise Ultra100 TX2 ATA
controllers
dbench Benchmark
| |
MB/sec |
| 8 clients |
16 clients |
32 clients |
64 clients |
| SR5 |
Auto write caching |
61.0 |
51.0 |
36.7 |
17.7 |
| 3ware
7500 |
Write caching on* |
24.7 |
20.7 |
15.3 |
7.7 |
| Write caching off |
16.0 |
15.7 |
11.3 |
5.7 |
| Linux
RAID5 |
Write caching on* |
50.3 |
47.3 |
24.3 |
15.3 |
| Write caching off |
41.7 |
30.3 |
20.7 |
12.7 |
* Running with caching on may lead to data corruption during
power failure.
Postmark Benchmark
| |
|
Transactions
/sec |
Data read
(KB/sec) |
Data written
(KB/sec) |
| SR5 |
Auto write caching |
185 |
486 |
918 |
| 3ware
7500 |
Write caching on* |
121 |
330 |
622 |
| Write caching off |
102 |
272 |
513 |
| Linux
RAID5 |
Write caching on* |
164 |
437 |
826 |
| Write caching off |
138 |
379 |
715 |
* Running with caching on may lead to data corruption during
power failure.
|
