TS-509 Pro -any statements regarding iSCSI Performance? Yes!

[qman-ger]

Hello,


in our firm the it enviroment needs a renewal. Migrating all the Windows Servers to VMWare ESXi we also came
accross TS-509 Pro, to use it as a iSCSI Target for VMFS. Does anybody have some information about the performance ? Or perhaps some links to tests... ? The SMB performance simply does not meet our requirements...

We need iSCSI !

Is the TS-509 Pro comparable to Thecus i5500, in means of performance ? I really like QNAP products, for private purpose...

Thx + Greets

bernd

[schumaku]

Hallo Bernd,

A number of thumb - the TS-509 makes about 60 MB write / 110 MB read when accessing iSCSI target hosted on a RAID6 (beeing the limiting factor for the write performance), using about 12..15% of the CPU.

in our firm the it environment needs a renewal. Migrating all the Windows Servers to VMWare ESXi we also came accross TS-509 Pro, to use it as a iSCSI Target for VMFS.

Please provide some more details - like total number and size of iSCSI targets.

We need iSCSI !

No doubt in server consolidation project...

Is the TS-509 Pro comparable to Thecus i5500, in means of performance ?

The CPU in the TS-509 is much more powerful then the ARM core deployed to the i5500. On the NAS, iSCSI is creating a much lower load to the CPU then SAMBA/CIFS. But when it comes to concurrent access to a bunch of iSCSI targets, the CPU will become the limiting factor, for both serving iSCSI and the software RAID - but not the I/O subsystem itself. Likely, in response to the QNAP TS-509, this competitor has launched the i7700, based on a similar platform and a plus of some MHz to cover the additional two disk drives.

As QNAP is fully committed to business systems, iSCSI is a key technology. No longer a big secret (as listed in the official QNAP download area; and in some reports, which made it to the public), there are two new QNAP NSA series in the queue:
- TS-x39 (starting with 6 bay, low-power CPU, starting from 1GB DRAM, performance slightly below the TS-509)
- TS-809 (8 bay, dual CORE CPU, stating from 2GB DRAM)
Some sites from Poland already unveiled pictures and data - just use Google...

Depending on the number of servers to migrate to ESX and iSCSI and the performance expectations, the second one is what you might take into consideration aside the TS-509.

Regards,
-Kurt.

PS. Edit: See also viewtopic.php?f=12&t=10144

[qman-ger]

Hello Kurt,

thx because of the interesting information. We are planning a consolidation project like this:

We are 10 - 12 Users. As a small IT firm we provide our customers with Windows based networking solutions...
Our inhouse enviroment needs a renewal. We have:

1 W2K DC & Exchange 2000
1 W2K3 Terminalserver
1 W2K3 Testserver, hosting DATEV (german bookkeeping, taxes software...) appliances (MS SQL 2005...) (not running all the time)

We want:

1 Win2008 Standard 64 Bit 1stDC
1 Win2008 Standard 64 Bit ((2ndDC))with Exchange 2008
1 Win2008 Standard 64 Terminalservices (5 user max)
1 Win2008 Testserver (Member) (not running all the time)
(1 W2K3 32-Bit Member running ESXXPRESS backing up VMs...)

running on ESXi with following hardware specs:

2 x Intel Xeon 5430 DP 2,66 (2x6MB Cache)
24 GB DDR2 RAM ECC (perhaps 32GB)
4 LAN Interfaces (GBit)
ESXi 3.5 Embedded (I think running from a CF Card...)
No local storage subsys

So far, so good.

So I am thinking of this:

TS-509 Pro with 5x 750 Gbyte Seagate ES2 750 Gbyte Enterprise SATA2 - RAID 6 (or 5) - directly connected via crossover GBit (both interfaces) to dedicated LAN interfaces on the vm host.

1 iSCSI target for all the VMs (mentioned above) - 160 GByte

Win2008 Server brings allong its own iSCSI Software Initiator - so I would connect out of the running Win 2008 VMs to other iSCSI targets on TS-509:

1 iSCSI Target for the databases of the Exchange 2007 Server 80 GByte
1 iSCSI Target for our static data (or should this be better native SMB ??? beside the other iSCSI targets) 500 GByte
1 iSCSI Target for MSSQL 2005 databases 300 Gbyte


So here we are with 4 iSCSI targets...

Rest of the space should be SMB shares

Depending on the number of servers to migrate to ESX and iSCSI and the performance expectations, the second one is what you might take into consideration aside the TS-509.

We took Thecus i5500 into consideration. But the i5500 does not have SMB / NFS... and other features like webserver etc...

Any thoughts are welcome...

regards

bernd

[spikehome]

i think the qnap 509 is more faster then the thecus 5500.
and with iscsi use the 509 with teaming and use a managed switch with the 802.ad support
also can u put more memory in it (i have 4GB)

[qman-ger]

Hi

@spikehome thx

i think the qnap 509 is more faster then the thecus 5500.
and with iscsi use the 509 with teaming and use a managed switch with the 802.ad support
also can u put more memory in it (i have 4GB)

Do you have any "real" experience with that ? We need this for a productive enviroment...

Meeting our Requirements (above), we tend to buy a Thecus I4500R 19" rackmount solution because of
2 hot plug powersupplies, only for dedicated purpose of the use of iSCSI with 2Tbyte RAID 6 for fault tolerance.

Please be careful to compare TS-509 with I5500 or I4500R (these are iSCSI "only" SAN - no SMB etc...), but not with N5500...

We regret that QNAP has nothing comparable... I would like the other features using QNAP...

greets

bernd

[spikehome]

i use iscsi at my qnap 509 with xp then not with vmware esx (we have a san for that).
And with xp i use vm workstation where the disks are with iscsi at my qnap and the speed for one vm is good (100mb lan 1 nic)

[qman-ger]

Thx guys,


after seeking information in several VMWare forums about the "real" performance of low cost iSCSI solutions like TS-509 Pro, Thecus or Buffalo we have come to the conclusion, that these solutions are NOT build for those purposes, mentioned above.

iSCSI (or SAN) solutions, which can deliver 100 to 130 MB(not Bit) / per second stable to several VMs cost about ~8000 Euro or ~10500 Dollar.

greets

bernd

[spikehome]

Right, for home testing is it nice a 509.
But a real business solution not.
We have a san storage (glass fiber) with o.a. 5 esx servers each with 8 processors and 32GB memory every esx runs about an 20 vm servers. with vmotion load balancing between the esx' en.
so we have a total from a about 60 vm-servers running at 5 real servers.

[paulo.meireles]

iSCSI (or SAN) solutions, which can deliver 100 to 130 MB(not Bit) / per second stable to several VMs cost about ~8000 Euro or ~10500 Dollar.

Well, it depends. A QNAP 509 with 4 drives in RAID 1+0 (with the 5th as a spare) may, eventually, reach 100MB/s. Five 1.5TB drives (which are, actually, more like 1.4TB each) would get you 2.8TB of available storage.

Speed and performance aside (as I've seen some awful "enterprise grade" pieces of junk, too), the question remaining is how long it would take to get it back up and running if it ever fails, and if you can afford the wait, as there are no "24/7 support contracts" for that kind of hardware.

Another possibility is to buy 2 or 3 of them, and keep one running idle, ready to be used if the one in production ever fails... It all depends on how much is at stake.

Just a thought.

Paulo

[QNAPSimon]

QA department is testing iSCSI performance. We should have the result by Monday. Stay toned