IBM Turbo Performance License Explained

Download the PDF of this: Performance Recommendation Handout_081010

What is Turbo Performance

An optional premium feature, that when enabled, boosts the performance of a storage system across both throughput and IOPs workloads. This implementation is based on a firmware algorithm and does not require any new hardware dependencies.

Turbo Performance Feature Rules of Thumb

Use Turbo Performance Feature when:

The storage system performance demands exceed the base maximum performance across either the FC or SAS host interfaces.

Refer to page 2 for recommendations based on four corner performance testing

Often, IOPs performance is often not realized with Turbo Performance Feature until target drive quantities are achieved. For throughput, improvement is achieved at very low drive quantities.

Note: Performance is dependant not only on the storage system and drives, but also the host, OS, HBAs and the application workload. Therefore, results may vary!

Note: As 1Gb/s iSCSI may be a bottleneck in taking full advantage of the Turbo Performance feature (minimal improvement in overall performance), this feature is not recommended for use the iSCSI daughter card, but for SAS and FC.

Environments that may benefit from Turbo Performance

While almost every environment can realize the benefits of the Turbo Performance feature, the following environments may especially benefit:

  • Consolidation /Virtualization
  • Video streaming, rich media
  • 3D modeling and simulation
  • High performance computing (HPC)
  • Real‐time data backup
  • Online retail (online transaction processing)
  • Data warehousing
  • Distributed data collection
  • Grid computing
  • Multi‐media
  • SAN Volume Controller and ProtecTIER implementations

Focus on positioning the Turbo Performance feature for those customers with bandwidth‐intensive applications

Selling Script / Questions to Ask You Customer

  1. What types of applications/environments do you intend for the DS3500 to support? * Multiple (due to virtualization and consolidation) – go to question #2 * Throughput/bandwidth intensive – go to question #2 * IOPs intensive – go to question #3
  2. The Turbo Performance feature allows you to take full advantage of your DS3500’s performance capabilities with throughput‐intensive applications. Let me share with you the performance improvements you may achieve based on your drive count for both read and write performance (refer to second page of handout)
  3. Up to how many drives are you planning on scaling to with you DS3500? * Over 60 – go to question #4 * Under 60 – revisit the Turbo Performance feature with this customer when their drive quantity gets closer to 60 drives
  4. For IOPs performance, the Turbo Performance feature is beneficial for high drive count configurations. Let me share with you the performance improvements you may achieve for both read and write performance (refer to second page of handout)
#IOPS #Performance