• As has been stated on multiple occasions and by multiple people, be sure that virtual machine disk/application partitions have been properly aligned. We recommend a 1MB boundary. Note that Windows Server 2008 aligns at a 1MB boundary automatically.
• Use a block size of 8KB unless other recommended or required by the application vendor. Note that the default NTFS block size is 4KB.
• Turn on the uncached write mechanism for NFS file systems used as VMware datastores. This can have a significant performance improvement for VMDKs on NFS but isn’t the default setting. From the Control Station, you can use this command to turn on the uncached write mechanism:
  server_mount <data mover name> -option <options>,uncached <file system name> <mount point>
  Be sure to review pages 99 through 101 of the VMware on Celerra best practices document for more information on the uncached write mechanism and any considerations for its use.
• Change the VMware ESX settings NFS.SendBufferSize andNFS.ReadBufferSize to a value that is a multiple of 32. The recommended value is 64. See page 73 of the best practices document for more details.
• If you’ve adjusted the NFS.MaxVolumes parameter in order to have access to more than 8 NFS datastores, you should also adjust NFS.TcpIpHeapSizeand NFS.TcpIpHeapMax parameters. The increase should be proportional; if you increase the maximum volumes to 32 (a common configuration), then you should increase the other parameters by a factor of 4 as well. Page 73 of the best practices document covers this. This VMware KB article andthis VMware KB article also have more information.
• Although not directly related to performance, best practices call for settingNFS.HeartbeatFrequency (or NFS.HeartbeatDelta in VMware vSphere) to 12, NFS.HeartbeatTimeout to 5, and NFS.HeartbeatMaxFailures to 10.
• Ensure that the LUNs backing the NFS file systems are allocated to the clar_r5_performance pool. This configuration will balance the load across the SPs, LUNs, etc., and help improve performance.

Imagine being able to minimize your backup times by 90 percent. Most large organizations have tight backup windows and even their enterprise level backup solution cant keep up with the day to day business processes. Imagine being able to run a daily full backup instead of a weekly full and daily incrementals or differentials.

Well that dream is a reality with EMC””s Avamar. I””ve seen it, and I do it every week in different companies all the time. Avamar is a unique backup solution that allows for accelerated VMware backup and restore performance and efficiency. By filtering out redundant data segments through its global source-based deduplication, Avamar pushes up to a 200 percent reduction in the amount of data that has to be moved through your virtual infrastructure. Allowing you to replace your weekly fulls and daily incrementals with daily fulls. Which also allows for a faster recovery time.

I””m mostly writing this in my own amazement of how Avamar has changed my opinion on how data should be backed up but also to help you in reducing backup windows and time to recovery. I””ll post more tips and tricks in later posts. If you would like some immediate help contact me on linkedin.

http://www.linkedin.com/in/robsteele

Even though there are quite a few solutions out there I have decided to take a look at NearPoint and EmailXtender but I will examine some other solutions in the future. So let me know if you are currently using a solution or are looking into buying one.

Alright Lets get started…

Mimosa Nearpoint uses a log shipping method to archive emails where as EMC EmailXtender uses a journaling technique. The advantage of the log shipping offers a minimal impact on the exchange server, EmailXtender uses a mailbox that is journaling enabled which can cause some performance impact if an Exchange server is over subscribed. I am all for reducing the amount of connectors and clients that are installed on production application servers. So in my book initially Nearpoint would get the point. However there is a con to this method as it is not fully supported by Microsoft because they cannot guarntee zero data loss. So overall I would say EmailXtender has the best approach as Microsoft supports journaling as the best archiving method.

EmailXtender has a solid light weight design which allows just one server to handle thousands of users and also perform Indexing, Journaling, Archiving, and Search functions. Nearpoint has a mutli-node grid architecture which is good for growth but requires creating another large storage space for email data. The trend these days is server consolidation and having an app that requires more servers for growth is frowned upon in my book.

Both Solutions offer support for Microsoft Exchange but EmailXtender also supports Lotus Notes. Even though I am not a fan of Lotus Notes some companies are stuck with it and I feel for them.

Alright after a couple beers I’m getting tired of typing. We will continue this in a part 2 blog entry.