Re: [Networker] Running 7.2.1 with NDMP including tuning

There are bold sysadmins and there are old sysadmins, but funny, no bold
and old sysadmins :)

Other than tuning the MTU on the separate NetApp NIC (which turns on
jumbo frames), I verified that the window scale option, etc, were
already turned on.

We have two gigabit ethernet interfaces servicing regular clients (in
Solaris Multi-path redudancy config) and one interface connected to a
vlan with the two NetApps.

At gigabit speed the NIC seems to be less of a issue than the CPU
servicing the NIC's interrupts. 

We eventually might move to a HP DL585 server with 4x dual core opteron
especially since HP sells Gigabit server adapters with TOE.

> 
> Those are some bold tuning parameters.  I like your design of 
> a separate VLAN to the filers where jumbo frames can be used. 
>  Did you need to tune the NetApp in anyway or does it adapt 
> nicely to the frame size and TCP window size?  
> 
> I presume you have another gigabit NIC to the regular clients 
> that have no problem with these tcp parameter?  Solaris 9 I assume.
> 
> On a NetApp restore from several tapes I would think the NIC 
> is a bottleneck; something we don't have with the filer 
> owning the drives.  
> 
> Very interesting insight into the jumbo frames the new NDMP 
> capabilities.
> 
> 
> Robert Maiello
> Pioneer Data Systems
> 
> 
> -----Original Message-----
> From: Matthew Huff [mailto:mhuff AT ox DOT com]
> Sent: Friday, September 16, 2005 12:50 PM
> To: Legato NetWorker discussion; Maiello, Robert
> Subject: RE: [Networker] Running 7.2.1 with NDMP including tuning
> 
> Another one of the big advantages of using DSA is that when 
> using the local network tape drives it uses variable block 
> size, so it's much faster on the tapes.
> 
> Just some info about the tuning. We found that we had to set 
> up a separate vlan for these backups because the interupt 
> overhead on the sparc was so high due to the large number of 
> packets. Setting up a separate vlan allowed us to turn on 
> jumbo frames, reducing the interrupts by a factor of 4.
> 
> We also tuned the gigabit ethernet adapter in the sun by 
> setting up an /etc/init.d/tune_ce script that does:
> 
> #!/bin/sh
> 
> PATH=/bin:/usr/sbin:/usr/sbin;export PATH
> 
> ndd -set /dev/tcp tcp_max_buf    4194304
> ndd -set /dev/tcp tcp_cwnd_max   2097152
> ndd -set /dev/tcp tcp_xmit_hiwat 1048576 ndd -set /dev/tcp 
> tcp_recv_hiwat 1048576 ndd -set /dev/tcp tcp_tstamp_always 1 
> ndd -set /dev/tcp tcp_wscale_always 1
> 
> ----
> Matthew Huff           | One Manhattanville Rd
> Director of Operations | Purchase, NY 10577
> OTA LLC                | Phone: 914-460-4039 
> http://www.otaotr.com  | Fax:   914-460-4139     
> 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Legato NetWorker discussion
> > [mailto:NETWORKER AT LISTSERV.TEMPLE DOT EDU] On Behalf Of Maiello, Robert
> > Sent: Friday, September 16, 2005 10:14 AM
> > To: NETWORKER AT LISTSERV.TEMPLE DOT EDU
> > Subject: Re: [Networker] Running 7.2.1 ???
> > 
> > Great, that looks like a real good design.   It sounds like the V480
> > is dedicated to this?  
> > 
> > Do you find this was faster then sending the NetApp single 
> streamed to 
> > several tape drives over the SAN?
> > 
> > You have other non-NDMP/regular savesets multiplexed with this?
> > 
> > 
> > Robert Maiello
> > Pioneer Data Systems
> > 
> > 
> > -----Original Message-----
> > From: Matthew Huff [mailto:mhuff AT ox DOT com]
> > Sent: Friday, September 16, 2005 9:41 AM
> > To: Legato NetWorker discussion; Maiello, Robert
> > Subject: RE: [Networker] Running 7.2.1 ???
> > 
> > The NDMP device backup is sent across the network. The data 
> is in the 
> > format that the NDMP backup creates (dump for NetApps for example), 
> > but is encapsulated in a Legato datastream. Hence you can 
> save it in 
> > the same pool and same media at the same time as other backups, and 
> > you can get improved parallelism.
> > 
> > We have two NetApp F920 clustered with about 4-5TB of data. 
> > We backup across a dedicated Gig-e pipe running Jumbo 
> frames and other 
> > tcp tuning to a Sun V480 connected with a fibre HBA to a StorageTek 
> > L180 with 6 x IBM LTO-2 drives. Since we upgrade to 7.2 and 
> moved the 
> > drives to the Sun, and finished tuning, our backup time 
> (even over the 
> > network) has improved by about 30%. The complete backup takes about 
> > 6-7 hours.
> > 
> > ----
> > Matthew Huff           | One Manhattanville Rd
> > Director of Operations | Purchase, NY 10577
> > OTA LLC                | Phone: 914-460-4039 
> > http://www.otaotr.com  | Fax:   914-460-4139     
> > 
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: Legato NetWorker discussion
> > > [mailto:NETWORKER AT LISTSERV.TEMPLE DOT EDU] On Behalf Of Robert Maiello
> > > Sent: Friday, September 16, 2005 9:23 AM
> > > To: NETWORKER AT LISTSERV.TEMPLE DOT EDU
> > > Subject: Re: [Networker] Running 7.2.1 ???
> > > 
> > > When you say "non-NDMP" device, does that imply that the 
> data goes 
> > > over the network to the storage node and then to the tape drive?.
> > > 
> > > Currently our NDMP devices are owned by the filer..  if 
> the devices 
> > > are non-NDMP (but can take an NDMP stream) and are owned by the 
> > > storage node, does that not imply the NDMP stream will go 
> over the 
> > > network to
> > > the storage node?   Currently they go right to tape not 
> > touching the
> > > network.
> > > 
> > > 
> > > Sorry if I mis-understood the thread.
> > > 
> > > 
> > > Robert Maiello
> > > Pioneer Data Systems
> > > 
> > > 
> > > On Thu, 15 Sep 2005 16:57:04 -0400, Stan Horwitz <stan AT TEMPLE DOT EDU>
> > > wrote:
> > > 
> > > >On Sep 15, 2005, at 2:05 PM, Yura Pismerov wrote:
> > > >
> > > >>
> > > >>
> > > >> Stan Horwitz wrote:
> > > >>
> > > >>> On Sep 13, 2005, at 5:46 PM, Jimeee Womack wrote:
> > > >>> Last night, we did our first test of an NDMP recover. We 
> > > >>> successfully  recovered approx. 450GB worth of data to a
> > > test server
> > > >>> via NDMP with  SnapImage. The test worked fine. As I 
> write this 
> > > >>> message, I am  backing
> > > >>>
> > > >>
> > > >> Is it true that 7.2.1 can now do NDMP backups without
> > > employing the
> > > >> Snapimage ?
> > > >
> > > >I tried doing a backup of around 450GB that way last night. 
> > > Although I
> > > >have not had time to test that backup yet, it seems to have
> > > run fine on
> > > >a non-NDMP device.
> > > >I am going to try cloning the data tomorrow.
> > > >
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> 
> 

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