QLogic 10000 Series Realize Significant Performance Gains in Oracle RAC with QLogic FabricCache - Manual (Page 2)

SN0451405-00 rev. B 07/13 2
White PaPer
Considerations for Business Continuity, High Availability,
and Scalability
Oracle raC databases ensure that the critical business application is
resilient because multiple instances (nodes) provide for business continuity
and high availability. the loss of a single node does not result in an
application outage. the Oracle raC database can be scaled by adding
more nodes to provide the processing capacity the application may need
going forward.
Based on this scalability, some database applications require high i/O with
low latency to support the increasing demand for quick response to the
application. if the SaN cannot provide the required performance in iOPS
for high-value, critical applications, administrators have some options to
improve this, including:
• Select and install a new SaN
• add a localized, server-based cache
• add additional nodes to an Oracle raC cluster
• add the QLogic FabricCache 10000 Series adapter
the following sections examine each of the preceding options.
installing a New SaN
installing a new SaN is a major operation that takes significant time,
significant investment, and significant planning to minimize operational
disruptions during the installation. While a new SaN also increases the
overall i/O pool and performance for the entire SaN, these increases
may be overkill if only a small quantity of applications require the
increased performance.
adding a Cache
Caching devices, such as a solid-state disk (SSD) cache in each node,
require that each node be brought down to install the cache. this cache
is local, captive to the node, and not shared. this limited solution provides
fewer benefits because, within the Oracle raC environment, the LUNs being
cached must be shared among all of the Oracle nodes. the biggest caching
benefit comes from full table scans (direct reads) that are not cached in the
Oracle block buffers, which requires that the cache be shared among the
servers in the cluster.
adding raC Nodes
to add more raC nodes to the existing cluster requires adding new physical
hardware, modifying the existing SaN zoning and mapping, and adding
network connectivity. Doing so can increase performance, but it does not
provide increased i/O from the SaN.
adding a QLogic FabricCache 10000 Series adapter
adding the 10000 Series adapter provides increased i/Os by caching read
operations. i/O is improved by replacing the existing QLogic host Bus
adapters within the nodes with the QLogic 10000 Series adapters. the
10000 Series adapter uses the same QLogic drivers and incurs minimal
disruption to the hardware infrastructure. the 10000 Series adapters
function as host Bus adapters within the SaN fabric, the same as the non-
QLogic FabricCache 10000 Series adapters bring shared, server-based
caching to the SaN. the 10000 Series adapters are purposely designed
to address the high i/O demands and distributed nature of clustered
applications and virtualized environments, including Oracle raC. Using
the following best practice guidelines, 10000 Series adapters have
been shown to improve Online analytical Processing workloads in
Oracle raC environments by up to 3.25 × more transactions in one
quarter the response time. Online transaction Processing workloads
were accelerated to almost twice the transactions at 56 percent of the
response time.
the 10000 Series adapter integrates a flash-based cache with a Fibre
Channel adapter that uses the existing SaN infrastructure to create a
shared cache resource distributed over multiple servers. this cache-
coherent implementation extends caching performance benefits
to the widest range of enterprise applications, including clustered
applications that use shared SaN storage.
10000 Series adapters lower transaction latency while increasing
storage i/O capacity in Oracle raC environments. the 10000
Series adapter offloads traffic from the SaN infrastructure, which
lowers disk array iOPS, while maintaining SaN data protection and
compliance policies. these benefits translate to improved resource
utilization, increased return on investment (rOi), extended useful
life of the SaN infrastructure, reduced costs, and overall improved
customer satisfaction.
Executive Summary