Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

White Paper: Storage Management

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

Contents Executive Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 From SAN to NAS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 The NAS bottleneck . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Unbundling NAS . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2 Symantec VirtualStore . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3 NAS economics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4 Use cases and advantages . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Adding capacity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5 Upgrading SAN resources. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Increasing throughput . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Optimizing desktop delivery. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 High Availability. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Business continuity and disaster recovery. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Snapshots. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6 Remote and branch offices. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 VirtualStore and Storage Foundation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 VirtualStore in VMware environments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Economy and performance. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Manageability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7 Conclusion. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

Executive Summary
Virtualization is transforming the worlds data centers, driving adoption of Network-Attached Storage (NAS) to simplify management of VMware virtual environments. But controller bottlenecks in bundled NAS appliances throttle performance even at modest storage volumes, and adding controllers to overcome them quickly becomes very expensive. Unbundled NAS solutions offer the same front-end flexibility, and unlock controller architecture and the storage-facing back end to deliver highly scalable storage using standard hardware to reduce costs dramatically. Symantec VirtualStore, built on Veritas Storage Foundation from Symantec, offers increased capacity and throughput for virtual servers and desktops, and adds High Availability, business continuity, policy-based tiered storage, and full integration with VMwares own vCenter management solution.

Introduction
Virtualizationwith VMware in the leadis transforming the worlds enterprise data centers. Governments, multinational financial conglomerates, and global hosted service providers are using the server and desktop virtualization to cut the costs of hardware, facilities, power and cooling, and take advantage of new approaches to availability, business continuity/disaster recovery, and IT management. Analyst firm IDC1 offers perspective on virtualizations penetration and growth: 2010 is the first year that more than 50% of application instances run in virtual machines (VMs) By 2014, more than 23% of new servers will support virtual machines, and more than 70% of newly installed workloads will run on them Virtualized server compound annual growth is forecast at 14%more than twice the rate of the server market as a whole Most large enterprise datacenters already have de facto virtual first policies for server deployment. Still, theres plenty of room to grow, for example at regional and branch offices, and in fast-emerging areas like private cloud computing and desktop virtualization. The next wave of virtualization, like the first, will be driven by economy, performance, manageability and security. But as virtualization expands outside the datacenter corecloser to employees and customersQuality-of-Service (QoS) issues take on more significance, cost pressures grow more severe, and IT organizations face new constraints on their virtualization initiatives.

From SAN to NAS

Virtualization changes the fundamentals of IT practice2, sometimes in unexpected ways. Storage is a case in point. Virtual machines consume lots of it, and QoS depends on high performance. Virtual desktops and streaming applications in particular need high-performance storage to cover unpredictable I/O patterns and worst-case scenarios like boot-up and login storms.
1-International Data Corporation (IDC). Worldwide Market for Enterprise Server Virtualization to Reach $19.3 Billion by 2014, According to IDC (press release). (Framingham, MA. December 6, 2010). http://www.idc.com/ about/viewpressrelease.jsp?containerId=prUS22605110&sectionId=null&elementId=null&pageType=SYNOPSIS 2-Galen Schreck. Why Isnt Server Virtualization Saving Us More? (Cambridge, MA: Forrester Research. January 28, 2009). http://www.vmware.com/files/pdf/technology/ Why_Isnt_Server_Virtualization_Saving_Us_More.pdf

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

Early versions of VMware ESX required that VMs be stored on fast, expensive Fibre Channel Storage Area Networks (SANs). But block-level SAN pushes responsibility for file-level storage management onto virtual clients, and Fibre Channel zoning is not only difficult to manage, but compromises the flexibility and mobility of virtual machines. Current versions of ESX support simpler, more flexible Network-Attached Storage (NAS) to overcome many of these limitations at lower initial cost. By using the Network File System (NFS) to deliver a file system as well as block-level storage, NAS takes care of storage housekeeping. This reduces the burden on virtual clients, so VMware virtual machines (VMs) run at higher speed. NAS also imposes no penalties for large LUNs, and intelligent solutions allow much more efficient storage management.

The NAS bottleneck

But the way NAS is bundled and sold complicatesand may even neutralizeits cost advantage. Pre-configured NAS appliances bundle NAS filers and servers along with storage, constraining scalability, utilization, manageability, and economy in virtualized IT environments: Added capacity bundles in filers and controllers (NAS heads) that raise cost and management complexity Raising throughput by adding controllers bundles in filers and storage, raising costs, management burdens, and underutilized storage assets In virtualized environments, the first of these is rarely a meaningful constraint. NAS appliances can pair a single filer and pair of controllers with massive amounts of storage, so growing virtualization environments typically encounter controller bottlenecks long before they reach their storage limits. In I/O-intensive database, application-streaming, and desktop virtualization environments, severe throughput constraints may show up at storage volumes as low as 6TB for servers or 30TB for desktops. NAS filers add significantly to the cost of raw storageand most of it comes from the cost of controllers. Add management, rack space, and other indirect costs, and its clear that using bundled NAS appliances to solve throughput problems gets expensive fast. As virtualization continues its torrid growth, these NAS price/performance tradeoffs will impose a significant brake on organizations ability to deploy virtualization in new locations and applications.

Unbundling NAS
An ideal storage solution for a growing virtualization environment would combine these elements: Front-end simplicityNAS, to relieve virtual clients of file-level abstraction responsibilities and IT administrators of complex storage management Back-end flexibilitya choice of storage hardware from fast Fibre Channel SAN for high QoS in demanding scenarios, to commodity storage for routine applications Scalable throughputinexpensive controller hardware that delivers extra NAS heads without bundling in unnecessary filers and storage Economyoff-the-shelf components, competitively-sourced to avoid vendor lock-in and preserve future flexibility

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

VMware compatibilityfull compatibility with VMware High Availability solutions, and with VMwares own vCenter consoles and utilities for tight integration and a minimum of management complexity Facing NAS price/performance tradeoffs and obsolescence of large SAN installations in their data center consolidations, a few large enterprises adapted the Veritas Storage Foundation Cluster File System from Symantec as an intermediarypresenting Fibre Channel SAN to the back end and NAS to the front. Their results proved the solutions performance and cost-effectiveness. Symantec has since generalized and adapted its customers solution, adding provisioning, caching, and management capabilities, and made it available as Symantec VirtualStore.

Symantec VirtualStore
Symantec VirtualStore is a highly scalable clustered Network File System solution for VMware virtual machines, based on the proven, industry-leading Veritas Storage Foundation Cluster File System from Symantec. VirtualStore unlocks the flexibility and power of Network Attached Storage architectures from the price/performance constraints of appliancebased solutions, without compromising the performance, scalability, and High Availability advantages of Cluster File System. It meets special challenges of virtual infrastructures with new features that rapidly provision virtual servers and desktops, and clone or boot virtual machines, all through the VMware vCenter management console. Figure 1 illustrates the general configuration of VirtualStore in a VMware environment. The solution comprises these elements: 1. ESX servers hosting virtual machines that access files over the network using the Network File System protocol 2. A scalable VirtualStore cluster of commodity servers running Cluster File System under Solaris UNIX or Red Hat Linux, using standard Network Interface Cards for I/O 3. Back-end storage hardware from a choice of vendors, and technology options that include or combine SAN, SATA, SCSI (SAS), iSCSI, JBOD commodity storage, and solid-state drives 4. The VMware vCenter management interface plug-in (not shown) integrates VirtualStore storage management operations into vCenter so that virtual machinesstorage and allmay be provisioned, moved, and managed as complete entities for greater flexibility and simpler operations

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

Figure 1: Symantec VirtualStore presents highly scalable NFS simplicity and flexibility to VMware virtual machine environments, while preserving a broad choice of technologies, price points, performance standards, and storage vendor options.

NAS economics
Price comparisons between NAS appliances and Symantec VirtualStore will depend on hardware costs, network and storage bandwidth, number, size, and diversity of served images, and all the other factors that define specific use cases. But in most mainstream applications, VirtualStore offers compelling cost advantages. Consider three standard VirtualStore scenarios using mainstream hardware3, illustrated in Figure 2: Comparison casean extremely light requirement sometimes used as a benchmark for comparisons: 8 NAS operations per second (op/sec), adequate for acceptable QoS in only the most forgiving use cases Desktop virtualizationless demanding due to lighter loads and greater opportunity for cloning and compression: assumed to consume 25 op/sec per virtual desktop served
3-

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

Server virtualization (for example, data-center consolidation)the most demanding case, here assumed to require 100 op/sec per virtual machine for acceptable QoS

Figure 2: The number of virtual machines VirtualStore will support at three performance levels, using standard hardware and the indicated number of nodes. See text for details. Figure 2 shows that performance-scaling VirtualStore environments is a matter of adding standard nodes, each configured using stock components available from competing suppliers. Scaling storage volume means attaching more drives to the SAN fabric on the back end. VirtualStore, like the Storage Foundation architecture on which it is built, easily manages heterogeneous storage hardware, so hardware re-use and storage tiering are realistic, low-cost alternatives. Finally, nodes can be added hot for zero business interruption during expansion or maintenance. In comparisons with VirtualStore, it is worth keeping in mind that NAS appliance alternatives impose recurring expense and disruption. Depending on organizations hardware refresh policies, they will face large-scale forklift-style upgrades of very expensive hardware every few years. Using VirtualStore to disaggregate NAS into stock server and storage components makes it easier to integrate upgrades into data center refresh cycles, and can completely eliminate the associated business interruptions.

Use cases and advantages

Symantec VirtualStore unbundled high-performance NAS storage outperforms appliance-based NAS in virtualized environments in a broad spectrum of use cases. Adding capacit y capacity Symantec VirtualStore offers a cost-effective way to scale storage capacity for VMware servers by adding intelligent storage arrays or commodity storage as required. Storage Foundation technology includes thin provisioning and storage

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

tiering, so VMs consume only the quantity of storage they need, and may be allocated only the quality of storage their applications require. With no filers bundled with storage, VirtualStore offers nearly perfect linear scaling, and helps minimize underutilization of storage assets. Upgrading SAN resources Upgrading the functionality and manageability of SAN assets in VM environments is a natural application for Symantec VirtualStore, requiring only software licenses and stock hardware to upgrade even the largest SAN arrays to NFS. Benefits include elimination of file management overhead from virtual machines, and better VM mobility, without the complications of Fibre Channel zoning. Increasing throughput With a capacity of 64 (software) controllers per filer compared with 2 (typical) to 8 for NAS, VirtualStore excels delivering cost-effective storage throughput. Using stock server and NIC hardware, a single VirtualStore node has a practical throughput capacity of about 250 full-throttle ESX servers (at 100 op/sec; see Figure 2). Optimizing desktop deliver y Optimizing delivery Desktop virtualization has special requirements. First, Quality-of-Service requirements are very high: desktop-level personalization and performance is the key to user acceptance. Second, typical large-scale back-office deployments generate breathtakingly high traffic during boot- and login- storms. Instead of a brute-force solution using expensive solid-state drives, VirtualStore caches and serves one image copy from the controllers main memory, retrieving only difference imagesdeltasfrom disk. High Availabilit y Availability VirtualStore offers all the High Availability (HA) features that make Storage Foundation Cluster File System the first choice for management of large-scale enterprise storage environments. These include fast failover for applications and SAP, Oracle, Sybase, or Tibco databases, the ability to add or replace servers hot in the cluster, eliminating planned downtime for maintenance or filer/controller upgrades, and NFS active/active failover from all hosts in a VirtualStore cluster. Business continuit y and disaster recover y continuity disaster recovery VirtualStore Campus or Metro Clusters are fully compatible with VMware vMotion, supporting fast migration of running virtual machines from one site to another with no downtime or user impact, and virtually undetectable backup and recovery. Snapshots Snapshots VirtualStore includes efficient FileSnap technology that allows on the fly creation and storage of space-optimized boot images of virtual machines. These file-level differential snapshots of virtual machine images reference a single golden template. Deduplication of 80% or more allows provisioning hundreds of virtual machines without excessive storage consumption.

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

Remote and branch offices Remote Virtualization is an excellent way to address utilization issues at remote and branch offices: allocating virtual resources rather than physical hardware supports multiple applications while keeping IT facilities, expenditures, and management effort under control. But few smaller offices can justify the expense of high-performance NAS appliances. Stock hardware and VirtualStore offer a practical alternative that integrates storage more tightly into virtual infrastructure, and simplifies both local and remote management.

VirtualStore and Storage Foundation

VirtualStore is based on Veritas Storage Foundation from Symantec, a complete solution for managing heterogeneous online storage. VirtualStore supports Solaris Sparc, and RedHat Linux, as well as a broad set of qualified storage devices and arrays. VirtualStore supports efficient, non-disruptive migration from one storage platform to another, and keeps thinprovisioning environments thin using automated storage reclamation. The solution includes SmartTier, which migrates data among storage tiersFibre Channel, SATA, Solid State, and moreseamlessly and transparently, based on its business value.

VirtualStore in VMware environments

Economy and performance conomy performance In a variety of server and desktop virtualization environments, VirtualStore can help organizations optimize current SAN storage infrastructure for performance, flexibility, and manageability while reducing capital and operating costs. Free from the constraints of NAS appliances that bundle storage with throughput-constrained fixed controllers, VirtualStore introduces modular, granular, scalable storage that eases the transition to NAS: Reducing operating costs and management overhead As storage infrastructures scale up and out to accommodate more virtual machines and growing business requirements By smoothing hardware lifecycle financial shocks at deployment, upgrade, and replacement

Manageabilit y Manageability VirtualStore is integrated with VMware vCenter for end-to-end management of whole virtual machines, including storage, from a single console. Virtual machine administrators can continue using their familiar vCenter tools, and wont have to learn additional management tools, shuttle between consoles, or rely on storage specialists for routine tasks. VirtualStore enhancements to vCenter include: FileSnap snapshot capability, so administrators can create, store, and provision space-optimized boot VM boot images from within vCenter Labeling of clone images and customization of their hosts and network interfaces to avoid conflicts, from the same vCenter console

Symantec VirtualStore A NAS Software Solution for VMware Environments

Integration VirtualStore and VMware View desktop management, extending VirtualStore management capabilities to virtual desktop environments

Conclusion
This paper has focused on VirtualStores capability to provide cost-effective NFS storage to ESX host servers, but this is only the beginning of the solutions capabilities. Backed by Storage Foundation, which incorporates decades of experience in the worlds most demanding storage environments, VirtualStore can: Provide NFS storage to other clients or directly to individual virtual machines Deliver advanced management, storage tiering, thin provisioning, and storage optimization services to meet the most complex requirements Present storage to clients as Common Internet File System (CIFS) as an alternative to NFS, offering access to the same data through both protocols Symantec VirtualStore offers high-performance NAS storage at highly competitive price points, to extend the benefits of virtualization wider and deeper throughout enterprise computing. VirtualStore offers High Availability and Business Continuity/Disaster Recovery, thin provisioning, tiered storage, and desktop image deduplication and caching that bring the power of comprehensive, mature storage management solutions to the virtual world.

About Symantec Symantec is a global leader in providing security, storage, and systems management solutions to help consumers and organizations secure and manage their information-driven world. Our software and services protect against more risks at more points, more completely and efficiently, enabling confidence wherever information is used or stored. Headquartered in Mountain View, Calif., Symantec has operations in 40 countries. More information is available at www.symantec.com.

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