Sep 07 MVitale

An Intro to AIX Virtualization
Philadelphia CMG
September 14, 2007
Mark Vitale
Generic disclaimer
• All trademarks referenced in this presentation are the

properties of their respective companies.
• Most diagrams are from IBM Redbook SG24-7940-02
Advanced POWER Virtualization on IBM System p5:
Introduction and Configuration
Septemberl 2007
Copyright  The Information Systems Manager 2007 – All rights reserved
AIX Virtualization 2
A complete solution
• Dynamic hardware management

– Advanced POWER Virtualization (APV)
• Application balancing
– Partition Load Manager (PLM)
• “IRD” for AIX
– Workload Manager (WLM)
• “WLM” for AIX
• Availability
– High Availability Clustering Multi-Processing
(HACMP)
• “parallel sysplex” for AIX
Septemberl 2007
Advanced POWER
Virtualization
• available on System p5 and higher

• a marketing umbrella term for a number of hardware
and software technologies:
– Dynamic LPAR (DLPAR)
– Shared Processor Pool (Micro-partitioning)
– Virtual IO Server (VIO)
– Simultaneous Multi-Threading (SMT)
– Virtual LAN (VLAN)
– Integrated Virtualization Manager (IVM)
– Capacity on Demand (CoD)
– Live Partition Mobility (POWER6 only)
– Shared Dedicated Capacity (POWER6 only)
Septemberl 2007
Overview
p5 server
AIX LPAR hypervisor

firmware
Linux LPAR HMC
VIO Server LPAR
intranet
intranet
Septemberl 2007
Comparison of virtualization
technologies
p5 APV z9 PR/SM z9 z/VM
Max virtualized Up to 254 LPARs, Up to 60 LPARs “unlimited” virtual
max 10 per machines
servers
processor
Processor Virtual - backed by Logical – backed Virtual – backed by
physical dedicated by physical physical dedicated or
allocation
or shared, no dedicated or shared
mixing shared
Interpartition Partition Load Intelligent Virtual Machine
Manager (PLM) Resource Director Resource Manager
load
(IRD) (VMRM)
management
I/O (network, Virtual IO Server Enhanced Multiple Virtual devices
LPAR; hypervisor Image Facility
disk)
VLAN (EMIF);
HiperSockets
Memory Dedicated, dynamic Dedicated, dynamic Virtual memory
source: Advanced POWER Virtualization on IBM System p5 – SG24-7940-02

Septemberl 2007
POWER architecture
• RS/6000 (1990)
• POWER2 (1993)
• PowerPC (1993)
• POWER3 (1998)
• POWER4 (2001)
– first use in both AIX and AS/400 servers
– static LPAR
– dynamic LPAR (2002)
– no resource sharing
Septemberl 2007
POWER architecture (cont’d)
• POWER5 (2004)
– aka pSeries
– Hypervisor
– dual cores - Simultaneous Multi-Threading (SMT)
– Processor Utilization Resource Register (PURR)
– shared processor pools (Micro-partitioning) (AIX 5.3 only)
– Virtual IO resource sharing
• POWER5+ (2005)
– aka p5
– quad cores
– faster, smaller, more instructions
• POWER6 (2007)
– Live Partition Mobility
– Shared Dedicated Capacity
• dedicated processors may donate unused cycles to the shared
processor pool
Septemberl 2007
POWER Hypervisor
• system firmware
– introduced w/ POWER5
– always enabled (think “NO BASIC MODE”)
• key features
– Dynamic LPAR (DLPAR)
• allows dynamic reallocation of resources
• ... but only if the OS supports it!
– shared processor pool (Micro-partitioning)
• AIX 5.3 & Linux only (no i5/OS support)
• allows fractional physical CPU entitlement
– virtual device support (VLAN, SCSI, consoles)
Septemberl 2007
POWER Hypervisor

Septemberl 2007
Virtual IO Server
• a software appliance that runs in a dedicated LPAR

• as the name implies, it provides virtual IO services to
other (“client”) LPARs
– virtual disks
– virtual Ethernet adapters
– shared Ethernet adapters (SEA)
• Integrated Virtualization Manager (IVM)
– feature added w/ VIO Server 1.2
– provides a browser-based subset of HMC function
– main restriction – all resources are owned by VIO, no
dedicated resources
Septemberl 2007
Hardware Management
Console (HMC)
• hardware appliance to manage one or more

managed systems (CECs)
• includes partition management and many other
management functions
• provides optional web interface for remote access
Septemberl 2007
Web-based System Manager
(WebSM)
Septemberl 2007
Processor allocations
Septemberl 2007
Physical, virtual, and logical
processors

Septemberl 2007
SMT and PURR

Septemberl 2007
Performance questions
• SMT on or off?
• dedicated or shared processors?
• real or virtual IO?
Septemberl 2007
Best practices
• SMT
– usually best to leave it on (default), but for some CPU-intensive
loads it may be better to turn it off
• CPU allocation
– dedicated for sustained heavy workloads (WebSphere)
– shared for light workloads (DNS)
– make sure virtual processors are close to entitlement
• IO allocation
– dedicated disk and network for best performance
– shared Ethernet adapter and virtual SCSI can be great for light
workloads
– use VLAN between LPARs when possible
• Virtual IO Server
– if you use it, give it a shared, uncapped processor entitlement
Septemberl 2007
Prototype chart
Septemberl 2007
Questions and Responses
Septemberl 2007
References
• Advanced POWER Virtualization on IBM System p5:

Introduction and Configuration (IBM Redbook SG24-
7940-02)
• IBM System p Advanced POWER Virtualization Best
Practices (IBM Redpaper)
• System p Logical Partitioning Guide (SA76-0098-00)
Septemberl 2007

Sep 07 MVitale

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An Intro to AIX Virtualization

• All trademarks referenced in this presentation are the

• Dynamic hardware management

• available on System p5 and higher

AIX LPAR hypervisor

Linux LPAR HMC

VIO Server LPAR

source: Advanced POWER Virtualization on IBM System p5 – SG24-7940-02

source: Advanced POWER Virtualization on IBM System p5 – SG24-7940-02

• a software appliance that runs in a dedicated LPAR

• hardware appliance to manage one or more

source: Advanced POWER Virtualization on IBM System p5 – SG24-7940-02

source: Advanced POWER Virtualization on IBM System p5 – SG24-7940-02

• Advanced POWER Virtualization on IBM System p5:

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