WHITE PAPER
Advanced Virtualization Using
QLogic 8300 Series Adapters
Eliminate I/O Bottlenecks for Enterprise Applications
and Accelerate Virtualization Deployments
Key Findings
Support for increased workloads, acceleration of application performance, and meeting the growing demands placed on the enterprise
data center is key in the selection and deployment of a 1OGbE Converged Network Adapter with the right architecture to scale and
support robust databases, mail servers, and secondary storage.
• Enterprise Performance: QLogic delivers double the performance of previous-generation adapters with more than 1 million IOPS
and 4500 MBps bidirectional throughput.
• Application Workloads: QLogic delivers up to 40 percent higher throughput than Emulex® in Oracle® and Microsoft Exchange
Server™ environments.
• Advanced Virtualization: Support for secure NIC SR-IOV with more Virtual Functions (VFs) and switch-agnostic NIC Partitioning
(NPAR) to enable multi-tenant cloud deployments.
• Superior Business Scalability: The scalable architecture of the QLogic 8300 Series Converged Network Adapters provides 75
percent more performance when more VMs are added to VMware® ESXi 5 than the Emulex OCe11102.
• Unparalleled Flexibility: QLogic I/OFlex technology—any I/O, any network from the same physical adapter—allows supporting
Fibre Channel SANs and 10Gb converged networks (FCoE, iSCSI, and TCP/IP) with the same physical adapter.
Executive Summary
WHITE PAPER
Server consolidation through virtualization of the enterprise data center
improves server/processor utilization and lowers data center capital
and operational cost. IT administrators must ensure that none of the
subsystems become a bottleneck for successful deployment of a
virtualized and consolidated data center. The evolution of consolidated
server deployments and the move to 16Gb Fibre Channel and
10GbE converged network infrastructures require higher scalability
in server connectivity to storage. QLogic delivers the performance,
flexibility, scalability, and investment protection to meet the needs
of the enterprise data center. QLogic is the trusted market leader of
Converged Network Adapters.
Industry Environment
Virtualization of networks, storage, servers, and applications continues to
grow in the data center. While virtualization provides many benefits, virtual
deployment workloads have been increasing the demands placed on the
network I/O infrastructure, which can significantly impact system and
application performance.
QLogic compared the overall performance of the 8300 Series 10GbE
Converged Network Adapters with Emulex adapters in a real-world
SAN environment with maximum throughput workloads. These tests
highlight the advantage delivered by the QLogic 8300 Series architecture
in both Microsoft Exchange Server and Oracle environments compared
with Emulex adapters.
QLogic I/OFlex technology provides a free, field-configurable
firmware upgrade, enabling IT administrators to define personality
(16Gb Fibre Channel, 10Gb Ethernet, iSCSI, or Fibre Channel over
Ethernet (FCoE)) on a single adapter with the highest flexibility and
investment protection.
Virtual Machine Mobility
QLogic 8300 Series Adapters are the only adapters in the industry
to support simultaneous LAN (TCP/IP) and SAN (Fibre Channel over
Ethernet (FCoE) and iSCSI) traffic at line rate, making the adapter
interoperable across the data center. QLogic delivers the most efficient
data-movement adapter.
Virtual Machine Density
Virtual machine (VM) deployments are increasing in density ratios. Today,
an average implementation may be six VMs per server, but the best
performers are installing 15 VMs per server. As the technology matures and
hardware performance increases, planning for future deployments of up to
25 VMs per server will protect infrastructure investments. The QLogic 8300
Series Converged Network Adapter offloads all FCoE and iSCSI protocol
processing to the adapter, freeing up server CPU cycles to deliver the
highest levels of server utilization and virtualization performance. QLogic
architecture delivers up to 75 percent higher performance than its closest
competitor as the number of VMs is increased (see Figure 3). The adapter
supports simultaneous data and storage networking across a 10Gb Ethernet
connection and PCI Express® Gen3 x4 data transfer on the host side.
Advanced Virtualization—Secure Networking SR-IOV
SR-IOV allows direct I/O virtualization, where the I/O path from the VM
on the server to the peripheral device is now virtualized. This dedicated
I/O path allows a higher ratio of VMs to servers. QLogic’s implementation
allows for granular QoS control and up to 128 VFs per adapter.
Unified I/O Fabric
QLogic I/OFlex technology allows you to use the same hardware for 16Gb
Fibre Channel or 10GbE server connectivity (Figure 1). QLogic FlexSuite™
Adapters provide you with the ability to use a single adapter through the
lifetime of a server. The unique QLogic I/OFlex technology allows you
to extend the useful life of your servers, getting the most out of your IT
investment dollars. The adapter supports simultaneous data and storage
networking across a 10Gb Ethernet connection and PCI Express Gen3 x4
data transfer on the host side.
HSG-WP13002 SN0430942-00 Rev. A 05/13 2
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