#129: So, You Want to Build a Storage Performance Testing Lab?

Whether you are a storage vendor, consumer, or developer, the performance of storage solutions affects you. Assessing the performance of large and complex storage solutions requires some level of performance testing lab, and there are many factors to consider. From network topology to load generator CPU, all components must be selected and configured with care to avoid unintended bottlenecks. In this session, we will review a few best practices and lessons learned, including: whether virtual clients are feasible and my experiences attempting performance testing on several different hypervisors, best practices for network configuration, and how to use maximum effective data rates to avoid unintended bottlenecks. Finally, we will conclude with a review of data comparing different physical load generating hardware and its effect on measured performance. Learning Objectives: 1) Effect of load generating client hardware on measured performance; 2) Avoiding unintended bottlenecks by using interconnect maximum effective data rates; 3) Best practices for configuring a performance lab network and load generators.