Server using SSD
Can anyone offer input on how to reliably use SSD's in a server? The main issue that has been offered against this idea is the limited write issue. Is there a reliable way to address that so that the server can benefit from the speed of SSDs? The main bottleneck to our custom app is large SQL queries and I think a simple solution, as opposed to a massive rewrite of our app, is to utilize SSD's where those SQL queries are bogging us down.
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How big is the database?
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weird, my screen on the sbs 2008 is black and only shows a pointer. I just logged on to check the database size and getting this black screen. Any idea what is going on? Server seems to be running fine. We are getting email and I can access the shared files, just this black screen...
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database is 685MB
An SSD won't help a bit.
The entire database will fit into memory so the speed of the back end storage is meaningless. Even bad queries should be very fast as once the data's read into memory, it remains cached.
You can spend your money a lot better by investing elsewhere in your network.
Kent
The entire database will fit into memory so the speed of the back end storage is meaningless. Even bad queries should be very fast as once the data's read into memory, it remains cached.
You can spend your money a lot better by investing elsewhere in your network.
Kent
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8GB ram.
So, when there are 50+ lines that have to be displayed, those take a long time to come up. Each line has to run a number of calculations. Where is the speed bottleneck, if not in the RAID5 spinning platter?
I don't know much. I am going on the experience I had of switching my desktop computer from a quad core AMD and spinning platter to an i7 core and with an SSD, this thing is stunningly amazingly fast. I am looking for that kind of difference in our server experience and feel SSD's would contribute to opening up the bottleneck. Again, I don't know anything technically, just looking at this from my perspective. I have posted this question EE and had responses the run the spectrum, from little speed pick up, to amazing speed pick up. Why such a disparity in answers from EE guys?
Also, we did add an SSD to this current server, as a "G" drive and put the SQL database on it and it did help the speed, some, but not what I expected. Now I think the OS and maybe the SQL app have to go onto the SSD to see the real speed benefit?
So, when there are 50+ lines that have to be displayed, those take a long time to come up. Each line has to run a number of calculations. Where is the speed bottleneck, if not in the RAID5 spinning platter?
I don't know much. I am going on the experience I had of switching my desktop computer from a quad core AMD and spinning platter to an i7 core and with an SSD, this thing is stunningly amazingly fast. I am looking for that kind of difference in our server experience and feel SSD's would contribute to opening up the bottleneck. Again, I don't know anything technically, just looking at this from my perspective. I have posted this question EE and had responses the run the spectrum, from little speed pick up, to amazing speed pick up. Why such a disparity in answers from EE guys?
Also, we did add an SSD to this current server, as a "G" drive and put the SQL database on it and it did help the speed, some, but not what I expected. Now I think the OS and maybe the SQL app have to go onto the SSD to see the real speed benefit?
The disparity is due to us not knowing your complete setup until half way through the question. SSDs will reduce your disk latency but if you can keep it all in RAM (except for the writes) then that'll speed it up even more.
8GB's not much RAM to put SQL, Exchange and AD on. what make/model computer is it?
You can sneak in a bit more info into the thread by running perfmon and looking at disk write ops per second and memory usage.
8GB's not much RAM to put SQL, Exchange and AD on. what make/model computer is it?
You can sneak in a bit more info into the thread by running perfmon and looking at disk write ops per second and memory usage.
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it is one we put in 2008, a Xeon 3220 with RAID 5. It is a basic server and we run SBS 2008. It was our first time to implement a server. Now that we have this custom app developed, I would like to upgrade the hardware to work better. The users from their workstations are running IE8 and the app is querying SQL database on teh server. I think it is all the operations it is doing that makes the 50+ line page run slow. Where should I look to optimize? What can be kept on RAM? I think the IE8 app causes SQL to run data queries to multple related tables and run calculations from those tables data to compile each "line" that displays in our app. No problem when a page has 20 or less lines, but get up to 50 lines and it bogs down. I don't want to address that with code, would rather address it with the SSD or with "kept in RAM" where possible.
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Right, I will plan on separating things out over two servers. I do want to explore the SSD idea.
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Have you considered the fact that ir COULD be the clients that are actually slow?
Some pages that are poorly designed for displaying dynamic data may respond fine when there is a limited amount of data, but give it a lot, 50+ rows in your instance, and the page rendering takes ages!!
Just a thought if you have not explored this yet. Do you have a high end machine with lots of ram an an I3/I5/I7 processor in it that you can try this with?
It could just be a very poorly designed page that is pushed back to the browser to render.
Some pages that are poorly designed for displaying dynamic data may respond fine when there is a limited amount of data, but give it a lot, 50+ rows in your instance, and the page rendering takes ages!!
Just a thought if you have not explored this yet. Do you have a high end machine with lots of ram an an I3/I5/I7 processor in it that you can try this with?
It could just be a very poorly designed page that is pushed back to the browser to render.
ASKER
Neilsr, yes my PC is i7 core and while pages do load faster, the 50+ line thing is still a factor on this machine and why I think the issue needs to be addressed on server.
arnold, are you available to do screen share session or would you be willing to be on screen and walk me thru what you are talking about? It would be nice to try those suggestions and narrow it down.
I am preparing to implement a new server and continue using the old server as a second in the mix. So, really, the more I think about it, the focus being on how to implement SSD's on the new server in a way that best speeds the SQL query issue, that would be a good focus, moving forward, with settings set appropriately.....
arnold, are you available to do screen share session or would you be willing to be on screen and walk me thru what you are talking about? It would be nice to try those suggestions and narrow it down.
I am preparing to implement a new server and continue using the old server as a second in the mix. So, really, the more I think about it, the focus being on how to implement SSD's on the new server in a way that best speeds the SQL query issue, that would be a good focus, moving forward, with settings set appropriately.....
With a new server dedicated to SQL and lots of RAM you probably won't need SSDs. Useful table at http://www.tomshardware.com/reviews/ssd-910-benchmark-performance,3226-6.html for write endurance (a bit less than trillions).
Also bear in mind that depending on your license you may be able to use Hyper-V and have 2 VMs, one with SBS and one with SQL on it. DDR3 RAM is so much cheaper than the old DDR2 used on your server that then new server would be nearly as cheap as a RAM upgrade.
Also bear in mind that depending on your license you may be able to use Hyper-V and have 2 VMs, one with SBS and one with SQL on it. DDR3 RAM is so much cheaper than the old DDR2 used on your server that then new server would be nearly as cheap as a RAM upgrade.
http://martin77s.wordpress.com/2010/03/28/performance-tuning-your-windows-server-part-1/
On windows 2008 the options are under the advanced system settings. The first page that comes up deals with visual effects, eliminating all the niceties with the manner in which folders open, etc.
The network related items
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc739330(v=ws.10).aspx
On windows 2008 the options are under the advanced system settings. The first page that comes up deals with visual effects, eliminating all the niceties with the manner in which folders open, etc.
The network related items
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc739330(v=ws.10).aspx
I don't see anywhere in this discussion where the server's processor(s) are defined. How many processors and what type/speed are they?
Xeon 3220 quad core 2.4GHz http:#a38729889 referenced as a single processor.
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each "line" runs a number of calculations, has a pdf link and does a number of things across 15 columns/cells. I think it is just task intensive, each line computing and displaying it's data. When there are more than 20 lines to retrieve, it is just a lot of calculations to run. And each time that page has to refresh, it runs all those calcualtions again. The "lines" are live billing lines with data in each cell that has to be calculated and also with links refreshed. I think it is just very intensive process....
Based on the above, it is unclear what it is you have/are dealing with.
You could use triggers that on update/insert of new data, the (computational columns are auto-updated)
or have a separate table/view that has the totals/computations.
You saying it takes you a long time to get from point A to point B and asking whether replacing the Engine, Transmission, wheels will speed up the process.
There is no way to answer unless the path from point A to point B is clear.
i.e. no matter on which day or during which time period, the travel speed on the path from A to B can not exceed 5 km or mi per hour because of the road type and conditions.
There are no changes that can be done to the vehicle to shorten the travel period from A to B.
If you have a 20x10 table of ajax items that each change triggers a refresh for the server to compute and respond, that is where you have to improve.
The problem in this scenario is that you can not lock update access such that only one person can make updates. If you could, you can perform the computation/adjustments on the client side via Javascript while at the same time, sending notification of the changes to the server.
javascript updates the totals in the browser (onChange), while relaying the changed column data to the server.
Locking is required to make sure that the data presented to user A remains consistent with the changes made otherwise. User A updates entry in row 5 column 4 from 3 to 4 while userB updates row 15 column 2 from 12 to 34. each will reflect incorrect cumulative information. until both refresh their displays.
You could use triggers that on update/insert of new data, the (computational columns are auto-updated)
or have a separate table/view that has the totals/computations.
You saying it takes you a long time to get from point A to point B and asking whether replacing the Engine, Transmission, wheels will speed up the process.
There is no way to answer unless the path from point A to point B is clear.
i.e. no matter on which day or during which time period, the travel speed on the path from A to B can not exceed 5 km or mi per hour because of the road type and conditions.
There are no changes that can be done to the vehicle to shorten the travel period from A to B.
If you have a 20x10 table of ajax items that each change triggers a refresh for the server to compute and respond, that is where you have to improve.
The problem in this scenario is that you can not lock update access such that only one person can make updates. If you could, you can perform the computation/adjustments on the client side via Javascript while at the same time, sending notification of the changes to the server.
javascript updates the totals in the browser (onChange), while relaying the changed column data to the server.
Locking is required to make sure that the data presented to user A remains consistent with the changes made otherwise. User A updates entry in row 5 column 4 from 3 to 4 while userB updates row 15 column 2 from 12 to 34. each will reflect incorrect cumulative information. until both refresh their displays.
ASKER
I posted a couple pics and a Technologies list in hopes of clarifying. I can't really give precise and definitive responses to your questions, as I am the biz owner, not the programmer. I do know that we brought this app to a point a couple of years ago and stopped. It is fully developed adn functioning, but, as you say and as the programmer has said, there are areas that could be addressed, in code, to make it more efficient. My point in all this is that a change in hardware may get us through another 2 years without spending 50-100k on reworking the code.
The page that is problematic on reload is perhaps best addressed in code, but, when looking at cost and time to implement, I think using a faster server with SSD's will essentially eliminate the speed problem and keep us from having to go into "round three" on our custom app.
This seems to be stirring frustrations and I do not mean for this post to go that direction. Should we continue or is it best to close this question? If we continue on this question, what can I give you to help isolate the speed drag? Based on what I remember from the programmers description of it, the page is running multiple calculations on each "line" and that won't change without much re-work. Given that, will SSD implementation help the calcuations run more quickly?
From the programmer:
C#
ASP.NET 3.5
JavaScript
AJAX
Ajax.NET (http://www.ajaxpro.info/)
WebDAV (Exchange interfacing)
SQL Server 2008
Libraries
iText (PDF generation)
zxing (barcodes)
jQuery
Version Control
Subversion SVN
2013-01-02-1326.png
2013-01-02-1327.png
The page that is problematic on reload is perhaps best addressed in code, but, when looking at cost and time to implement, I think using a faster server with SSD's will essentially eliminate the speed problem and keep us from having to go into "round three" on our custom app.
This seems to be stirring frustrations and I do not mean for this post to go that direction. Should we continue or is it best to close this question? If we continue on this question, what can I give you to help isolate the speed drag? Based on what I remember from the programmers description of it, the page is running multiple calculations on each "line" and that won't change without much re-work. Given that, will SSD implementation help the calcuations run more quickly?
From the programmer:
C#
ASP.NET 3.5
JavaScript
AJAX
Ajax.NET (http://www.ajaxpro.info/)
WebDAV (Exchange interfacing)
SQL Server 2008
Libraries
iText (PDF generation)
zxing (barcodes)
jQuery
Version Control
Subversion SVN
2013-01-02-1326.png
2013-01-02-1327.png
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Your question as you asked it has been answered over and over. Adding SSD will very very little, if any, effect on your system. Its down to software design. Sorry to say.
ASKER
Hi Kent,
Not sure if it makes a difference, but those pics are of live, editable lines, not reports. I am not sure of the terminology to use, so bear with me, those pics are of the pages I work in all day long. Those lines can be "opened and edited" from the pages depicted.
OP is on C drive, which is part of a RAID 5 and the RAID is intel software. Swap space? Not sure how to figure that out.
I think mobo only takes max of 8gb ram (it has it)
http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/dq965gf/sb/CS-025978.htm
Not sure if it makes a difference, but those pics are of live, editable lines, not reports. I am not sure of the terminology to use, so bear with me, those pics are of the pages I work in all day long. Those lines can be "opened and edited" from the pages depicted.
OP is on C drive, which is part of a RAID 5 and the RAID is intel software. Swap space? Not sure how to figure that out.
I think mobo only takes max of 8gb ram (it has it)
http://www.intel.com/support/motherboards/desktop/dq965gf/sb/CS-025978.htm
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Hey Neil, Arnold, just saw your posts and wanted to acknowledge and say thanks for the input
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I really dont figure why anyone is encouraging this questioner to even consider moving to SSD. From the information given and the answers to questions he has been asked, any competent expert would be giving the same advice.
Your solution will not lie in speeding up your disks a bit.
Your solution will not lie in speeding up your disks a bit.
Hi wfcrr,
And news to report back? :)
And news to report back? :)
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Thanks for the input on this item, fellas. Not sure what I will do, but the back and forth was very helpful.
When you decide how you want to proceed, how about posting more here? I'd like to know how this turns out....
Kent
Kent
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I am such a procrastinator, don't hold your breathe, but most def, if it is in the next month or so, will post here. From this volley of answers on this post, I am leaning towards a single processor build with raid hardware and use SSD's in the array and then swap out with spinners, just to see what it is like. Will proly do 16 GB ram, to see how that works. Seems we are allways using max ram with current system at 8GB, so will be interesting to see if it maxes out 16 GB right away. Between the ram and the SSD's and also by installing the OS on a dif machine from Exchange (I think?), all that should relieve alot of the bog.
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can you guys look at this one?
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/28415853/Server-build-question.html
https://www.experts-exchange.com/questions/28415853/Server-build-question.html
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My assumption is that SQL and the OS residing on a SSD would be much faster access. I don't know anything, so, really just assuming that placing both onto a SSD will bring much faster query response. Valid or no?