X-POD for VDI: X-POD for VDI. 500-, 1,000-, 1,500-seat solution Enabled by: Reference Architecture

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1 X-POD for VDI Reference Architecture X-POD for VDI: 500-, 1,000-, 1,500-seat solution Enabled by: X-IO ISE G3 740 Hybrid Storage Array Cisco UCS VMware Horizon 6

2 Table of Contents Table of Contents Introduction... 3 Highlights... 3 Key takeaway... 3 Executive Overview... 4 VDI Business Benefits... 4 Flexible desktop environment... 5 Better, easier desktop management... 5 Desktop by template... 6 Security and compliance... 6 Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) support... 6 Virtual Desktop Implementation Gotchas... 6 It s not performance versus capacity, it s performance and capacity... 7 Reliability and redundancy... 7 VDI Planning Questions to Ask... 7 Solution Overview Components Solution Architecture Hardware components Software components ISE to Cisco Unified Compute System (UCS) configuration VMware vsphere 6 configuration VMware Horizon View 6 environment architecture X-IO ISE G3 700 Series All-Flash and Flash-accelerated datastores VMware vrealize Operations Manager (vrops) integration Performance Analysis of Tested Configurations Test methodology Workload analysis ,000 virtual desktop boot storm Summary Appendix A. References X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 2

3 Introduction Introduction This paper details a reference architecture designed to deliver a repeatable, high-performance virtual desktop infrastructure solution. It uses the industry-leading VMware Horizon 6 desktop management environment running on Cisco Unified Computing System (UCS) blade servers with a Flash-Accelerated X- IO ISE G3 740 Hybrid Storage Array. The environment described herein has been tested by X-IO and verified by VMware and is intended to provide insight into the components, architecture, and performance requirements discovered during lab VDI testing. Highlights 66 minutes 1,500 linked clone desktops deployed and available Boot storm 5 minutes 1,000 linked clone desktops booted to a poweredon state 900,000 KBps Max 51,000 IOPS < 4 ms latency VSIMax 4.1 Not Reached Login VSI 500 Knowledge Worker VSI Average score = 803 VSIMax 4.1 Not Reached Login VSI 1,000 Knowledge Worker VSI Average score = 1060 VSIMax 4.1 Not Reached Login VSI 1,500 Knowledge Worker VSI average score = 1056 Table 1 Highlights Key Takeaway This paper details the extensive testing that X-IO has performed and provides guidance to the performance requirements of various operations based on Cisco UCS server and networking hardware combined with X-IO Intelligent Storage Element (ISE) systems. This validated testing demonstrates a solution that easily delivers a high-performance virtual desktop experience with VMware Horizon 6. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 3

4 Executive Overview Executive Overview Virtualization of servers and IT infrastructure has been well established in the business landscape. Operating expense (OPEX) cost reductions are routine in a virtualized datacenter due to the reduced number of physical servers, more centralized management tools, energy savings, and many other factors. This cost savings makes desktop virtualization a promising opportunity to transform a major cost for IT organizations. It is well known that virtualized desktop workloads are unlike most of the server virtualization workloads organizations experience. While steady-state desktop operations are commonly sized for, as an example, IOPS/desktop, it is non-standard operations and misconfigured sizing operations that result in degraded end-user experiences and potential downtime. This can make VDI a challenging and expensive solution to design and implement. By leveraging desktop virtualization solutions such as IT organizations can provide their customers with a superior desktop experience while decreasing management cost and increasing the flexibility of the organization. IT organizations can now increase the utilization of their IT staff by consolidating desktop management and hardware into the enterprise virtualization computing model. For example, relatively few IT staff can manage hundreds (if not thousands) of desktops for patch management or application upgrades. Using tools such as Recompose in VMware Horizon 6, patching operations can be applied to entire pools of desktops without impact to operations. As users log out of their desktops, Recompose rebuilds the desktop from a patched snapshot of the gold image. By contrast, traditional methods of patch management require excessive involvement from the IT organization across hundreds (if not thousands) of physical machines that may be spread around the world. Implementing a virtual desktop solution can be immensely beneficial to the organization, but, if implemented incorrectly, it can be an equally impressive failure. User experience is the gold standard that any solution will be held to, because users evaluate the new solution based on the physical desktop that was just replaced. Proof of Concept (POC) testing is essential when evaluating any new solution, because the process of configuring the test gives essential information about how the system will perform. Tools such as Login Virtual Session Indexer (Login VSI ) and VMware View Planner are critical for simulating like production workloads and are a worthwhile investment as part of evaluating different solutions. Ultimate failures of inadequately designed VDI implementations often perform well in the POC phase but are overwhelmed when placed into production. In the majority of these cases, storage performance is often the cause of a poor user experience, is often undersized for performance, and can be the most expensive single component of any VDI solution. VDI Business Benefits Properly sized and implemented, a VDI project can provide users with a whole desktop experience that surpasses their physical desktop machines. The benefits to the business are similar to server virtualization, but these benefits are applied at a greater scale. Enterprise-class computing hardware can be applied to end-user computing (reliability/availability/performance) and can leverage large-scale virtualization management techniques (capacity/scale). This can allow for greater utilization of existing IT staff, enable higher levels of reliability (including disaster recovery), and reduce overall ongoing costs to the business. While VDI can be a tremendous advantage for the business, data storage costs are historically the single largest cost component of the solution and the most common cause of poor user experiences and failed implementations. Listed below are some of the advantages VDI can bring to the business and the role that storage has to play. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 4

5 Business Benefits Flexible Desktop Environment Organizations leverage many different types of desktop applications. The type and number of applications running on a desktop impact the load on the virtual infrastructure. Based on the application workload and use case, different kinds of desktop virtualization options are available. Most organizations have different desktop builds for different users or groups of users. For that reason, user type definitions are leveraged during the planning, testing, and designing phases of VDI implementations. The user type corresponds directly to the resources assigned to each desktop and the anticipated activity of the users. For example, the resource requirements for graphic designers, software developers, Microsoft Office power users, and executives are quite different from the requirements for a call center or kiosk desktop. The power users will generally have higher CPU and memory requirements and will likely require that the desktop be persistent. Power users will expect that any changes to their desktops be preserved and in the same state the next time they log in. Persona management and roaming profiles can be used to preserve the user s state, but the customization of the desktop when the user logs in can cause high spikes in performance over regular login activity. Maintenance operations (deploy/recompose/etc.) will move several full copies of the base image, which can affect any active users. This impact can make scheduling maintenance operations (backup/deploy/recompose/patch) a strictly off-hours operation to avoid the impact on the user experience. In a call center (or kiosk) configuration, users expect to log in to any desktop and have a similar experience with nothing preserved between sessions. If one desktop has an issue, the user simply moves to another desktop and tries again. There is often a standard suite of software used by the virtual desktops to support business functions, and image management and testing are critical. However, with the growing adoption of cloud-based business tools (Salesforce, Office 365, etc.), applications are further being outsourced, which reduces the complexity and cost to support a virtual desktop s solution. The impact of maintenance operations should be well understood, as refreshing desktop images between sessions can have a dramatic impact to the underlying storage performance demands. Better, Easier Desktop Management In some cases, with physical desktops, the IT organization has to physically touch each desktop to remediate a problem. This geographic dispersion, even if within the same office building, increases the staffing requirements to manage the end-user desktops and increases the time required for break/fix functions. There is also an increased risk of data theft when users store corporate data on physical desktops that reside anywhere within the organization. Desktop virtualization allows for centralized management of the most commonly touched component in the desktop solution, the desktop itself. Backups can also be more effective, since all user data is kept in the datacenter, even though it looks to the user like an attached physical disk housed on local storage. This eliminates many of the issues seen when trying to back up hundreds and thousands of remote, physical desktop machines. Network interruptions, issues with individual operating system bugs, and failing physical hard drives are examples of situations that can be mitigated by utilizing a common storage platform. Performance of the storage system when performing recovery operations can have a substantial impact to the end users on the system. With some systems using 7200 RPM high-capacity HDDs, recovery operations can take days (or longer) depending on system load. For years, VMware has provided a rich API to enable storage partners to better integrate with the VMware ecosystem. This enables the virtualization administrator (vadmin) to quickly and efficiently assign storage resources where required. The complex provisioning of storage resources is done by software through the different hardware and virtualization layers. This greatly leverages the amount of capacity the vadmin can effectively manage and ensures best practices for storage configuration, thereby reducing risk. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 5

6 Business Benefits Desktop by Template IT organizations can create a library of virtual desktop templates, each of which can be carefully tuned and configured for the business need. Alternatively, an IT organization may choose to maintain a few templates and customize the end-user experience with virtual applications that are presented to the desktop sessions. Either way, templates provide a simple, supportable method of presenting virtual desktop solutions to the end users. For example, if an organization routinely uses contractors for a few different types of functions, a gold image template can be created for each, which can include the appropriate operating system, security settings, and all the applications that contractors require to accomplish their tasks. When a new contract employee is added, the IT staff only needs to deploy a new virtual desktop based upon the appropriate template. This can be done in minutes, but this can also generate an enormous amount of storage traffic or I/Os per second (IOPS) with a relatively small number of deployment operations. NOTE: Deploying a desktop is one of the most performance-demanding operations that storage will encounter in a desktop virtualization solution. The highest performance-demanding periods were observed during the desktop customization phase, executing Sysprep functions. Performing these operations during steady-state operations can put an abnormally large strain on the storage infrastructure, potentially impacting all other users on the system. Security and Compliance Virtual desktops allow an IT organization to have much better control over corporate data. As such, they make it easier to implement consistent, common security and compliance features. Depending upon the industry, compliance and security concerns can be important or strictly mandated. With physical desktops and mobile devices, corporations face the increased risk of data loss and theft of any device where data is stored locally. Desktop virtualization enables employees to work with data securely on centralized corporate resources. In some cases, users can work from any device, in any location, with confidence that their data is meeting the security requirements of the organization. Depending on the role of the desktop users, certain data regulations that require data separation and isolation (for example, financial, legal, and medical) may apply. This requires separate storage devices that must be able to support high IOPS and capacity levels that the separated pools require. Modularbased storage systems are inherently designed to accommodate this data security requirement. Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) Support Increasingly, organizations are supporting (and are being demanded to support) BYOD functionality. The workforce is changing, and the growing expectation is that applications and desktop access will be available on whatever device the employee has, from laptop to tablet to smartphone. This also has an immense benefit to the business, as the employee is providing a preferred end-point device that can be productive. VMware Horizon 6 offers a rich interface, enabling users to access their applications and desktops on any device. Individual applications can be virtualized, further enabling employee productivity and easing the demands on corporate computing resources. Virtual Desktop Implementation Considerations While the list of benefits that can be realized by a virtual desktop solution is impressive, the opportunities for failure, both in labor and in operating expenses (OPEX), are equally concerning. This section lists several areas that can put a VDI initiative at risk. In all cases, sufficient planning for the final production load and careful monitoring of operations is required to ensure smooth operations. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 6

7 Business Benefits and Planning Questions It s Not Performance Versus Capacity, It s Performance and Capacity Performance has a direct effect on end-user experience, and poor storage performance sizing is usually the number-one reason. Many VDI solutions are sized only for steady-state performance requirements. Common VDI operations, such as boot storms, login storms, virus scans, deployment operations, recovery, and other maintenance operations, can require an enormous amount of transactional performance (IOPS) from storage systems. VDI instances have to respond with little or no discernable impact to the end user when these maintenance operations are conducted. Performance is not the only thing to consider when sizing a VDI solution, as there must be enough capacity to satisfy the requirements for user data, operating systems, application data, and user persona. While there are several techniques to increase the amount of effective capacity a solution can provide (VMware Horizon View Composer Linked-Clones), there is still an underlying requirement for capacity. Unlike regular file server class capacity, this data has performance requirements that go across all of the data (there is little dead data ). This broad requirement means that while there may be areas of high-performance concentration (base images or replicas), the rest of the data has a high IOPS/TB requirement as well. This rest-of-the-data is what the individual VDI instances have to work with, so any slowdown in capacity will directly affect the end-user experience. Solutions that rely on calculated deduplication and compression techniques will see degrading performance ratios as the capacity is consumed. With the limited amounts of processing power and memory capacity in the storage controllers, the number of calculations increases with increasing capacity (and not necessarily in a linear fashion). According to VDI support organizations, storage systems account for 80 90% of the VDI performance issues reported. Often this is due to high read and write latencies in the storage system. Reliability and Redundancy No virtualized datacenter is sustainable without reliability and redundancy. Virtual Desktop Infrastructures can represent a true disaster if they become sluggish or non-responsive. The user impact is no longer limited to one or two applications but to the whole desktop itself. Imagine the majority of the workforce reduced to typing 10 or 20 words per minute or login times in excess of 5 minutes. Any slowdown in the VDI ecosystem has a very public result. Storage systems incur a tremendous performance penalty when performing disk drive recovery operations, and these have a dramatically negative impact to the end-user experience. Even if data is separated into groups or sets, centralized storage controllers are now responsible for managing recovery operations in addition to ongoing operations. Storage companies would not generally consider this a single point of failure, but users will. VDI Planning Questions to Ask High-Level Planning Proper planning is essential to a successful VDI rollout. Below is a non-exhaustive set of questions to help guide your investigation into a VDI pilot program and your full production program: What are the different kinds of users you will have to support (for example, kiosks, developers, power users, bank tellers, knowledge workers)? What is the scope of each user type? How many simultaneous desktops will be required? What are the expected resource demands for each user (for example, CPU, memory, disk space, network traffic)? What is the planned concurrency for your user pools and will their usage be offset from each other (for example, shifts, geographical support)? What are the relative benefits for virtualizing desktop access for each user type? What are the relative risks for each user type if there are access issues? What existing infrastructure can be used for the VDI implementation? For each user type, would persistent or non-persistent desktops be more appropriate? X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 7

8 VDI Planning Questions For each user type, would linked clones, full clones, or dedicated virtual machines be more appropriate? What existing IT management and monitoring tools do you have in place? Will your infrastructure support iscsi? Fibre Channel? Is either preferable to you? Will the pilot program be based on actual users or will it use validation software like Login VSI? For the pilot program, what are your success criteria? How much cost will there be in extending the warranty beyond what was included with the base support period? What metrics are important to you? For example: o Total number of IOPS o Total throughput o Recompose wall-clock duration o Maximum latency as seen by end user o Virtual machine boot time o Login/logout times o Tools that measure the user experience (for example, Login PI) How will the transition from pilot program to full production implementation be done? Economic Validation The Value of an X-IO VDI Solution Understanding the ROI during the planning phase is equally important for the VDI project to be successful. Dozens of factors determine costs, from energy use to the time spent on maintenance and upgrades, end-user productivity, and customer satisfaction. Evaluating the true cost of ownership for the VDI storage investment is key to understanding the ROI of the overall solution. X-IO s Economic Value Validation Assessment tool (EVV), created by the Enterprise Strategy Group (ESG), a leading independent research firm, demonstrates the measurable advantages in performance and ROI for VDI deployments leveraging X-IO storage. ESG s model estimates the likely cost and potential benefits according to the tasks outlined of deploying X-IO storage over traditional storage systems. Data sources used by ESG to inform and populate the assumptions in the model include reviews of publicly referenceable case studies, in-depth interviews with current X-IO customers and other IT professionals, and supplementary ESG market research data. The EVV Assessment tool compares X-IO products to an alternative storage solution/scenario running four different workloads simultaneously. The four workloads are: Virtual Desktop Infrastructure Business Intelligence Analytics Customer-Facing Transaction Processing General Server Virtualization The tasks and processes used as the basis of comparison between the scenarios include: Deployment tasks and costs, including expected professional services engagements. Ongoing storage administrator activities, including provisioning, monitoring, tiering, and troubleshooting disk drive failures. The impact of storage performance on end-user workflows across a mix of workloads, including a virtual desktop infrastructure deployment, a business intelligence (BI) and analytics application, and a customer-facing e-commerce application. Both end-user productivity for employees and the value of improving customer transaction processing are measured by the model. The impact of storage performance on incidental IT investments, including the reduction of server sprawl from increased virtual machine density and operational cost savings. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 8

9 VDI Planning Questions For the purpose of this paper, the workload used will be VDI. The inputs and values used in a 300-seat VDI solution follow. Table 2 EVV Tool Inputs for VDI Workload Input Example Scenario Virtual Desktop Infrastructure Deployment What are the usable capacity required and the expected annual growth rate? 7.5 TB / 5% What is the IOPS requirement for this workload? 27,000 How many VDI users are supported today and what is the expected annual growth rate? How many boot storms/scan storms/other high-latency events occur in a typical week? What percent of users is typically impacted by boot storms/scan storms/other high-latency events when they occur? How many hours of unplanned downtime per month is typical for this workload? 300 / 25% 5 / 5 / 3 65% / 65% / 100% 1 hour In the figure below, the X-IO solution is compared to an existing traditional storage array. The figure shows the two input screens of the EVV tool, and the only workload selected is Virtual Desktop Infrastructure. Figure 1 EVV Tool Inputs X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 9

10 VDI Planning Questions The analysis is immediately available for review. The report and a PDF summary are downloadable from the X-IO website, Based on the workload(s) and inputs, an X-IO storage solution is expected to lower the storage TCO by $90,641 over five years while also adding $555,181 in net-new benefits not achievable with traditional storage infrastructure. The result is an expected ROI of 217% and a payback period of 24 months. Figure 2 EVV Tool Results As noted above, the data sources used by ESG to inform and populate the assumptions in the model include reviews of publicly referenceable case studies and in-depth interviews with current X-IO customers and other IT professionals. While the assumptions reflect a vast majority of use cases, the EVV tool is customizable to meet the needs of an organization. The EVV tool produces an Excel spreadsheet, and the additional assumptions worksheet allows for more granular inputs and the ability to insert manual overrides of values. Figure 3 EVV Tool Workloads To obtain a copy of the EVV tool, please contact an X-IO representative in your area. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 10

11 Solution Overview Solution Overview This X-Pod reference architecture white paper describes a compact configuration to deliver a highperformance VDI environment that supports up to 1,500 virtual desktops. The following sections describe the components that comprise this reference architecture: Cisco UCS, Cisco Nexus, Cisco MDS, VMware vsphere, VMware vrealize Operations, VMware Horizon 6, and the ISE Hybrid Storage Array. Components The following components and information were leveraged for this X-Pod reference architecture. X-IO Technologies Intelligent Storage Element (ISE) G3 Consolidation and business intelligence are key themes in today s IT. Consolidation brings challenges in server multi-tenancy and hosted desktops, while database management systems enable a successful business. In both cases, fast and reliable solutions lead to a more productive and profitable enterprise. Flash-based ISE solutions are available in two models, the ISE 700 Series Hybrid and the ISE 800 Series All-Flash modular arrays. Figure 4 X-IO Intelligent Storage Element X-IO Flash-Enabled ISE 700 Series G3 ISE Hybrid Storage Arrays deliver three tiers of storage from a single Flash-based platform, giving administrators the control to apply Flash or HDD capacity where they need it. (Tier 0) All-Flash datastores are designed for applications with the highest performancedensity requirements. (Tier 1) Flash-Accelerated LUNs migrate blocks of data transparently between SSD and HDD media in near-real time. For workloads with a high concentration of performance requirements, such as VDI, Flash-Accelerated datastores are an ideal choice for applying SSD where needed (and HDD where it isn t). In this VDI reference architecture, all Flash-based volumes are used for the View Composer replica images, and Flash-Accelerated datastores are used for the VMware View Composer linked clone data. (Tier 2) Enterprise All-HDD-based datastores are ideal when capacity and high reliability are a premium, but performance demands can overwhelm traditional HDD solutions. During testing, All-HDD volumes were used for virtual machine backups, image development, performance data collection and analysis, and all infrastructure virtual machines (including Login VSI File Server). With the ISE 700 Series Hybrid arrays, Flash and HDD capacity can be dynamically moved between tiers, adjusting as the demands of the environment change and grow. ISE Hybrid arrays outperform systems that are up to ten times more expensive and provide lower overall total cost of ownership (TCO). X-IO ISE 800 Series G3 All-Flash Arrays are designed to drastically lower costs for delivering highperformance capacity to the most valuable applications that businesses run in today s environments. Applications such as online transaction processing (OLTP), mission-critical database applications, order processing, and call center VDI have broad capacity and high performance demands, historically requiring expensive Flash-based solutions based on commodity server hardware. ISE 800 series arrays are purpose-built to unlock the performance that Flash-based media can offer, providing a solution that yields high performance and utilization and low latency while reducing costs for the crown jewel applications in the datacenter. Storage Review, magazine has performed extensive testing of the ISE 700 and 800 Series arrays and has performed a two-part review (Part 1 Part 2 of the ISE 800 Series G3 All-Flash Array. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 11

12 Solution Overview Ease of Management with ISE Manager Suite VMware Ecosystem Integration Integration with the management tools and nomenclature of VMware environments greatly increases the productivity of IT staff and reduces the instances of human configuration errors. ISE Manager Suite provides simple integration of multiple ISE systems with the VMware Ecosystem. By using the VMware APIs, storage management is automated from the LUN to the datastore. With wizard-based workflows, VMware administrators are given a familiar single interface for managing storage from ISE systems, eliminating the need to switch between multiple applications. For example, the creation and presentation of a datastore is accomplished by using one wizard in ISE Manager Suite without having to execute any administrative tasks from the VMware Virtual Center client. When the wizard is done, the datastore is ready for use in the VMware environment. Plug-ins for ISE Management Suite are also available for the Windows and Web vcenter clients. ISE Manager Suite not only provides integration with VMware infrastructures but also with Citrix, Windows, and Linux operating systems. This enables simple storage management across multiple technologies, including physical hosts, clusters, and vcenter servers from one interface. Figure 5 ISE Manager Suite Cisco Unified Computing Systems (UCS) The underlying premise of a VDI solution is to run user desktops on powerful datacenter servers rather than on distributed physical machines. Cisco has focused on the characteristics needed to support this functionality in datacenter servers and has developed the following innovations: Extended memory Virtualization optimization with Cisco VN-Link technology Unified I/O access and unified fabric Unified, centralized management Figure 6 Cisco UCS B Series Service profiles Cisco has developed and refined the Unified Computing System (UCS) to specifically meet Enterprise VDI requirements. Simplified architecture and management geared toward datacenter fulfillment of virtual desktops lead to reduced TCO through lower acquisition costs and lower ongoing operational costs. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 12

13 Solution Overview Cisco UCS unites compute, network, storage access, and virtualization into a single cohesive system. The system is integrated with a low-latency 10 Gigabit Ethernet (10 GbE) unified network fabric with enterprise-class x86-architecture servers. It is an integrated multi-chassis platform in which all resources participate in a unified management domain. Cisco UCS accelerates the delivery of new services simply, reliably, and securely through end-to-end provisioning and migration support for both virtualized and non-virtualized systems. Cisco Nexus The Cisco Nexus 5548UP is a one-rack-unit (1U) 1 GbE, 10 GbE, and FCoE access-layer switch built to provide 960 Gbps of throughput with very low latency. It has 32x fixed 1 GbE or 10 GbE ports that accept modules and cables meeting the Small Form-Factor Pluggable Plus (SFP+) form factor. One expansion module slot can be configured to support up to 16 additional 1 GbE and 10 GbE ports or 8x Fibre Channel ports plus 8x 1 GbE and 10 GbE ports. The switch has a single serial console port and a single out-of-band 10/100/1000 Mbps Ethernet management port. VMware Horizon Suite VMware Horizon 6 is used to deliver virtual desktops as a service in a broad range of enterprise use cases, enabling the best user experience for maximum productivity. The suite of products, fully integrated with VMware vsphere, is built around the function of delivering virtualized desktops and applications through a single platform. Administrators can easily provision and customize the environment to comply with corporate policy and enduser needs. Desktop virtualization with VMware Horizon 6 enables organizations to do more with less and adopt a user-centric, flexible approach to computing. By decoupling applications, data, and operating systems from the endpoint (and by moving these components into the enterprise datacenter), desktop virtualization offers a more streamlined and secure way to manage users desktop needs. Figure 7 Cisco Nexus 5548UP VMware Horizon 6 introduces new capabilities that help deliver Figure 8 VMware vsphere unlimited access to desktops and applications at lower costs and bring better performance than earlier versions of Horizon View. The X-Pod solution leverages the following Horizon View products: VMware View Connection Server: Provides provisioning, deployment, and management of virtual desktops and acts as a broker for client connections authenticating and directing incoming user desktop requests. The connection broker allows the VDI administrator to centrally manage thousands of desktops from a single console. In this reference architecture, four desktop pools will be leveraged across two ESXi clusters. View Composer Server: This optional feature caters to the management of linked clone desktops and was used to greatly reduce the amount of capacity required. In this solution, the View Composer service resided on a dedicated virtual machine on the X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 13

14 Solution Overview infrastructure cluster. View Agent: This agent is installed on the guest OS of all VMs that require communication to be maintained with the View Connection server(s). The View Agent is used to monitor the health of provisioned VMs and current connections. Horizon Client The client is installed on end-point devices that require connections to the Horizon View-hosted VMs from another device. In this solution, the client is installed on the Login VSI Launcher Machines. Pool, Desktop, and Assignment type Pool Types: Unless working with Microsoft Terminal Servers machines, VMware Horizon 6 has two Desktop Pool types: Manual and Automatic. A manual desktop pool is used to manage an existing group of desktops created from a separate desktop source. Alternatively, the Automatic Pool (as used in this reference architecture) uses VMware View to control the deployment/recompose/management of the VM desktops with the View Composer providing the Linked-Clone functionality. Desktop Types: With VMware Horizon View 6, desktops can be built in either a full clone or linked clone configuration. The full clone option is a complete clone of an existing virtual machine and operates independently from the parent virtual machine. A linked clone desktop is based on VMware snapshot technology, with all desktops relying on a central image(s) for common files. These have the advantage of much quicker deploy times (no copying of data, just snapshot creation), but care must be taken to not overwhelm the system, as deploying large numbers of desktops is deceptively easy to perform. Assignment Types: Horizon View 6 allows two methods of virtual desktop assignment type, dedicated (persistent) and floating (non-persistent). In a persistent assignment, users are assigned to the same desktop when they log in. This can be good for environments where some level of customization is allowed (persona management) and can also prevent excessive downloading of group/user policies as users are directed back to the same desktop they were connected to initially. In a non-persistent assignment, users receive any available desktop in the pool. This is a common configuration in 24x7 operations (such as call centers), where the desktops will be refreshed (returned back to original state) when users log off at the end of their shifts. While this ensures that all users have a new instance whenever they connect to a desktop, this can increase the performance demands on the environment when large numbers of users are logging in/out. This reference architecture leverages automatic, non-persistent desktop pools, with View- Composer managed linked clones. Login VSI 4.1 Login Virtual Session Indexer (Login VSI) is the vendor-agnostic, industry-standard load-testing tool for virtualized desktop environments and is designed to perform benchmarks for VDI workloads through system saturation. Login VSI can be used to test the performance and scalability of VMware Horizon View, Citrix XenDesktop and XenApp, Microsoft Remote Desktop Services (Terminal Services), and any other Windows-based virtual desktop solution. Login VSI may be used to compare and validate the performance of different software and hardware solutions in an environment. Login VSI provides a method to measure the maximum capacity of an infrastructure, known as the VSImax value. Simulated users work with the same applications, such as Word, Excel, Outlook, and Internet Explorer, as standard users. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 14

15 Solution Overview Login VSI 4.0 provides organizations the ability to test low, medium, and high workloads across an infrastructure. Version 4.1 shifted the definitions of the workloads to be more aligned with VMwaredefined user types and introduced a new workload called Office Worker. The new workloads allow organizations to better match and simulate their virtual desktop use and predict and validate the performance of constantly changing production environments. Several workload definitions are available to simulate users with a wide range of performance demands. Workload VSI Version Apps Open CPU Usage Disk Reads Disk Writes IOPS Memory vcpu Light % 52% 65% GB 1 vcpu Medium % 93% 97% GB 2 vcpu Heavy % 89% 94% 7 1 GB 2 vcpu Task Worker Office Worker Knowledge Worker Power Worker % 79% 77% 6 1 GB 1 vcpu % 90% 101% GB 1 vcpu % 100% 100% GB 2 vcpu % 133% 123% GB 2 vcpu+ Table 3 Login VSI Workloads A Login VSI test run consists of a 48-minute scripted loop simulating a desktop workload for a specific number of users, with results accessible through the included Login VSI Analyzer. The ultimate metric used to evaluate the test run performance is called the VSImax value. The response times of five specific operations are used to determine the VSImax, or the maximum capacity of the solution (compute, storage, network). Notepad File Open (NFO): This action loads and initiates VSINotepad.exe and opens the Open File dialog. This operation is handled by the OS and by the VSINotepad.exe itself through execution. This operation seems almost instantaneous from an end user s point of view. CPU, RAM, and I/O are measured and compared. Notepad Start Load (NSLD): This actions loads VSINotepad.exe and opens a file. This operation is also handled by the OS and by the VSINotepad.exe itself through execution. CPU and I/O are measured. Zip High Compression (ZHC): This action copies a random file and compresses it (with 7zip) with high compression enabled. The compression will very briefly spike CPU. Disk I/O, CPU, and I/O are measured. Zip Low Compression (ZLC): This action copies a random file and compresses it (with 7zip) with low compression enabled. The compression will very briefly spike disk I/O and create some load on the CPU as well. I/O is measured. CPU: Calculates a large array of random data and spikes the CPU for a short time. CPU utilization is measured. When VSImax is reached, the latency in application response times indicates that the tested infrastructure is overloaded or saturated, and the test completes. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 15

16 CISCO UCS 6248UP ID STAT CISCONEXUSN548UP ID STAT 3 ALERT STATUS 5 8 EXP 1 0 MANAGEMENT 6 2/ MRC-1 1/ 4/ MRC-1 7 3/ USB CONSOLE CONSOLE USB 3/ 7 6 MANAGEMENT 4/ 2/ MRC-1 1/ 1 0 MRC-1 EXP 8 5 STATUS ALERT UCS 5108 UCS UCS A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 Console Console Console Console UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 Console Console Console Console OK FAIL OK FAIL OK FAIL OK FAIL UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 Console Console Console Console UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 UCS B200 M3 Console Console Console Console OK FAIL OK FAIL OK FAIL OK FAIL A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB OK FAIL OK FAIL OK FAIL OK FAIL A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB A GA2 10k SAS 300GB Console Console Console UCS B440 M1/M2 UCS B440 M1/M2 UCS B440 M1/M CISCO UCS 6248UP ID STAT CISCONEXUSN548UP ID STAT ALERT STATUS 5 8 4/ EXP 1 0 MANAGEMENT 6 2/ MRC-1 1/ MRC-1 7 3/ USB CONSOLE CONSOLE USB 3/ 7 6 MANAGEMENT MRC-1 4/ 2/ MRC-1 1/ 1 0 EXP 8 5 STATUS ALERT 3 Solution Architecture Solution Architecture This section highlights the hardware and software configurations used to assemble this reference architecture for 500, 1,000, and 1,500 virtual desktops delivered with VMware Horizon 6 on vsphere 6. This environment was built on two Cisco UCS B-Series Chassis with 16x B-200M3 blade servers, Cisco networking components, and X-IO ISE G3 700 Series Hybrid storage arrays. It should be noted that in this configuration the CPU resources of the UCS B200 M3 blade servers (16) were the main limiting factor in achieving higher numbers of virtual desktops. Figure 9 shows the logical diagram of the solution architecture for 500, 1,000 and 1,500 virtual desktops. The same infrastructure was used for all four tests. 8 x Cisco B-200 M3, 2 x 12 core Intel Xeon E GHz, 256GB RAM Up to 1200 Win 7 32 bit Desktops. 1 vcpu, 1.5 GB RAM Target Servers for Desktop Load - Benchmark Chassis 1 8 x Cisco B-200 M3, 2 x 8 core Intel Xeon E GHz, 128GB RAM Up to 800 Win 7 32 bit Desktops. 1 vcpu, 1.5 GB RAM Management Server 1 x B-440 M2, 4 x 8 Core E GHz, 256GB RAM Virtual Servers: All OS: Windows 2008 R2 Standard Edition VC Server 6.0, Horizon View Connection Broker 6.2, Composer Server, LoginVSI Server, vrealize Operations Manager Appliance Chassis 2 Management Server and Load Generating Servers Chassis 3 Launch servers 2 x B440 M3, 4 x 10 Core Intel Xeon E GHz, 256GB RAM Launch Desktops: 80 x Windows 7, 32 bit desktops. 2 vcpu, 4 GB RAM Primary 2 x UCS Fabric Interconnect 10Gbs connection to 8Gbs FC ports from FI to Nexus 5548 UP Secondary 2 x Cisco Nexus 5548UP 16 x 8Ggbs FC Port Configuration 8 x 8Gbs Connection to X-IO ISE Target ISE Storage Array Launch and Management Storage Array X-IO Technologies ISE G3 740 Hybrid X-IO Technologies ISE G3 240 HDD 2 x 200 GB All Flash Volumes for Target Replica disks 8 x 1.2 TB LUNs for Target Virtual Desktops 2 x 1.2 TB LUNs for Login VSI Launcher VMs 2 x 1 TB LUNs for Virtual Management Servers Figure 9 Solution Architecture X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 16

17 Solution Architecture Hardware Components To support the Login VSI test of 500, 1,000, and 1,500 VDI desktop loads on the X-IO ISE G3 740, the following hardware components were used. Hardware Quantity Configuration Servers Cisco UCS 5100 B-Series Chassis 1 2 Up to 500 VDI desktops (Performance Cluster) 2208XP Fabric I/O Extenders 2 Cisco UCS B200 M3 8 Two Intel Xeon E X.X-GHz CPU (16 cores total) 128 GB RAM VIC Cisco UCS 5100 B-Series Chassis 2 1 Up to 1,000 VDI desktops (High-Performance Cluster) 2208XP Fabric I/O Extenders 2 Cisco UCS B200 M3 8 Two Intel Xeon E X.X-GHz CPU (24 cores total) 256 GB RAM VIC Cisco UCS 5100 B-Series Chassis 3 3 Infrastructure (1) and Launcher (2) clusters 2208XP Fabric I/O Extenders 2 Cisco UCS B440 1 Two Intel Xeon E X.X-GHz CPU (24 cores total) 256 GB RAM Infrastructure vsphere server UCS-VIC-M82-8P 8 Networking Cisco Nexus 5548 UP 2 Ports configured for FC connections to ISE and Cisco UCS Fabric Interconnect Cisco UCS 6248 Fabric Interconnect 2 Ports configured for FC connection to Cisco Nexus 5548UP Storage X-IO ISE G3 710 Hybrid Storage Array 1 8 Gb/s Fibre Channel for Login VSI Share and Management Infrastructure X-IO ISE G3 740 Hybrid Storage Array 1 8 Gb/s Fibre Channel for all Horizon View desktop pools Table 4 Hardware Components X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 17

18 Solution Architecture Software Components See the table below for software details. Software vsphere Version ESXi 6.0 build VMware Virtual Center Appliance 6.0 build VMware Horizon 6 Ecosystem VMware Horizon 6 Connection Server Operating System VMware Horizon 6 Composer Server Operating System Composer Database Microsoft Software Platforms Active Directory, DNS, DHCP Login VSI, VSIshare Server Operating System Microsoft.NET 3.5 Login VSI 4.1 Virtual Desktops: Target Desktop Operating System Microsoft Office 2010 Adobe Reader v. 11 Java Doro PDF Writer build Windows Server 2012 R build Windows Server 2012 R2 SQL Server 2008 R2 Windows Server 2012 R2 Windows Server 2012 R2 Windows 7 32-bit SE 7 U13 VMware View Agent Virtual Desktop: Launch Desktop OS Table 5 Software Components Windows 7 32-bit X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 18

19 Solution Architecture ISE to Cisco Unified Compute System (UCS) Configuration The Cisco UCS configuration communicates to the X-IO ISE G3 740 and 240 storage arrays through dual redundant paths from the Nexus 5548 UP. Ports on each Nexus switch are configured for Fibre Channel traffic and used for connections to the ISE units and to the UCS 6248 fabric interconnect. Ports on the UCS 6248 fabric interconnect are configured for Fibre Channel traffic and connect to Nexus 5548UP, allowing the Fibre Channel shared storage to be presented to the ESXi hosts in the chassis. Each Cisco UCS chassis connects to each fabric interconnect with four 10 Gbps network connections. The Fibre Channel traffic in the UCS is encapsulated in a Fibre Channel over Ethernet (FCoE) frame, and when the traffic reaches the SAN network, the FCoE encapsulation is removed. In UCS, the converged network adapters perform the function of both NIC and HBA. When the traffic leaves the blade, it is FCoE-encapsulated and is passed to the UCS 6100/6200 series fabric interconnects. The dual fabric interconnect pairs have primary and subordinate roles in this configuration. For Figure 10 X-POD Networking Configuration more information about optimizing and configuring the Cisco UCS server service profiles for VDI, click here VMware vsphere 6 Configuration For this reference architecture, the VMware vsphere 6.0 build ESXi hypervisor is deployed. All of the hosts-under-test are configured to boot from storage that is internal to the UCS blade servers. Cluster Configuration The environment is organized into three main clusters of servers: 1. VDI clusters under test: Two VDI clusters encompassing a total of 16x UCS blades (chassis 1 and 2 in Figure 9) are responsible for supporting all target virtual desktops. The first VDI cluster of 8x nodes runs up to 500 VDI target desktops, while the second VDI cluster of 8x nodes runs up to 1,000 target VDI desktops. 2. Management cluster: 1x UCS blade (in its own cluster) is used to run all infrastructure virtual machines, including a Domain Controller (DHCP/DNS), VMware Virtual Appliance, vcenter Operations Manager, VMware Horizon servers, and Login VSI Server. 3. Login VSI Launcher cluster: The Login VSI Launcher cluster comprises 2x UCS blades that run 80x Login VSI Launcher desktops. VDI Clusters The two clusters that are the focus of this reference architecture are the VDI clusters. Combined, they consist of 16x hosts as described in the hardware components section above. These work together to support the test loads of 500, 1,000 and 1,500 virtual desktop machines. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 19

20 Solution Architecture Figure 11 VDI Cluster, Up to 500 Desktops Figure 12 VDI Cluster, Up to 1,000 Desktops X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 20

21 Solution Architecture Management Cluster The Infrastructure UCS blade hosts all virtual machines required to support the vsphere environment, the Horizon View environment, and the Login VSI management server. Figure 13 Infrastructure VM for Reference Architecture Validation Login VSI Launcher Cluster The Login VSI Launcher cluster hosts all of the virtual machines used to generate desktop sessions on the target desktops in the VDI clusters. Figure 14 Launcher Cluster X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 21

22 Solution Architecture VMware Horizon View 6 Environment Architecture This VDI solution is created and managed in VMware Horizon View v6.2 build (will be referred to as Horizon View 6). All hosts are running ESXi 6.0 build and are referred to as ESXi 6.0. This test leveraged automatic, floating desktop pools based on linked clone desktop virtual machines. In addition to the linked clone method of deploying desktop virtual machines, VMware Horizon 6 uses VMware View Storage Accelerator (VSA) technology. This technology allows a small amount of VMware ESXi host RAM to be used as a content-based read cache for the selected desktops read I/O operations. VMware VSA was configured at 2 GB for each VMware ESXi host and for each VMware View pool used for this test. Horizon 6 Desktop Pools The target desktop pools in all three test scenarios were built leveraging All-Flash and Flash-Accelerated datastores residing on the ISE G3 740 Hybrid storage array. VMware Horizon desktop pools were used to distribute the load evenly among the clusters, as shown in the table of test cases below. Desktop Pool ESXi Cluster 500 desktop test 1000 desktop test 1,500 desktop test Pool1 X-Pod1-Ch1-HighP Pool2 X-Pod1-Ch1-HighP Pool3 X-Pod1-Ch2-Perf n/a n/a 250 Pool4 X-Pod1-Ch2-Perf n/a n/a 250 Table 6 Desktop Pool Configurations The View Composer replica disks were placed on the two All-Flash datastores, while the target desktops (which are linked clones) were evenly distributed across 12 Flash-Accelerated datastores. Both the All- Flash and Flash-Accelerated volumes were configured with a virtual RAID-1 protection scheme. A screen shot of the datastore configuration, as presented to the ESXi hosts, is below. Figure 15 Datastores for All Desktop Pools The ISE Management Suite allows for batch creation of storage resources and was heavily used in configuring the ISE systems during testing. ISE Manager Suite s deep integration with the VMware ecosystem allowed management of storage resources for clusters of servers at a time. This greatly simplified changing configurations for the various tests that were conducted over the course of the project. This was estimated to have saved almost two business days (up to 12 hours) of manual operations for each test case change. X-Pod for VDI Cisco UCS Vmware Horizon View 6 22