Best Practice of Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Based on HUAWEI OceanStor Series Enterprise Storage Systems

Transcription

1 Best Practice of Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 Based on HUAWEI OceanStor Series Enterprise Storage Systems This document describes the best practice of planning and deploying the Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 on HUAWEI OceanStor Series and the steps to verify the performance of the Exchange Server This document describes how to design and configure the performance and capacities of storage systems, server CPU, and server memory. Jetstress is used to test the maximal mailbox users that can be supported by the storage systems and servers available so that users can deploy an Exchange on VMware efficiently, with the Exchange performance predictable, to meet enterprise's requirements. Tong Kaiguo IT Storage Solution SDT, Huawei Enterprise BG V1.0 Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd.

2 Contents 1 Overview Description Benefits Intended Audience Terminology HUAWEI OceanStor Series Overview Smart Matrix Architecture RAID 2.0+ Fully Virtualized Intelligent Volume Smart Series Software Hyper Series Data Protection Software OceanStor DeviceManager Microsoft Exchange Roles of Exchange 2010 Servers Mailbox Server Mailbox servers perform the following functions: Mailbox Server Interactions Services and Executables Exchange 2010 Store Logical Components of the Exchange 2010 Store File Structure of the Exchange High Availability and Site Resilience Best Practice Planning Descriptions Physical Network Storage Configuration RAID Groups Configuration LUN Configuration Configuration Targets Test Configuration Simulated Exchange Configuration Hardware Configuration Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 2

3 4.5.3 Software Configuration Storage Configuration of Mailbox Databases Best Practice Storage Configuration Disk Domain Configuration Disk Type Storage Pool Configuration RAID Level Number of Member Disks in a RAID Group LUN Configuration Host and Host Group Configuration Configuring Port Groups Mapping View Configuration Transaction Performance Planning Storage Performance Planning Storage Capacity Planning Final Storage Solution Mailbox Server Planning Mailbox Server CPU Planning Mailbox Server CPU Calculation Capacity Calculation Mailbox Server Memory Planning Host Multipathing Configuration NTFS Allocation Unit Size HBA Driver Test Results of Best Practice Jetstress Test Results Reliability Storage Performance Detailed Test Results Summary Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 3

4 1 Overview Centering on the needs of large- and medium-sized enterprises, the best practice of Exchange based on HUAWEI OceanStor series enterprise storage systems (the OceanStor series) describe how to efficiently plan and deploy Exchange services by using the OceanStor In addition, the practices employ the high database availability group (DAG) of the Exchange 2010 databases to provide high availability and site resilience for services and data. Lastly, the practice conducts the Exchange Solution Review Program (ESRP) verification with a scale of 9000 mailbox users. The best practice can improve service deployment efficiency and ensure the performance and continuity of Exchange Server 2010 services. 1.1 Description The best practice of Exchange based on the OceanStor series presents a detailed description of the design and deployment of the Microsoft Exchange on the VMware. The document gives a detailed description of the functions and features of the OceanStor series and Exchange 2010 in the beginning chapters, followed by the descriptions about how to plan the IOPS performance and capacities of the storage system, server CPU, memory, and multipathing software with 9000 users running on the Exchange Lastly, the document probes into the verification of service performance and reliability with the best practice applied. With supporting documentation available, the best practice has been verified and can help users efficiently and quickly deploy the Exchange on the VMware and reduce workloads and risks in the planning and deploying stages. 1.2 Benefits With the two models of the OceanStor 18500/18800 available, the OceanStor series is optimal for an enterprise's core services (that require high reliability and high performance). Geared to the needs of large- and medium-sized enterprises, the best practice of Exchange based on the OceanStor series is calculable and customizable, protect costumers' investments, and reduce workloads in planning and configuring the system. The best practice presents an open architecture. Users can choose all components recommended, or they choose some of components and deploy them on the OceanStor series based on the resources available and their budget. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 4

5 As an indispensable tool is business communication, enables an enterprise to communicate with its client, potential clients, partners, and suppliers. Nowadays, IT administrators of the Microsoft Exchange are facing the challenges posed by the requirements of high performance and high efficiency. Operating, auditing, protecting, and managing an Exchange environment involving multiple working regions are the demanding challenges to most IT departments. Many enterprises attempt to overcome the bottlenecks by adding physical servers or storage systems, which not only proves ineffective but aggravates the problems. Huawei has secured its position among the top IT basic architecture suppliers in the industry and offers a comprehensive Microsoft Exchange virtual solution that can be deployed efficiently. 1.3 Intended Audience This document is intended for Huawei employees, Huawei partners, and customers. Personnel that deploy this solution are supposed to have met the following requirements: Authorized by Microsoft to sell and install the Exchange solution Authorized by Huawei to sell, install, and configure the OceanStor series Personnel that deploy the solution must have the know-how to install and configure the following systems: Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 the OceanStor series 1.4 Terminology Table 1-1 Terminology Acronym AD CA DAC DAG DDL DNS ESRP FC IOPS LDAP LUN Full Spelling Active Directory Client Access Server Role Datacenter Activation Coordination Database Availability Group Data Definition Language Domain Name Service Exchange Solution Review Program Fibre Channel Input/Output Operations Per Second Lightweight Directory Access Protocol Logical Unit Number Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 5

6 Acronym MRM NL-SAS NSPI OAB PAM Full Spelling Messaging Records Management Near Line SAS Name Service Provider Interface Offline Address Book Primary Active Manager POP3 Post Office Protocol 3 RAID RPO SAN SAS SATA SCSI SMTP TCO Redundant Array of Independent Disk Recovery Point Objective Storage Area Network Serial Attached SCSI Serial Advanced Technology Attachment Small Computer System Interface Simple Mail Transfer Protocol Total cost of ownership Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 6

7 2 HUAWEI OceanStor Series 2.1 Overview The OceanStor series enterprise storage systems are ideal storage platforms designed for new-generation data centers. Boasting high reliability, excellent scalability, and outstanding efficiency, the OceanStor series addresses the mission-critical service storage requirements of various industries, including finance, government, energy, manufacturing, transportation, education, and telecommunication. Figure 2-1 HUAWEI OceanStor series storage system Secure and Trusted The following describes the highlights of the OceanStor series. Multi-controller full-redundancy architecture: zero single point of failure and load balancing, ensuring stable system running RAID 2.0+ disk virtualization: no hotspot disk and 20 times faster data recovery, greatly improving data reliability Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 7

8 Flexible and Efficient Robust Reliability Comprehensive disaster recovery solution: industry's shortest RPO of 0 to 5 seconds and one-click disaster recovery management, protecting business continuity to the maximum Maximum specifications: 1 million SPC-1 IOPS, 16 controllers, 3 TB cache, 7 PB capacity, scalable based on demands, meeting storage requirements in the next 10 years Fastest response: world's only enterprise storage systems that respond in microseconds, delivering 10 times faster service processing Highest efficiency: maximized storage system efficiency, improving storage utilization by three times The OceanStor series offers incomparable reliability in terms of architecture, data storage, and applications to ensure business continuity. With the Smart Matrix architecture, the OceanStor series is able to provide 16 fully redundant controllers to maintain system reliability. All the controllers are optically interconnected through PCIe 2.0 to support lossless data exchange among them. All OceanStor components and channels are redundantly configured so that fault detection, correction, and isolation can be independently carried out on each module or channel without interrupting system services. The OceanStor series leverages the innovative block virtualization technology to shorten reconstruction time per TB data from 10 hours to 30 minutes, accelerating data reconstruction by 20 times and greatly enhancing data reliability. End-to-end data integrity verification means are implemented based on the Protection Information (PI) technology to prevent data from being damaged. SmartQoS and SmartPartition help critical services get sufficient resources for continuous business running. The Hyper series data protection software executes local and remote protection for customers' data, and ensures business continuity by working with Huawei disaster recovery solutions. PI+DIX end-to-end data protection The OceanStor series offers the PI+DIX end-to-end data integrity solution to protect data integrity ranging from application systems, host bus adapters (HBAs), storage systems, to disks. The PI+DIX solution prevents silent data corruption and delivers end-to-end data protection. Intensity 9 earthquake resistance The OceanStor series is the only enterprise storage product that has passed the intensity 9 earthquake resistance test held by the Communication Equipment Earthquake Resistance Performance Quality Inspection and Testing Center, which is under China's Ministry of Industry and Information Technology. The OceanStor series can prevent faults caused by mechanical vibrations that occur during transportation and operation. Moreover, the OceanStor series can resist 90% earthquakes in 50 years and ensures zero data loss in case of serious earthquakes. Predictable and manageable SSD lifetime The OceanStor 18800F all-flash enterprise storage system employs the global wear leveling technology to balance the erase frequency of flash cells globally while reducing the erase times of solid-state drives (SSDs) that have little redundant space. The SSD life span is extended as a result. Meanwhile, the OceanStor 18800F provides the unique global anti-wear leveling technology to centralize flash erase operations onto only a few SSDs when most SSDs have reached their wear thresholds, reducing the probability of multi-disk failure to a large degree. The OceanStor 18800F is able to accurately predict Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 8

9 High Scalability the lifetime of SSDs based on flash erase times, and uses a graphical user interface (GUI) to intuitively show SSD lifetime. The OceanStor series is highly scalable and supports on-demand capacity and performance expansion. Built on the Smart Matrix architecture, the OceanStor series can be configured with a maximum of 3216 disks to provide a capacity up to 7 PB. An OceanStor storage system supports a maximum of 3 TB cache and 192 Fibre Channel or iscsi ports. The 4S expansion technology includes scale-up, scale-out, scale-deep, and scale-in. Scale-up increases storage capacity and performance of controllers. Scale-out enables storage performance to increase linearly with capacity. Scale-deep consolidates third-party storage resources. Scale-in expands performance and capacity of host volumes without adding any hardware resources, and allows the storage system to infinitely adapt to service needs. The OceanStor series is a distributed multi-controller storage system whose controllers can increase from 2 to 16 non-disruptively with the scale-out technology. A maximally configured OceanStor storage system consists of eight system bays and two disk bays. Each system bay can house a maximum of inch disks or inch disks. Each disk bay can house a maximum of inch disks. The OceanStor series offers the disk options of ultrafast enterprise-class SSDs, high-performance enterprise-class SAS disks, and large-capacity NL-SAS disks, as well as the port options of 8 Gbit/s Fibre Channel ports and 10 Gbit/s Ethernet ports used for FCoE and iscsi connections. The OceanStor series maintains a microsecond-level latency to provide quick response to critical services. 2.2 Smart Matrix Architecture Smart Matrix Architecture The Smart Matrix architecture is exclusively incorporated by the OceanStor series and enables an OceanStor storage system to scale up to 16 controllers, 3 TB cache, and 7 PB capacity, breaking the limit of the traditional dual-controller architecture and leading to unprecedented system scalability and availability. PCIe Optical Interconnection Scale-Out Expansion The Smart Matrix architecture adopts PCIe 2.0 to interconnect all controllers in full switch mode and deliver a bandwidth up to 192 GB/s. Each controller integrates front- and back-end ports and global cache, and allows data to be flushed to disks simultaneously from multiple controllers to improve I/O efficiency. The Smart Matrix architecture enables system resources to increase linearly. Controllers of an OceanStor storage system can online expand to 16 and be deployed in a distributed manner in the data center. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 9

10 2.3 RAID 2.0+ Fully Virtualized Intelligent Volume New-Generation Intelligent Disk Management Technology Space on all disks in a storage system is divided into chunks. The chunks constitute chunk groups (CKGs), which are divided into extents. The extents then form LUNs. This process enables data to be evenly distributed on disks, greatly improving I/O performance, eliminating hot spot disks, reducing the disk failure rate, and enhancing system reliability. Each disk reserves certain hot spare space. Once a disk is faulty, all the other disks participate in data reconstruction, accelerating data recovery by 20 times and further boosting system reliability. Smart Series Resource Allocation Software The Smart series software provides the OceanStor series with high efficiency and flexibility. SmarTier automatically optimizes performance and lowers costs. SmartMotion dynamically adjusts data distribution to balance performance and capacity among disks. SmartThin optimizes storage space utilization. SmartQoS controls service quality and prioritize resource demands of critical services. SmartPartition partitions and isolates storage cache, and guarantees cache resources for critical services. SmartVirtualization consolidates heterogeneous storage resources, simplifying storage management and maximizing customers' return on investment (ROI). 2.4 Smart Series Software SmartQoS Service Quality Control SmartQoS classifies I/Os into priority-specific queues according to application priorities. Sufficient storage resources are reserved for I/O queues with high priorities to meet their performance requirements, while a performance upper threshold is set for applications with low priorities to avoid overuse of resources. The execution period of a SmartQoS policy is customizable. SmartPartition Cache Partitioning SmartPartition sets cache partition requirements for critical services, dynamically allocates cache resources to services based on the requirements, and isolates the cache resources between services, preventing unnecessary cache competition and ensuring performance of critical services. SmartTier Intelligent Storage Tiering SmartTier creates different storage tiers based on disk types, analyzes the access frequency of data, and migrates data among tiers based on analysis results. This feature ensures that data is stored in proper storage media, improving system performance and reducing total cost of ownership (TCO). Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 10

11 SmartMotion Balanced Performance and Capacity Among Disks SmartMotion analyzes the access frequency of data and available capacity on a type of disks, and migrates data among those disks to balance performance and capacity among disks of the same type. This feature eliminates disk hot spots, and improves disk utilization and system performance. In system expansion, SmartMotion reallocates performance and capacity to ensure smooth expansion. SmartThin Optimal Resource Allocation SmartThin allocates storage space on demand and reclaims unused space of typical applications such as VMware, Veritas Storage Foundation, and Windows Server. The space is allocated and reclaimed at a granularity of 64 KB. SmartThin also supports space preallocation for thin LUNs. SmartVirtualization Heterogeneous Storage Virtualization SmartVirtualization consolidates storage resources on a live network by taking control of heterogeneous storage systems to make full use of legacy storage space, reduce management complexity, and maximize customers' ROI. 2.5 Hyper Series Data Protection Software HyperSnap HyperClone HyperReplication/S HyperReplication/A HyperSnap generates snapshots for a source volume of any capacity at specified points in time without interrupting system services. Those snapshots can be used for backup, testing, data mining, and data recovery when the original data is lost by accident. HyperSnap stores only changed data to save storage space. HyperClone generates physical copies (data mirrors) for a primary LUN. After synchronizing and splitting the primary LUN and secondary LUN, users obtain physical copies that are consistent with the primary LUN. A primary LUN in a HyperClone task has a maximum of 16 physical copies, which can be used for different purposes. HyperReplication/S replicates data synchronously from a primary LUN to a secondary LUN on a different storage array. Data is consistent between the primary and secondary LUNs. This feature ensures data availability at disaster recovery sites and achieves zero data loss. HyperReplication/A replicates data asynchronously from a primary LUN to a secondary LUN at a remote site that may be thousands of kilometers away. HyperReplication/A supports a minimum RPO of 5 seconds, minimizing data loss caused by system downtime. The customizable periodic synchronization policy helps mitigate the impact on application and host performance. HyperReplication/CG Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 11

12 ReplicationDirector HyperReplication/CG allows multiple data volumes that apply the same replication policy to form a consistency group to ensure operation consistency among the data volumes. Huawei OceanStor ReplicationDirector is designed to manage disaster recovery of enterprise data centers. ReplicationDirector incorporates application awareness and value-added features of Huawei storage systems to ensure application data consistency during disaster recovery. This software helps users efficiently configure disaster recovery, easily monitor the running of disaster recovery services, and conveniently perform disaster recovery tests. 2.6 OceanStor DeviceManager Huawei OceanStor DeviceManager is a platform for managing Huawei storage systems. It has the following characteristics: Web-based management interface The software is built in storage systems. Users can log in to its management interface using a web browser. Intuitive navigation Graphical navigation makes operation entries clearly and vividly displayed. Administrators can quickly get started with the software. Simplified storage configuration Centralized configuration entries reduce the procedures and page switching times of storage management tasks. Initial configuration greatly simplifies the process from storage system initialization to storage resource allocation. Intelligent storage system monitoring Various means of event notification allow administrators to initiate active storage management. Classified operations reduce the possibility of misoperations and enhance users' confidence. Performance statistics help administrators find and smash performance bottlenecks. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 12

13 3 Microsoft Exchange Roles of Exchange 2010 Servers Mailbox server A back-end server that hosts mailbox databases and public folder databases Client Access server Handles access protocols, such as Post Office Protocol 3 (POP3), Internet Message Access Protocol 4 (IMAP4), Secure Hypertext Transfer Protocol (HTTPS), and Outlook Anywhere. The Client Access server also hosts Web services. Hub Transport server Handles all mail flow inside the organization Edge Transport server Handles all Internet-facing mail flow and blocks viruses and spam Unified Messaging server Integrates multiple methods of communication and supports the access of multiple types of terminals Mailbox Server As the most common server role, the Mailbox server role is at the core of an Exchange organization and is closely related to the storage system. Servers on which the Mailbox server is installed are called Mailbox servers Mailbox servers perform the following functions: Host mailbox databases Provide storage Host public folder databases Calculate address policies Generate address lists and offline address books (OAB) Conduct Multi-Mailbox Searches Provide high availability and site resiliency Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 13

14 Provide content indexing Provide message records management (MRM) and retention policies Mailbox Server Interactions The Mailbox server must directly interact with the following: Active Directory Client Access server Hub Transport server Unified Messaging server Microsoft Outlook clients Figure 3-1 Interactions between the Mailbox server and other servers Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 14

15 1. The Mailbox server uses LDAP to access recipient, server, and organization configuration information from Active Directory. 2. The store driver on the Hub Transport server places messages from the transport pipeline into the appropriate mailbox. The store driver on the Hub Transport server also adds messages from a sender's Outbox on the Mailbox server to the transport pipeline. 3. The Client Access server sends requests from clients to the Mailbox server, and returns data from the Mailbox server to the clients. The Client Access server can also access OAB files on the Mailbox server through NetBIOS file sharing. The types of data that the Client Access server sends between the clients and the Mailbox server include messages, free/busy data, client profile settings, and OAB data. 4. The Unified Messaging server retrieves , voice mail messages, and calendar information from the Mailbox server for Outlook Voice Access. The Unified Messaging server also retrieves storage quota information from the Mailbox server. 5. Outlook clients inside your firewall can access the Access Client server to send and retrieve messages. Outlook clients outside the firewall can access the Client Access server by using Outlook Anywhere (which uses RPC over HTTP). However, Outlook clients that are viewing or changing public folders can access the Client Access server by using RPC over TCP. 6. The administrator-only computer retrieves Active Directory topology information from the Microsoft Exchange Active Directory topology service. It also retrieves address policy information and address list information. 7. The Client Access server uses LDAP or Name Service Provider Interface (NSPI) to contact the Active Directory and retrieve users' Active Directory information Services and Executables When you install the Exchange 2010 Mailbox server, the service and port executables shown in the follow table are installed and service ports are created. Table 3-1 Services Service Short Name Service Name Associated Executable Port Name MSExchangeIS Microsoft Exchange Information Store Store.exe MSExchangeIS MSExchangeADT opology Microsoft Exchange Active Directory Topology MSExchangeADTopo logyservice.exe MSExchangeAD Topology MSExchang b oxassistants Microsoft Exchange Mailbox Assistants MSExchang box Assistants.exe MSExchangeMai lboxassistantspo rts MSExchangeSearc h Microsoft Exchange Search Indexer Microsoft.Exchange.S earch.exsearch.exe MSExchangeSea rchports MSExchangeServi cehost Microsoft Exchange Service Host Microsoft.Exchange.S ervicehost.exe MSExchangeSer vicehostports MSExchangeMoni toring Microsoft Exchange Monitoring Microsoft.Exchange. Monitoring.exe MSExchangeMo nitoringports MSExchangeSA Microsoft Exchange System Attendant Mad.exe MSExchangeSA Ports Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 15

16 Service Short Name Service Name Associated Executable Port Name MSExchang Submission Microsoft Exchange Mail Submission MSExchang Sub mission.exe MSExchangeMai lsubmissionports msftesql-exchange Microsoft Search(Exchange Server) Msftesql.exe msftesql-exchan geports MSExchangeTrans portlogsearch Microsoft Exchange Transport Log Search MSExchangeTranspor tlogsearch.exe MSExchangeTra nportlogsearchp orts 3.2 Exchange 2010 Store Logical Components of the Exchange 2010 Store The primary components of the Exchange store include mailbox databases and public folder databases. These components can reside on a single server, or they can be distributed across multiple servers. Mailbox databases contain the data, data definitions, indexes, checksums, flags, and other information that comprise any public folders in you Exchange organization. Mailbox databases contain data that is private to an individual user and mailbox folders generated when a mailbox is created for that user. A mailbox database is saved as an Exchange database (.edb) file. Public folder databases contain the data, indexes, checksums, flags, and other information that comprise any public folders in your Exchange organization File Structure of the Exchange 2010 Exchange 2010 saves data in a specialized set of data files, such as Exchange database (.edb) files, transaction log (.log) files, and checkpoint (.chk) files. Exchange database (.edb) files These files are the repository for mailbox data. They can be accessed by the Extensible Storage Engine (ESE) directly and have a B-tree structure designed for quick access. This enables a user to access any page of data within one input/output cycle. The access speed increases by four folds compared that of the Microsoft Exchange Server Exchange databases consist of multiple B-trees and ancillary trees that used to store indexes and views. Transaction log (.log) files These files are the repository for database operations such as creating or modifying a message. Committed operations are later written to the database itself (in an.edb file.)the approach guarantees that all complete and incomplete transactions are logged to maintain data integrity in case of a service interruption. Checkpoint (.chk) files Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 16

17 When a checkpoint occurs, the dirty data (committed data changes) in the memory is forcibly written into a database file. Checkpoint (.chk) files store information that indicates when a transaction is successfully saved to the database files on the hard disk. Exchange 2010 uses checkpoint files to allow an instance of the ESE to automatically replay log files into an inconsistent database when recovering from a service interruption, starting with the next unwritten transaction High Availability and Site Resilience Mailbox databases are one of the most critical components of any Exchange organization. In Microsoft Exchange Server 2010, you can protect mailbox databases and the data they contain by configuring your mailbox databases for high availability and site resilience. Exchange 2010 reduces the cost and complexity of deploying a highly available and resilient messaging solution while providing higher levels of end-to-end availability and supporting large mailboxes. Building on the native replication capabilities introduced in Exchange 2007, the new high availability architecture in Exchange 2010 provides a simplified, unified framework for high availability and site resilience. Database Availability Groups Active Manager A DAG is the base component of the high availability and site resilience framework built into Exchange A DAG is a group of up to 16 Mailbox servers that hosts a set of databases and provides automatic database-level recovery from failures that affect individual databases. Any server in a DAG can host a copy of a mailbox database from any other server in the DAG. Exchange 2007 introduces a built-in data replication technology called continuous replication. Continuous replication, which was available in three forms: local, cluster, and standby, significantly reduced the cost of deploying a highly available Exchange infrastructure, and provided a much improved deployment and management experience over previous versions of Exchange. Even with these cost savings and improvements, however, running a highly available Exchange 2007 infrastructure still required much time and expertise because the integration between Exchange and Windows failover clustering wasn't seamless. In addition, customers wanted an easier way to replicate their data to a remote location, to protect their Exchange environment against site-level disasters. Exchange 2010 uses the same continuous replication technology found in Exchange Exchange 2010 combines on-site data replication (CCR) and off-site data replication (SCR) into a single framework called a database availability group (DAG). After servers are added to a DAG, you can add replicated database copies incrementally (up to 16 total), and Exchange 2010 switches between these copies automatically, to maintain availability. Unlike Exchange 2007, where clustered mailbox servers required dedicated hardware, Mailbox servers in a DAG can host other Exchange roles (Client Access, Hub Transport, and Unified Messaging), providing full redundancy of Exchange services and data with just two servers. This new high availability architecture also provides simplified recovery from a variety of failures (disk-level, server-level, and datacenter-level), and the architecture can be deployed on a variety of storage types. Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 includes a new component called Active Manager that provides functionality that replaces the resource model and failover management features. The Active Manager has two roles: Primary Active Manager (PAM) and Standby Active Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 17

18 Manager (SAM). PAM is the Active Manager in a DAG that decides which copies will be active and passive. PAM is responsible for getting topology change notifications and reacting to server failures. The SAM provides information on which server hosts the active copy of a mailbox database to other components of Exchange that are running an Active Manager client component. The SAM detects failures of local databases and the local Information Store. It reacts to failures by asking the PAM to initiate a failover. In Exchange 2010, the Microsoft Exchange Replication service periodically monitors the health of all mounted databases. In addition, it monitors ESE for any I/O errors or failures. When the service detects a failure, it notifies Active Manager. Active Manager then determines which database copy should be mounted and what it requires to mount that database. In addition, it tracks the active copy of a mailbox database and provides the tracking results information to the Client Access server. Datacenter Activation Coordination Mode The Datacenter Activation Coordination (DAC) mode is designed for a DAG that covers two sites. The DAC mode can control the DAG activation behaviors in case of a catastrophic failure. Consider the two-datacenter scenario. Suppose there is a complete power failure in the primary datacenter. In this event, all of the servers and WAN are down, and the organization decides to activate the standby datacenter. In almost all such recovery scenarios, when power is restored to the primary datacenter, WAN connectivity is typically not immediately restored. This means that the DAG members in the primary datacenter will power up, but they will not be able to communicate with the DAG members in the activated standby center, which would cause data divergence. The DAC can address this problem. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 18

19 4 Best Practice Planning 4.1 Descriptions The best practice can be employed by large and medium-sized enterprises that plan to deploy Microsoft 2010 on OceanStor series and use the Exchange 2010 DAG function. The purpose of the best practice is to use the OceanStor series to support an Exchange 2010 environment where 9000 mailboxes can be deployed as well as provide outstanding performance and flexibility for existing and future Exchange users. In a scenario where the best practice is employed, 9000 mailboxes are deployed on a site-crossing DAG which contains two Exchange mailbox servers. As shown in Figure 4-1, the two Exchange mailbox servers are deployed at two different sites. Each database contains two copies: DB1 and DB2. One copy is saved at the local site, and the other one is a copy of the first copy and is saved on the server of the standby site. When the DAG is running properly, 4500 active users and 4500 passive users are deployed on each Exchange Mailbox server, and each Exchange Mailbox server can support another 4500 active users that are transferred to it in case of server error or server maintenance. Each user can have 1 GB-sized mailbox and can process (send and receive) up to 100 s each day (supposing that the average size of s is 75 KB). Figure 4-1 Mailbox Server DAG Exchange Mailbox Server 1 Exchange Mailbox Server 2 Active database Passive database Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 19

20 4.2 Physical Network The basic architecture of the best practice consists of the VMware host cluster, OceanStor series, network switches, virtual machines (VMs) that are used to deploy Exchange, and other supporting components. This document describes how to design and deploy Exchange 2010 based on the best practice. The best practice employs three HUAWEI RH2288 servers to deploy the VMware ESXI 5.0 host cluster and store VMware VMs' data in OceanStor series. Servers are connected to the storage using 8 GB FC SAN, and GE network ports are used in the cluster network, service network, and management network. The best practice does not specify the models of servers and network switches as long as they can meet the performance requirement. The best practice contains SAN, cluster network, service network, and management network. IP SAN and FC SAN as well as GE and 10GE Ethernet can be used. Figure 4-2 shows the physical networking. Figure 4-2 Physical network diagram OceanStor Before completing the networking, ensure that servers, network switches, Fibre Channel switches, and storage systems have been released. Connect the cables properly to power up the devices. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 20

21 4.3 Storage Configuration RAID Groups Configuration The OceanStor series use RAID 2.0+ full virtualization smart disks GB 2.5-inch 10K RMP SAS disks are configured in the best practice, and a disk domain consisting of 24 disks is created on engine 0 and engine 1. The following table describes the configurations of system volumes, data volumes, and log volumes. Table 4-1 Configuration of Exchange 2010 resource pools Storage Pool RAID Level StoragePool_ExchangeDB_001 RAID 6 StoragePool_ExchangeDB_002 RAID 6 StoragePool_ExchangeLog_001 RAID 6 StoragePool_ExchangeLog_002 RAID 6 StoragePool_ExchangeOS_001 RAID 6 Disk Type 10k RPM SAS 10k RPM SAS 10k RPM SAS 10k RPM SAS 10k RPM SAS Disk Capacity Resource Pool Capacity 600 GB 8600 GB 600 GB 8600 GB 600 GB 250 GB 600 GB 250 GB 600 GB 100 GB Mailbox databases are deployed on StoragePool_ExchangeDB_001 and StoragePool_ExchangeDB_002, and mailbox transaction logs are deployed on StoragePool_ExchangeLog_001 and StoragePool_ExchangeLog_002, with Mailbox server operating systems deployed on StoragePool_ExchangeOS_ LUN Configuration Table 4-2 LUN configuration Owning controller Database Distributed evenly on four controllers Transaction Log Distributed evenly on four controllers LUN capacity 2150 GB 120 GB Number of LUNs 4 4 Stripe depth 128 KB 128 KB Read policy No prefetch No prefetch Write policy Write back and mirror Write back and mirror Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 21

22 4.4 Configuration Targets The solution comes with the following features: 9000 active users Each user processes (receives and sends) 100 s each day with the size averaging 75 KB and IOPS being 0.1 (which is 0.12 in the test). The size of each mailbox is 1 GB (500 MB is used in the test). Two Exchange Mailbox servers, with 4500 active users and 4500 passive users running on each server. (Only one server on which 9000 active users are running is tested.) Each mailbox database has two duplicates, and the local DAG replication mechanism is used. 24/7 background database maintenance (BDM) is enabled. Two HUAWEI OceanStor storage systems are used. (Two Mailbox servers are connected to on the HUAWEI OceanStor in the test.) 4.5 Test Configuration Simulated Exchange Configuration Table 4-3 Simulated Exchange configuration Attribute Value Number of Exchange mailboxes 9000 Number of DAGs 1 Number of Mailbox servers on each DAG Number of active mailboxes on each server Number of databases on each Mailbox server 2 (Only 1 in the test) 4500 (9000 users in the test where Jetstress is used) 4 Number of database copies 4 Number of mailboxes on each database 2250 User IOPS Capacity of a database LUN Capacity of a log LUN 0.10 (0.12 in the test where Jetstress is used) 2 TB 120 GB Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 22

23 4.5.2 Hardware Configuration Table 4-4 Hardware Configuration Component Storage front-end connection (Fibre Channel or iscsi) Storage model and operating system version Cache Description Fibre Channel OceanStor V100R001C GB (on controller) Number of storage controllers 4 Number of storage front-end ports Maximal bandwidth between the storage systems and hosts HBA model 16 (4 on each controller) 32 Gbit/s (4 x 8 Gbit/s Fibre Channel port) Qlogic ALE2562 PCI Express to 8 GB FC Dual Channel Number of HBAs on each server 1 Host type Number of disks HUAWEI Tecal RH2288 V2 with Intel(R) Xeon(R) E5-2640, 2.20 GHz, 96 GB RAM 48(2.5-inch 10k RPM SAS) Software Configuration Table 4-5 Software configuration Component HBA driver version Description 901.k1.1-14vmw HBA queue depth. 64 Host operating system Microsoft Windows Server 2008 R2 Enterprise Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 23

24 4.5.4 Storage Configuration of Mailbox Databases Table 4-6 Storage configuration of mailbox databases and transaction logs Attribute Disk type, rotational speed, and firmware version of databases and transaction logs Raw capacity of each disk Description 600 GB SAS 10k RPM 2.5 inch Firmware Hitachi ver A GB SAS 10k RPM 2.5 inch Firmware Seagate ver GB Number of disks used in the test 48 Storage raw capacity GB RAID level RAID 6(8+2) Total capacity of databases after disks are formatted Total capacity of transaction logs after disks are formatted 8600 GB (on each Mailbox server) 480 GB (on each Mailbox server) Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 24

25 5 Best Practice Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 is an I/O intensive application, and the I/O loads between Exchange Server 2010 and a storage system fall into the following two categories: random reads/writes of 32 KB data blocks on databases, and sequential writes of data blocks with different sizes (from 512 KB to the size of a log buffer) on transaction logs. 5.1 Storage Configuration In the best practice, the OceanStor series serves as the base of Exchange. This section describes the best configuration to deploy Exchange 2010 on the OceanStor series using 2.5-inch 10k SAS disks and Fibre Channel protocols. Basically, it is about the best configuration of allocating storage resources on the storage system for hosts. Log in to the OceanStor DeviceManager following instructions in the OceanStor release notes and make the following configuration: Figure 5-1 Process of allocating storage resources Disk Domain Configuration A disk domain is a group of some or all disks in a storage system. These disks are consolidated into one logical domain with reserved hot spare space to provide storage resources for storage pools in a unified manner. The OceanStor can have one or multiple disk domains. Multiple storage pools can be created using the storage resources of one disk domain. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 25

26 Disk Type Disks in one disk domain can be of the same or different types (SSD, SAS, and NL-SAS). Faults, performance, and storage resources of one disk domain are separated from those of other domains. The OceanStor series supports the following disk types: SAS, NL-SAS, SATA, and SSD. It is advisable to deploy Exchange databases and logs on SAS and NL-SAS disks rather than on SATA disks (with lower performance) or SSD disks (with high performance but lower capacities). As 9000 mailbox users are supported in the best practice, databases, logs, and operating systems are deployed on SAS disks to meet the requirements on capacity and relatively higher IOPS. Table 5-1 Disk IOPS Disk Type IOPS 7.2k RPM NL-SAS 50 10k RPM SAS k RPM SAS Storage Pool Configuration RAID Level A storage pool is a container of storage resources, which are used by all application servers. One storage pool is created based on a specified disk domain, which can dynamically allocate resources to the storage pool. The storage pool provides applications with storage resources that have RAID protection based on the RAID policy of each storage tier. A storage tier is a set of storage media that has similar performance in a storage pool. Storage tiers are used to manage storage media with different performance and provide appropriate storage space for applications that have diversified performance requirements. A storage pool can be divided into several tiers based on the types of disk it contains. When creating a storage pool from a disk domain, you can specify the storage pool's tier, RAID policy, and storage capacity. The OceanStor series supports RAID 5, RAID 6, and RAID 10. As the capacity tier consists of large-capacity NL-SAS disks, the recommended RAID level is RAID 6 because it provides two parity check mechanisms. In the OceanStor series, it is advisable to create RAID 6 for SAS disks where operating systems, logs, and mailbox databases are deployed and RAID 10 for NL-SAS disks where mailbox databases are deployed. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 26

27 Number of Member Disks in a RAID Group Five or nine disks to for a RAID 5 group Six or 10 disks for a RAID 6 group Four or eight disks for a RAID 10 group LUN Configuration Owning controller The OceanStor series contains four controllers. It is advisable to distribute all LUNs evenly on the four controllers for load balancing Stripe depth In a RAID 6 group, it is advisable to set the stripe depth of a LUN to 128 KB with the stripe size smaller than or equal to 1 MB. In a RAID 10 group, it is advisable to set the stripe depth of a LUN to 128 KB. Write policy It is advisable to set the write policy to write back and mirror in most scenarios but to write through in scenarios where high demands are imposed on availability and not on performance. Prefetch policy Setting the prefetch policy to no prefetch is recommended Host and Host Group Configuration This function allows you to create and manage hosts so that the hosts can use the storage resources allocated by the storage system. To easily manage hosts, you can create a host group, which is similar to VMware cluster management. The best practice of creating hosts and a host group for VDI is as follows: When creating a host, name it after the ESXi host name or the last two parts of the host IP address for easy management and maintenance. When creating a host, set OS to VMware ESX. After creating a host, modify its initiator and add ALUA support. When creating a host group, match it with a VMware cluster and name it after the cluster name for easy management and maintenance. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 27

28 Figure 5-2 Modifying an initiator Configuring Port Groups By creating and managing a port group, you allow a specified host group and LUN group to use the ports in the port group to communicate with the storage system. The best practice of creating a port group for Exchange is as follows: Add all ports that are connected to Exchange hosts to a host group for simplified deployment and management. Front-end ports connected to hosts are 8 Gbit/s Fibre Channel ports. It is recommended that each controller has at least two front-end ports for redundancy Mapping View Configuration A mapping view enables you to allocate storage resources to hosts and complete the configuration of the storage systems. Figure 5-3 Configuring a mapping view Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 28

29 5.2 Transaction Performance Planning Storage Performance Planning Transactional I/O is divided into database volume and log volume I/O. Mailbox databases are random I/Os in small data blocks, and transaction logs are sequential I/Os in small data blocks. After obtaining customer's requests, calculate the storage I/Os required by Exchange. These I/Os contain the I/Os in mailbox database volumes only. Overhead for processing log volume I/Os is very negligibly small because log volume I/Os are sequential, database volumes and log volumes isolated, and a HUAWEI storage system provides write cache. You do not need to consider the log volume I/Os when planning storage. For details, see Understanding Database and Log Performance Factors. You can use the following formula to calculate the database volume I/Os: IOPS required by Exchange = Number of mailbox users x IOPS of each mailbox x 1.2 Microsoft recommends that you add a 20% I/O overhead factor to the IOPS you obtained to reserve some capacity. The two most important factors that can be used to predict Exchange 2010 mailbox IOPS are database cache size of each mailbox and the number of daily incoming/outgoing mails of a user. For details, see Understanding the Mailbox Database Cache. You can refer to the following table for the estimate of the IOPS of each mailbox in the preceding formula for calculating IOPS required by Exchange. Table 5-2 Mail activity-based database cache and IOPS estimate of each mailbox Number of Mails Sent/Received y Each Mailbox (With Mail Sizes Averaging 75 KB) Database Cache of Each Mailbox (MB) A Single Database Copy (Independent): IOPS Estimate of Each Mailbox Multiple Database Copies (Database Recovery): IOPS Estimate of Each Mailbox For reasons of the IOPS different between a single database copy and multiple database copies, see Improved Database Effectiveness on Understanding the Mailbox Cache. Huawei Proprietary and Confidential Copyright Huawei Technologies Co., Ltd. 29