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Texas Memory Systems RamSan-500, User Manual

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RamSan-500 User’s Manual 

 

32 of 48 

4.12

 

Configuring the RamSan-500 Cache 

The RamSan-500 contains a large RAM cache to buffer write operations 
and keep the back and Flash busy with parallel operation.  The cache 
details and configuration can be viewed by selecting the “

Cache

” item 

from under the “

Storage

” node of the system tree.  The cache “

Detailed 

Information

” is shown in 

Figure 22

. 

 

Figure 22 - Web Monitor Cache Detailed Information 

The detailed information includes information about the cache and its 
current configuration.  To modify the configuration of the cache, click the 
“

Configure

” button.  This will open the “

Cache Configuration

” wizard, 

shown in 

Figure 23

. 

 

Figure 23 - Web Monitor Cache Configuration 

Summary of Contents for RamSan-500

Page 1: ...TEXAS MEMORY SYSTEMS INC RamSan 500 User s Manual Version 1 2 RamSan 500 ...

Page 2: ...4 2007 Any trademarks or registered trademarks used in this document belong to the companies that own them Copyright 2007 Texas Memory Systems Inc All rights are reserved No part of this work may be reproduced or used in any form or by any means graphic electronic or mechanical including photocopying recording taping or information storage and retrieval systems without permission of the copyright ...

Page 3: ... System Initialization 12 4 3 Front Panel Display Basics 13 4 4 Controlling System Power with the Front Panel Display 14 4 5 Network Configuration with the Front Panel Display 17 4 6 Additional System Management Options 20 4 7 Web Monitor Basics 21 4 8 Date and time setup with the Web monitor 24 4 9 Network Configuration with the Web Monitor 25 4 10 Managing security with the Web Monitor 26 4 11 B...

Page 4: ... a simple transfer protocol While the capacity and throughput of the RamSan 500 is impressive the key to the system s power resides in its I O structure The RamSan 500 can be configured with 2 8 Fibre Channel FC ports Internally it can handle the bandwidth and supply the IOPS needed for emerging storage applications 1 1 2 1 1 2 1 1 2 1 1 2 Easy Easy Easy Easy I I I Installation and nstallation and...

Page 5: ... data integrity even in the event of the complete failure of a single Flash module In order to reduce the probability of a Flash module failure the unit incorporates multiple error correcting methods 1 5 System Management Basic management operations including manual shutdown and alerts are available from the front panel screen Full monitoring and configuration capabilities are available over any b...

Page 6: ...ng 3 Inspect the interface plate for any screws that might have loosened during shipping 4 Inspect the front panel display for damage 5 Report any meaningful damage to Texas Memory Systems 2 2 System Overview All nine Flash storage modules can be quickly accessed from the front of the RamSan 500 Each module has an interlocking system with the look and feel of a typical disk drive The Flash module ...

Page 7: ... Back 2 2 1 2 2 1 2 2 1 2 2 1 Rack mounting Rack mounting Rack mounting Rack mounting The RamSan 500 solid state disk SSD system is a 4U rack mountable system TMS ships the system with the slides and equipment needed to install it into a standard 19 rack ...

Page 8: ...RamSan 500 s capabilities A few different components can affect the maximum performance of the RamSan 500 including FC interfaces Host Bus Adapters PCI buses and server CPU resources 3 1 1 3 1 1 3 1 1 3 1 1 Fibre Channel Fibre Channel Fibre Channel Fibre Channel I I I Interface nterface nterface nterface Currently the RamSan supports two Fibre Channel communication speeds 2 and 4 gigabit Accountin...

Page 9: ...g each 4 gigabit 2 port HBA at least an entire PCIX bus or a PCI Express PCIe slot 3 1 4 3 1 4 3 1 4 3 1 4 C C C CPU PU PU PU At a certain point CPU performance can limit data transfer rates Determine whether the server s CPU resources are the limiting factor in performance while benchmarking the RamSan 500 as a raw physical device Otherwise an improperly tuned file system or application can make ...

Page 10: ...respectively The FC 77 ports on the system are capable of connecting to point to point arbitrated loop and switched fabric topologies at either 4 Gigabit or 2 Gigabit speeds 3 3 Connecting to a Network Your RamSan 500 includes a Gigabit Ethernet port for remote management over a network You use this connection to configure the storage and management features Figure 4 Gigabit Ethernet Port Location...

Page 11: ...indicator light WARNING A HARD SHUTDOWN WILL CAUSE DATA LOSS AND SHOULD ONLY BE USED WHEN YOU ARE UNABLE TO PERFORM A MANUAL SHUTDOWN AND BACK UP ALL DATA TO THE FLASH MODULES OR EXTERNAL STORAGE 3 4 2 3 4 2 3 4 2 3 4 2 AC AC AC AC Voltage I Voltage I Voltage I Voltage Indicator ndicator ndicator ndicator L L L Light ight ight ight When the power supply is connected to AC power and is operating pr...

Page 12: ...er on the system both power modules should be switched on Though the RamSan 500 will operate when only one power supply is switched on this is not recommended After a user initiated shutdown switch both power modules off then switch both modules on again to bring the system back on line 4 2 System Initialization The front panel display shows the boot process current state Once the power is connect...

Page 13: ...elect When a menu item is on the display pressing this button will either execute that menu option or proceed to the next layer in the menu If the menu is not selected this button is disabled This button scrolls up through the menu It is also used to cancel certain commands as indicated on the display If the menu is not selected this button is disabled This button scrolls down through the menu It ...

Page 14: ...has been set Main Menu Manual Restart Selecting Manual Restart reboots your RamSan 500 See Section 4 4 2 for more information Main Menu Manual Shutdown Selecting Manual Shutdown turns off your RamSan 500 See Section 4 4 1 for more information 4 4 Controlling System Power with the Front Panel Display The RamSan 500 has features that allow the administrator to safely power down the system Before pow...

Page 15: ...dules Flash Modules Flash Modules You may need to remove one or more of the Flash modules for various reasons This can be done with the RamSan 500 system power on or off However if the RamSan power is on the particular Flash module selected for removal must always be powered off prior to removal WARNING REMOVING A FLASH MODULE WHILE IT IS POWERED ON MAY CAUSE IRREVERSIBLE DAMAGE TO THE MODULE Prio...

Page 16: ...ugh the top level menu to select Flash Modules Use the Select button to select this menu item Flash Modules Power off Module To choose a particular Flash module to power off scroll through the Flash Module sub menu and choose the Power Off Module option Power Off Module Module 1 Next scroll down the Power Off Module sub menu to choose the module that you wish to power off Power Off Module 1 Yes No...

Page 17: ...the front panel display indicates that the system is powering off When the system is ready it will automatically shut off In approximately 5 seconds time the system will turn back on 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 4 Automatic Automatic Automatic Automatic S S S Shutdown hutdown hutdown hutdown In the event that the system senses a high system temperature power out of range or a variety of other dangerous e...

Page 18: ...current IP assignment configuration Network Config Exit Menu Exits the setup menu Use the arrow buttons to scroll up and down through the list To continue setting up the Ethernet configuration select Set IP Config After selecting Set IP Config you may use the arrow buttons to cycle through Set IP Config Static Enables you to set a static IP address for the RamSan Set IP Config DHCP Sets the IP con...

Page 19: ...he Ethernet Gateway If the RamSan is on a private network and this value is not needed enter the value 000 000 000 000 to tell the RamSan to ignore this entry Assign Static IP Yes No The next screen commits the changes and automatically restarts the network Restarting Network Done You should witness the network restarting New IP Address 192 168 111 101 The final screen displays the assigned IP add...

Page 20: ...act your system administrator If the system successfully saved the IP configuration you may simply select the Restart Network option from the Ethernet Setup menu instead of re selecting the same IP configuration 4 6 Additional System Management Options 4 6 1 4 6 1 4 6 1 4 6 1 Connecting using a Connecting using a Connecting using a Connecting using a T T T Terminal erminal erminal erminal P P P Pr...

Page 21: ...ing the configuration on behalf of the network management application end users Agents are devices such as the RamSan which are responsible for maintaining local management information and delivering that information to a manager via SNMP Both the manager via polling and the agent via a trap can initiate management information exchanges Managers can access statistical information from the RamSan t...

Page 22: ...Accessing the Web M M M Monitor onitor onitor onitor Accessing the Web monitor can be done from any Web browser that supports Sun Java v1 5 or later You can download the Sun Java plug in for Microsoft Internet Explorer for Windows and for both Linux and Windows versions of Firefox To get the latest Sun Java plug in go to http www sunjava com The following figures refer to myRamSan instead of an IP...

Page 23: ...of 48 After you log in the window shown in Figure 7 will appear Figure 7 Web Monitor Opening Screen From here select the RamSan icon When selected it shows a variety of information about the system Figure 8 Web Monitor Information ...

Page 24: ...nitor to change them From the Web monitor expand the Management tab under the System List This will expose three sub options Highlight Date Time it will display the current date and time as well as the amount of time the system has been up Please see Figure 9 for a screenshot Figure 9 Web Monitor Date and Time Management If the date and time are incorrect you can set the time and date manually Eit...

Page 25: ...nitor You should have already set up the basic network options via the front panel if you followed the instructions in Section 4 5 Network Configuration with the Front Panel Display The Web monitor allows you to change those options as well From the Web monitor expand the Management tab under the System List This will expose three sub options Highlight Network it will display the current network s...

Page 26: ... well as a low privileged user The high privileged user is User admin Password password The high privileged user is allowed to change RamSan configurations The low privileged user is User user Password password The low privileged user can view statistics logs and other information but cannot change any RamSan 500 settings 4 10 2 4 10 2 4 10 2 4 10 2 Changing Changing Changing Changing P P P Passwo...

Page 27: ...urrent users in the system By default there are only two users please see Figure 14 for a screenshot Figure 14 Web Monitor User Management Please change the password to your high privileged user account named admin by selecting the user and left clicking the Password button This will pop up the Change User window shown in Figure 15 ...

Page 28: ...to the admins group You can give the new user low privileges by assigning them to the users group 4 11 Basic LUN Creation The most common management activity on the RamSan is LUN provisioning This section will go over the basic LUN provisioning activities creating a LUN and linking it to a port for more in depth configuration details please consult the RamSan Web Interface Guide 4 11 1 4 11 1 4 11...

Page 29: ...gical Unit Parameters The parameters available for the Logical Unit are Name This is a user defined name for the LUN to make it easily identifiable Number This is the Logical Unit Number LUN that is presented to the host Size This is the size of the Logical Unit in Megabytes Backup mode This affects the cache operation for the Logical unit There are two modes available o Writeback Cache incoming w...

Page 30: ...s Policy to a LUN Adding an Access Policy to a LUN Adding an Access Policy to a LUN Adding an Access Policy to a LUN The Web Management Interface provides the ability to create access lists for individual Fibre Channel ports This allows the administrator to specify which worldwide port names HBAs are allowed to communicate with each partition To make partitioned LUNs accessible to connected server...

Page 31: ...e Logical unit to a host then select a Controller Port on the RamSan Next select a World Wide Port Name WWPN from the drop down box this box will include any hosts HBA WWPN that are presented to the RamSan port as well as an Open Access If a particular HBA WWPN is selected then the LUN will only be presented to that HBA it will be masked to it If Open Access is selected then the LUN will be presen...

Page 32: ...ed by selecting the Cache item from under the Storage node of the system tree The cache Detailed Information is shown in Figure 22 Figure 22 Web Monitor Cache Detailed Information The detailed information includes information about the cache and its current configuration To modify the configuration of the cache click the Configure button This will open the Cache Configuration wizard shown in Figur...

Page 33: ...use workloads Read Ahead The read ahead setting controls whether the cache attempts to read additional data ahead of the location of a read This can help improve performance in a highly sequential read environment but wastes cache space under a random workload The higher the setting the more read ahead is attempted Sync Always This parameter controls whether the cache will always attempt to sync t...

Page 34: ...r in the button bar while the Logs item is highlighted See Figure 25 Web Monitor Log Options for a screen shot of the right mouse click menu A second log is accessible via the Web monitor called the System Report It contains information about the system configuration firmware version environment and a range of other information including a copy of the system event log A System Report should always...

Page 35: ...ce you select the System Report option a new window will appear and download the support log from the RamSan It will take 10 to 20 seconds to complete You can then hit the Save button in the lower right to save the support log to a file Figure 26 Web Monitor System Report ...

Page 36: ...ersion Figure 27 Web Monitor Firmware Management To update the firmware either right mouse click and select Firmware update or left mouse click the open box icon in the button bar Both methods bring up the patch file selector window WARNING PATCHING THE RAMSAN 500 IS A DELICATE PROCESS IF THE PATCH IS INTERRUPTED THE SYSTEM CAN BECOME UNUSABLE AND MAY HAVE TO BE SENT BACK TO THE FACTORY FOR REPAIR...

Page 37: ... is happening inside the system The easiest way to detect if something has gone wrong is to monitor the front panel display The normal display will show a line at the top that tells you if the system is Good If the system has detected an error or if something has gone wrong the front panel display will report the error in a concise manner The system event log made available via the Web monitor wil...

Page 38: ...n in Section 4 8 to get to the Logs item in the Web monitor System List To clear the system event log right mouse click the Logs item and select Clear Logs alternatively left mouse click the eraser icon in the button bar This will clear the system event log ...

Page 39: ... ELECTROSTATIC DISCHARGE CAN DAMAGE THE COMPONENTS USED IN THE RAMSAN AND ITS INTERFACES Prior to performing maintenance on the RamSan 500 please contact Texas Memory Systems for detailed maintenance instructions 5 1 Contacting Texas Memory Systems Contact Texas Memory Systems for additional support Before contacting Texas Memory Systems please save a copy of the support log to send to tech suppor...

Page 40: ...ing the power modules Switch the power module off and disconnect the power cord Wait 15 seconds Remove the power module that needs to be replaced from the RamSan 500 chassis by pressing the release switch and pulling squarely on the power supply handle DO NOT REACH INSIDE THE PROTECTIVE ENCLOSURE AFTER REMOVING THE POWER SUPPLY Insert the replacement power module in the RamSan 500 chassis Make sur...

Page 41: ...s of the internal Flash media With this technology a module should last at least 3 years even under a continuous write load If the IO load is a mix of reads and writes Flash modules can last even longer Internal to each module there may be 1 or 2 regions depending on the ordered capacity for Flash storage These regions are largely independent of one another and are each given their own status indi...

Page 42: ...e Flash modules are protected from a complete Flash module failure by a RAID configuration If only a single module fails in a RAID all data in the array will be preserved You should replace the bad Flash module right away If the system detects a bad Flash module it will note the bad module by illuminating the red LED on the front of the module System Status WARN Errors Flash Module Degraded The fr...

Page 43: ...ysically removed from the system so the Web monitor is reporting it missing The module icons in the System List show a warning icon on all suspect components Both raid2 and Flash 2 have been noted with warning icons yellow triangled explanation points WARNING REPLACE FAILED FLASH MODULES AS SOON AS POSSIBLE IF A SECOND FLASH MODULE FAILS IN THE SAME RAID ALL DATA WILL BE LOST IN THE SYSTEM ...

Page 44: ...tor reports higher level information about a RAID that has a missing or bad Flash module Figure 32 above shows the RAID information generated by removing the same Flash drive as shown in Figure 31 In this case the removed module causes the RAID to be degraded meaning the RAID cannot tolerate another Flash module error without data loss but the RAID is still usable ...

Page 45: ...examine the status of the rebuilding process Please view Figure 33 above for a screen shot of RAID rebuild status A RAID rebuild should take about 30 minutes to complete 5 3 2 5 3 2 5 3 2 5 3 2 RAID RAID RAID RAID F F F Failure ailure ailure ailure It is unlikely but possible for multiple Flash modules to fail in a single RAID If it happens the system will turn the RAID offline System Status FAIL ...

Page 46: ...d WARNING RE INITIALIZING THE RAID WILL DESTROY ALL DATA ON THAT PARTICULAR RAID Right mouse click on the offline RAID icon shown in the Web monitor and select Initialize to start the process or you could just left mouse click the green plus sign in the button bar It will take roughly 20 minutes to finalize the initialization The RAID will not be usable while it is being initialized 5 4 Fans The s...

Page 47: ...ayed to the right scrolls across the bottom display row WARNING FIX OR REPLACE FAILED FANS AS SOON AS POSSIBLE IF TOO MANY FANS FAIL THE SYSTEM TEMPERATURES MAY RISE PAST AN ACCEPTABLE RANGE IF THIS HAPPENS THE SYSTEM MAY TURN OFF TO PREVENT COMPONENT DAMAGE Figure 35 Web Monitor Fan Failure Detection You can use the Web monitor to detect more specific information on failing or failed fans Once yo...

Page 48: ... has two batteries both are located directly in front of Fan bank 2 These batteries are redundant and will power the entire system in the event of an external power failure long enough to copy all of the data in the RAM cache to the Flash storage Internal sensors report on the battery voltage level and a monthly test ensures that the current supplied from batteries will be able to power the system...

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