Top 10 Ways to Optimize Network Performance Carrie Higbie, Siemon Global Network Applications Market Manager Ask the Expert , TechTarget – SearchNetworking, SearchEnterprise Voice, SearchDataCenter President,
Download ReportTranscript Top 10 Ways to Optimize Network Performance Carrie Higbie, Siemon Global Network Applications Market Manager Ask the Expert , TechTarget – SearchNetworking, SearchEnterprise Voice, SearchDataCenter President,
Top 10 Ways to Optimize Network Performance
Carrie Higbie, Siemon Global Network Applications Market Manager Ask the Expert , TechTarget – SearchNetworking, SearchEnterprise Voice, SearchDataCenter President, BladeSystems Alliance
Top 10 ways to optimize performance
•
Understand your performance
•
What is harming optimal performance?
• Physical layer • Routing and switching • Applications • Environmental concerns •
How to fix performance
•
What does poor performance cost?
1. Bandwidth bandits – Find ‘em, slay ‘em!
•
Begin with auto-discovery
•
Start at the physical layer
• Common to all systems • Can cause the most problems • According to LAN Magazine –
70% of all downtime!
• Can be 80% of all
troubleshooting costs
• Only 20% of troubleshooting
time is spent fixing the problem
• Documentation of the physical layer
may be required for compliance
• Absolute necessity for security
reasons
Top offenders
• • • • • • • • • • • • •
Improperly terminated cables Improperly terminated patch cords Lengths exceeded specified maximum Cabling was improperly or not labeled (troubleshooting problems) Electronics and closets in bad locations (humidity, EM, RF) Cables bunched to tightly causing the pairs to be flattened Cables tied to electrical conduits or run too close to power panels Cabling that did not pass testing due to various issues Closet spaghetti CAT 3 cables terminated to CAT 5 – 100M switches Bends exceeding bend radius Cables not to spec Racks not grounded
Active electronics and networking layers
•
Flat networks with large address ranges
•
Subnets are helpful
•
Poor VLAN management
•
Intruders and security breaches
•
Build a historic reference
•
Duplex mismatches
•
Ports forced to low speeds
•
Half-duplex connections
• May be electronics; may be cabling!
2. Building in resiliency
•
Load balancing and load sharing will help performance
•
Proper subnets and/or VLANs can help
•
If you build a monster, it will be a monster!
•
Use the electronics to your advantage
•
Price/performance ratios are key!
•
Interoperability must be tested, not just stated
•
Failover must be tested
3. Pay attention to applications
Application sizes double every 18 months
•
More capability and application bloat
•
Process increasingly larger file sizes
•
Shared applications and server-side processing can enhance or deplete resources
•
QoS attributes can be set in applications
• Don’t let them step on each other •
Increased demands on storage, backups and network resources
With growth comes problems
• • • •
According to Nucleus Research (2004)
• Average storage budget = $2.3 Million • Average storage capacity = 115 TB • Troubleshooting = Average 14 hours per month
Among companies with budgets > $1B
• 85% report service degradation • 51% said poor application performance • 82% said problems impact employee productivity • 79% said customer service quality suffers! • Study from Network World (2003)
According to Gartner, downtime will increase 200% in Q1 2005 20% of all IT expenditures are for things that DON’T work
Sample views - SNMP
Actual audit data
Node
192.168.1.91
192.168.1.9
192.168.2.11
192.168.1.92
192.168.2.11
192.168.1.94
192.168.1.104
192.168.1.97
192.168.1.14
192.168.2.11
192.168.1.124
192.168.1.114
192.168.1.105
192.168.2.11
192.168.2.11
1 2 3 4 6 15 18 16 2
Index
23 11 7 6 5 22 1514
Mtu
1514 1514 1514 1514 1514 1514 1514 1514 1514 1514 1514 1514 1514
Speed
200000000 10000000 200000000 200000000 200000000 200000000 200000000 200000000 200000000 200000000 200000000 200000000 200000000
In Octets
3,609,426,192 3,116,050,917 2,841,840,312 619,369,476 2,099,071,371 1,274,947,502 2,490,061,169 742,847,434 162,306,489 1,130,881,154 54,190,705 445,094,503 152,346,003 1,077,239,333 3,455,568,628
In Errors
6,975,445 5,761,862 1,507,894 2,302,031 4,227,351 3,155,459 5,247,177 3,437,434 8,258,906 7,166,234 11,145,670 1,315,031 6,514,778 1,913,864 14,413,615
4. Examine utilization
•
Snapshots do little good
•
Must be done over time
•
Sample period should include all normal business functions
• Closing out accounting • End-of-month processes • Payroll runs • High-traffic periods such as high customer service
demands
•
Forget averages – watch peak periods!
What is utilization really? What do I look for?
•
Make sure that periods viewed are consistent with hours worked
•
Averages do you little good
•
For real-time applications always plan on highest utilization numbers
• Includes VoIP/IPT, video, etc. •
Group utilization needs by class of user, not department
What causes slow response
• • • • •
Environmental conditions
• Temperature and humidity variations • EM and RF interference
High network traffic Outdated, slow PCs and NICs Poor installation
• Inferior patch cords • Damaged cable due to pulling, bending • Too many splices • Poor cable management
Inferior network cabling
• ACCORDING TO ESTIMATES GIVEN TO IEEE, OVER 50% OF ALL
CAT 5E WON’T PASS 5E TESTING!
The cost of a slow network
Calculate network slow cost:
Cost =
P
x
W
x
E P
= Total Number of hours lost
P
roductivity per year (weekly minutes/60 x 52)
W
= Average hourly
W
age
E
= Number of
E
mployees on the network
Examples: Company A:
Number of Employees: 500 Average Hourly Wage: $15.00
Hours of Productivity Lost per Year: 30 Network Slow Cost = $225,000.00
Company B:
Number of Employees: 1,000 Average Hourly Wage: $18.00
Hours of Productivity Lost per Year: 52 Network Slow Cost = $936,000.00
Company C:
Number of Employees: 5,000 Average Hourly Wage: $20.00
Hours of Productivity Lost per Year: 20 Network Slow Cost = $2,000,000.00
Formulas
• • • •
Revenue per hour
• Total revenue / 2080 hour work week
Revenue per employee per hour
• Total revenue / Number of employees / 2080
Salary expense per hour (weighted)
• Average hourly wage * 1.4 (to include overhead) / 2080
Salary expense plus lost revenue
• Total revenue per hour + weighted salary expense per hour
* % of workforce down at any given time (we used 15%)
5. Performance optimization: Tricks of the trade
•
Audit your infrastructure – cabling, electronics, etc.
•
Use a Certified Infrastructure Auditor
• Trained to understand relationships between electronics and
physical layer
• Omitting either one is only half an audit •
Audit your ports, not the entire switch
•
Use RMON to help determine bottlenecks
Adding new applications
•
BEWARE – minimums are dangerous!
•
Utilize a test bed to help understand needs
•
Multiply all results by the number of end users
•
Assume concurrent operations for all on the same shifts
•
Don’t forget additional loads for replication, redundancy and backups
•
There is a fine line between not enough and too much
•
Aim for a little too much
•
Don’t forget to account for growth!
Products to help
• • •
Bandwidth managers Layer 7 products
• Application classification • Routing based on need
Dynamic bandwidth allocation
•
Don’t stop at Layer 3
Courtesy of Packeteer
6. Trends: Know your bandwidth needs
Courtesy of Packeteer
Determine your need for speed
•
10G products are currently available, with new copper-based products expected this year
•
Your network may be a combination of speeds to the desktop
•
If a user can’t fill an entire gig channel but you have discards at 100 Mbps, gig should be used
•
Same applies to 10G
•
Watch power users
• CAD/CAM/CAE • Imaging and graphics • Video
7. Predict the future – The crystal ball
•
Examine your past 5 years if possible
•
Application changes
•
Speed changes
•
Hardware upgrades
•
Server upgrades
•
Memory upgrades
•
OS upgrades
Trends for ‘05
•
Gates’ Law revisited
•
“640k ought to be enough for anybody” -- Bill Gates, 1981
Application growth/bloat
Office 95 Office XP Windows 95 Windows XP 386 – 486 recommended 8 MB RAM PIII recommended 133MHz min 128 MB RAM 486 recommended 233MHz min 300MHz rec.
40 MB min disk space 128 all features + 8MB for each program 245MB disk space + 115MB +50 MB 4 MB RAM, 8 recommended 128 MB RAM+ recommended 50-55 MB 64MB min 1.5 GB Disk space
8. Know your security challenges
•
#$%^&* hackers!
•
Spyware and malware
•
Breaches
•
Reporting structure
•
Weaknesses
•
Logging
•
Compliance
IT management and security management
•
Shift in duties
•
Other spending is often derailed in lieu of security expenditures
•
Consumes many resources
•
Patch management adds overhead
•
WAN links can be hindered or halted
•
Utilize the best tools
• ROI based on cost avoidance •
Beware of target size!
9. Revisit and revise
•
Any and all measures mentioned
•
Quarterly health checks a must
•
Downtime is not the only factor
•
Slow performance is also very costly
•
Put in the best if you expect the best
•
The level of support you can give is equal to the level of support you can receive
10. Evaluate products: What are the extras in a top-of-the-line system?
•
R&D
•
Standards participation
•
Support on a global scale
•
Tried-and-true support
•
Product expediting
•
Value-added services
•
Warranty
•
Partner as opposed to seller
Evaluate your vendors properly
•
Check non-vendor references
•
Pose some questions and validate the answers
•
Training and transfer of knowledge
• Quality of training • Certification levels • Training for their resellers •
Back-end support – knowledge bases
•
Pricing is only one factor and should never be the deciding factor
•
MTBF/MTTR – every single component!
•
Upgrade paths and future capabilities
Have a bake-off
•
Invite your potential vendors in for testing
•
If they state it will work – make them show you
•
Verify fail-over/redundancy/resiliency
•
Look at the management tools
•
Play with the technology
•
If you find a weakness in one product, see how/if it is addressed in another
MOST IMPORTANT!
•
Understand what you are getting for your money
•
Front end
•
Back end
•
In between
•
Understand market share and marketing information
•
Understand where the standards are going. Today’s investment could kill support tomorrow!
Thank you
Carrie Higbie, Siemon Global Network Applications Market Manager Ask the Expert , TechTarget – SearchNetworking, SearchEnterprise Voice, SearchDataCenter President, BladeSystems Alliance