Our SQL server is becoming pretty heavily loaded, and all indications point to the disk channel being the bottleneck. The current HP server has a fairly low-end array card, and we're looking to augment this server with a Smart Array card and external storage array with SSD drives.
Current config is:
- DL360 G7
- Smart Array P410i
- Windows Server 2008R2
- 32Gb RAM
- Current array is 2 x 300Gb SAS RAID1 logical drive for boot/OS and 1 x 120Gb SATA SSD drive for data.
The database server hosts one fairly large database (~100Gb), containing both live and historical data. For many reasons, splitting the database isn't an option, so the current thinking is to have multiple logical drives on the new array, each on it's own channel, and then split the database into logical SQL partitions.
For example, the array might have:
- 2 x SSD (RAID1)
- 2 x SSD (RAID1)
- 4 x SSD (RAID1+0)
Currently, we're looking at something like a D2600 with a high-end Smart Array card.
In order to get the maximum performance, we really need each logical drive to run as fast as possible. HP's specs suggest that their top-end SSDs could come close to max'ing out the 6Gb connection that the Smart Array cards support.
However, some of the bigger SA cards suggest they support "multiple channels"; what's not clear to me is how this work. Does this mean, with a single cable from SA to D2600, each RAID set could be configured to get it's own 6Gb channel? Or is 6Gb the limit on the interconnection, and if so is there any configuration option (or even different HP product - not trying to get around the "no subjective questions" rule, honest :) ) that would overcome this limit?
EDIT: I can't see any HP server that will do it, but if there is a decent Proliant box that will allow me to split the internal drive cage into two (or more) channels, that might be a "Plan B" - does anyone know of such a server?