HP PolyServe Software for MS Sql Server

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HP PolyServe Software for MS Sql Server

SQLdba-473999

SSCrazy

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August 20, 2008 at 10:43 am

#382341

I am currently in the information gathering phase of our sql server consolidation project. We were recently approached by HP about their PolyServe software to assist with this project. We have a meeting setup next week with them to discuss. But before I go to the meeting I was wondering if anyone out there has already implemented this software? Could you give me your opinion, if so?
Thanks.

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DNA_DBA SSCrazy Eights Points: 9107 More actions · Answer 1

I for one would be interested in your thoughts on this technology after you've had your meeting. We are looking into consolidation as well but haven't got as far as you in the process.

Krishnaraj9 SSC Eights! Points: 959 More actions · Answer 2

Yes I have answers for you.

We implemented HP Polyserve Matrix and moved around almost all our qa,uat and dev environments to Polyserve and half of our production as well

In totall we are hosting around 150 instances in Polyserve..

It has advantages as well as disadvantages like any other product

Huge difference in budget If you are dealing with Lot of instances. (Cost effective)

Easy maintenance and monitoring

In terms of Consolidation, It really does

Risky in terms of availability (For eg. If the matrix server have issues whole the instances will go down)

Ask me If you need further info or anything to clarify.

We faced and fixed 100 of issues in last 8 months. No technical support on weekends is another issue with HP Polyserve. Ofcourse there are some smart HP technicians in support which will solve almost whole issues

Thanks

Shuchi Mehta Valued Member Points: 71 More actions · Answer 3

Hello Krishna,

I am SQL DBA and also looking into PS Deployment for our company. I would love to hear more on your experiences. Can you please contact me at s_mehta16@yahoo.com.

Thanks,

Shuchi.

Krishnaraj9 SSC Eights! Points: 959 More actions · Answer 4

Hi Shuchi,

I send you a mail.

If your questions are Generic post it here and If I can answer, it will help others as well

My little suggession

Please use PM instead of posting mail Id

Thanks

Krishnaraj

Steve Jones - SSC Editor SSC Guru Points: 734444 More actions · Answer 5

No support on weekends? Is this in the US?

That doesn't sound right. Polyserve was a small company before HP bought them, but I can't believe they don't provide support on the weekends since they're an HA product.

Krishnaraj9 SSC Eights! Points: 959 More actions · Answer 6

Hi Steve,

Sorry to say that it is the fact.

They have 3 level of support and then the Level 4 Engineer for research

I worked with each level engineers with lot of Polyserve support cases.

Since we normally do maintenance on weekends we requested them for support.

As per HP on weekends they have HP POLYSERVE support technician available upon request only. I MEAN FOR POLYSERVE (Our servers are monitored by HP 24/7 basis)

I guess our environment is one of the largest one to implement HP Polyserve (around 200 instances)

This was in my previous assignment and it was in California 2 months back.

I'm sure that any organization need support for a HA product 24/7, may be HP will start soon

Suchi, while you are implementing you can make sure with HP reagrding weekend support of Polyserve

Thanks

Krishnaraj

Shuchi Mehta Valued Member Points: 71 More actions · Answer 7

Hi Krishnaraj,

Thanks for the suggestion. Will keep in mind if we decide to go with PS.

Can you please help me with answers to this questions -

1. Did you host any SAP products with Polyserve in your environment?

2. Did you use EMC Business Continuity Volumes (BCVs), clone based backups, or other backend “snapshot” technologies for SQL database backups? If yes, how?

3. While testing at our end, we had a failed test involving pulling first one fibre cable connecting the SAN switch with the SAN, then replacing it and pulling the other. Since the paths are redundant and at least one path was available at all times, we expected no effect. Instead we unexpectedly lost connection to the SAN, which resulted in a total failure of the Polyserve cluster. This, in turn, invoked fencing of all servers, meaning that all cluster nodes had to be rebooted to recover. HP is looking into the problem. Did you ever face this problem?

3. I would be very interested in knowing you thoughts/ experiences in detail about PS disadvantages/ drawbacks?

Any information from you n other SQL Gurus would be appreciated?

Thanks,

Shuchi.

Krishnaraj9 SSC Eights! Points: 959 More actions · Answer 8

Hi

I feel like more over you are looking in the OS level which is tough for a SQL DBA to answer. I hope the Server Operation team should have gone through the training with HP, which is the first thing to do for a Polyserve implementation

:hehe:I don't have a lot of experience, but the things I mentioned below are I experienced or advised by HP engineers.

1.Did you host any SAP products with Polyserve in your environment?

a.No we don’t host any SAP products

2.Did you use EMC Business Continuity Volumes (BCVs), clone based backups, or other backend “snapshot” technologies for SQL database backups? If yes, how?

a.We have litespeed backup for SQL Server instances which are hosted in Polyserve, it is managed by SMA Opcon-XPS

b.The litespeed instance configuration for the SQl instances should follow a typical pattern (same as VERITAS )

3.While testing at our end, we had a failed test involving pulling first one fiber cable connecting the SAN switch with the SAN, then replacing it and pulling the other. Since the paths are redundant and at least one path was available at all times, we expected no effect. Instead we unexpectedly lost connection to the SAN, which resulted in a total failure of the Polyserve cluster. This, in turn, invoked fencing of all servers, meaning that all cluster nodes had to be rebooted to recover. HP is looking into the problem. Did you ever face this problem?

a.No idea my friend.. I can only remember from our server ops team complaining about some fencing issues which they worked with Polyserve technician

4.I would be very interested in knowing you thoughts/ experiences in detail about PS disadvantages/ drawbacks?

a.First thing is you should come up with a real good design for the cluster before implementing. Polyserve uses PSV file system which is basically mounted volumes like 50 GB Luns or 100 GB Luns as per requirement you can import it. These file system can be accessed from any cluster node. It is up to the architect, that how you are going to design it, like ideally you should have separate system mounts for each instance otherwise your whole instances will fail if a single mount fails. If you go with separate mounts it will take more storage space than a Single mount. So in terms of consolidation you should have proper balance in all these. Creating mounts for data, logs and replication snapshot and all.

b.Instances should be distributed wisely in the matrix for load balancing.

c.One of the issues we faced is after matrix server reboot some of the nodes are not able to access the mounted folders which will result in instance failure (Which ever hosted in that node) since all the SQL files are residing in the mount.

i.Resolution. Rename the mounted folder and mount the original folder again

d.While taking snapshots for replication whole system went down (300 GB Database)

i.Can’t handle too much I/O may be a hard ware issue

e.Never use a mixed cluster SQL 2000 and 2005 in same node or if you can avoid it- then not in same matrix as well

f.If you want to install SQL 2000 and SQL 2005 in same box you should install SQL 2000 with Sp4 first. Try to avoid un installation of SQL instances especially SQL 2000.( Just retire the instance)

g.Always install instances in all the nodes so that you have the luxury to failover to any node

h.We used remote MSDTC and I feel that’s better

i.Configuring SQL mail is another issue we faced, Microsoft won’t support whole the issues since this is a HP Polyserve cluster. So change the legacy applications to use DBmail

j.Just for information-You can’t share a mounted volume to any server outside the matrix

k.The IPs assigning for SQL Instances should be under corresponding matrix’s subnet, never use an IP from other matrix subnet which will result in errors in virtualization

l.HP doesn’t advise in place upgrade from SQL 2000 to SQL 2005 in Polyserve Cluster

m.Hp have a migration tool which comes with Polyserve Software, but hardly we can use it

n.Can’t trust MultiNodeInstaller, it initiated reboot to whole servers in a matrix while applying hot fix. So it’s safe to apply patches one by one with Multi-node installer or

i.De-virtualize the instance

ii.Apply paches and virtualize again

5.Time for initial setup / migration

a.Fast with Sql 2005 within 45mins -1 hour with hot-fixes

b.You can install multiple instances in multiple nodes in a shot using MNI

c.SQL 2000 takes long time and sometimes hangs

d.If you can…reboot the server before installation it is always better (As per my experience)

These are things I can think top of my head. If you have more specific questions please ask me.

I can try to answer it

Cheers:D

Thanks

Krishnaraj

Steve Jones - SSC Editor SSC Guru Points: 734444 More actions · Answer 9

That's amazing. I would think that if you needed help they'd call someone in anytime day or night. However you did say they were there on request. At least that's something.

Shuchi Mehta Valued Member Points: 71 More actions · Answer 10

Krishnaraj,

Thx so much for the prompt response. This is very useful.

Can I ask which company hosted 200+ instances?

Shuchi.

Shuchi Mehta Valued Member Points: 71 More actions · Answer 11

Krsihnaraj,

Is this a single Polyserve cluster hosting 150 SQL instances? How many nodes, what kind of boxes (How many CPUs, how much memory, etc.)? In other words, what’s the degree of consolidation (150 to 16 or about 10 to 1?)? And how much hardware do you have to buy to get there?

Thanks,

Shuchi.

Krishnaraj9 SSC Eights! Points: 959 More actions · Answer 12

Hi,

No we have like 40 instances in a matrix.

A matrix have 8 Servers added, with 4 and 8 cpus per server it depends to environment

Memory depends we have 64 GB in one server the max I mean

So I mean 4 matrixes each with 8 node cluster

How many instances you want to host in a node is up to you , there are Hp Recommendations.

I can clear your doubts But I can't explain our company design and architecture that's there property.

They will sue me 😛 😛

Thanks

Krishnaraj

Brookstone SSCommitted Points: 1745 More actions · Answer 13

I would be interested in your experience (good and bad) with polyserve (PS). We are looking at the solution for SQL consolidation and HA. At present we are waiting on the next PS release to support WIN 2008 64-bit.