In a BigAdmin document, Ryan Pratt provides information on a fully tested and validated Sun storage solution for Microsoft Exchange Server, based on the Microsoft Exchange Solution Reviewed Program (ESRP) – Storage program. The scenario presented in the article describes Sun Storage J4400 Arrays being used for a 6000-mailbox Microsoft Exchange 2007 implementation with Cluster Continuous Replication (CCR), which combines the asynchronous log shipping and replay technology built into Exchange.

Pratt says the Sun Storage J4000 array family is well-suited as a building block for any Microsoft Exchange 2007 implementation. The Sun Storage J4400 direct attached arrays, with their speed (3Gbs x 6 channels, 15KRPM drives) and ease of use with Sun StorageTek RAID Manager, can simplify the roll-out and expansion of a new or growing Microsoft Exchange 2007 site, he explains.

The Sun Storage J4000 array family does offer users the flexibility to mix and match drive sizes and types and to hot plug arrays and partitions. If the system is running low on mailboxes or secondary storage, more disks or arrays can be added, Pratt writes, suggesting that Sun Storage J4400 and J4200 arrays with SAS drives can be utilized to maximize performance and increase capacity. For secondary storage requirements, he notes that the same enclosures with SATA drives can be integrated to create a cost-effective Sun Storage J4400 Arrays as 6000-Mailbox Solution for Microsoft Exchange 2007 with CCR 4 solution for data lifecycle management in a single cascade of arrays. The Sun Storage J4500 array with SATA drives can also be added to the configuration for dense bulk storage, up to 48Tbyte per 4 rack units.

"The Sun Storage J4000 array family is designed for cost-effective scalability. Administrators can add drives and enclosures and increase LUN volume size without impacting the availability of email applications," Pratt explains. "The array family provides modular scalability to support the needs of all email users on the system. For example, with the Sun Storage J4000 array family, it is easy to increase quotas from 1 Gbyte to 5 Gbyte to quickly provide the capacity to store large attachments and comply with policies and regulations."

Pratt's solution presented in this document consists of a modular SAS Sun Storage J4400 array, which houses up to 24 SAS (serial attached SCSI) or SATA (Serial ATA) drives, connected via SAS expanders. It features:

• Up to six 3Gbs SAS ports per enclosure
• Dual I/O modules
• Twenty-four drives per 4RU array
• Up to 192 3.5-inch SAS/SATA II drives per RAID HBA with 8 enclosures, 24 Tbyte to 192 Tbyte

This solution is representative of a 6,000-mailbox CCR environment for small-to-medium organizations and offers the following characteristics:

• Number of hosts that can be attached to the storage: 6
• User I/O profile: 0.42 IOPS with 20% headroom (tested 0.5 IOPS, very heavy user profile)
• Backup strategy: Streaming backup
• Cluster Continuous Replication
• 1024-Mbyte mailbox quota

This scenario was tested with Microsoft ESRP – Storage v2.1 on March 18, 2009. In the article, Pratt summarizes the test's:

• Reliability
• Primary Storage Performance Results
• Replicated Storage Performance Results
• Streaming Backup/Recovery Performance, including Database Read-only Performance and Log Read-only Performance

More Information

Sun Storage J4400 Arrays as 6000-Mailbox Solution for Microsoft Exchange 2007 With CCR by Ryan Pratt (login or registration required)

Sun Storage J4400 Arrays

Infrastructure Solution for Microsoft Exchange

Microsoft Exchange Solution Reviewed Program (ESRP) – Storage program [...read more...]

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