VMworld 2013: Tips and Tricks for Capacity Risk Assessment, Rightsizing and Planning

Tips and Tricks for Capacity Risk Assessment,

Rightsizing and Planning

Kevin Denton, Gilead Sciences

Jim Medeiros, VMware

Monica Sharma, VMware

VCM4992

#VCM4992

2

Agenda: Tips and Tricks for vSphere Capacity Planning

Monitor & Analyze

Right-Size VMs Conclusion Improve Utilization

vC Ops – Overview Gilead’s Advantage

3

Gilead - Overview

Gilead Sciences • Growing, innovative leader in Research

based Biopharmaceutical

• Focus areas - HIV/AIDS, Hepatitis, Cancer,

Respiratory & Cardiovascular conditions

Goals • Robust capacity planning based on

tangible data

• Forecast growth to know what capacity

is needed

4

Gilead’s Challenges & Needs

Criteria for an Operations

Management Solution

No adequate capacity planning (Yearly fire drill)

No understanding of current utilization

No way to do adequate forecasting

Challenges

Drop & play – easy setup & management

Provides capabilities of showing Utilization,

Capacity management, Change management

and Forecasting

5

Agenda: Tips and Tricks for vSphere Capacity Planning

Monitor & Analyze

Right-Size VMs Conclusion Improve Utilization

vC Ops – Overview Gilead’s Advantage

6

Agenda: Tips and Tricks for vSphere Capacity Planning

vC Ops – Overview

Today & Roadmap Get Right Metrics Tune Policies Pick your Visuals

7

Capacity Planning in vCenter Operations – Today

Ensure performance SLAs

Increase Utilization & Realize Savings

Plan better by what-if modeling

Policy driven Capacity views/dashboards

Optimization & Rightsizing

recommendations

Modeling of how many VMs can

fit & do I have enough

Do I have any capacity risk? Benefit Benefit

Description

Can I improve utilization?

Do I have enough?

8

Capacity Planning in vCenter Operations – Today

Ensure performance SLAs

Increase Utilization & Realize Savings

Plan better by what-if modeling

Policy driven Capacity views/dashboards

Optimization & Rightsizing

recommendations

Modeling of how many VMs can

fit & do I have enough

Do I have any capacity risk? Benefit Benefit

Description

Can I improve utilization?

Do I have enough?

9

Capacity Planning in vCenter Operations – Roadmap

Manage capacity across

SDDC & hybrid

Forecast accurately

Optimize utilization

Extensible capacity models

beyond virtual

Save, Reserve future projects,

plan deficit

Policy-driven, automated

recommendations

Custom Report Builder

Capacity beyond vSphere Future-proof Forecast

Automate Recommendations

Benefit

Description

10

Get the Right Metrics

16 GB- Total Allocated Capacity

2GB -What VM did not get (Contention)

8GB - What the VM got(Usage)

SQL VM

10GB- What the VM wants(Demand)

Demand is What the VM wants: Physical

resources an object might consume

w/o constraints

Demand = Usage (what VM gets)

+

Contention (What VM does not get)

② Check Time Resolution - Don’t use one time

peak for planning, use rolled up avg over time

③ Use BOTH: Allocation & Demand Models • Use Allocation model to create a safe top line

E.g. fill VMs till cluster is at 200% ,then add

new host

• Use Demand model in conjunction to catch

unexpected bursts/peaks and prevent waste

④ Compare actual demand vs. allocation

• To assess performance risk

• To show optimization potential & savings

Allocation - Amount of a resource that the

user configures

① Use Demand for capacity & performance if Demand > Entitlement

• May have performance issues

• May be undersized (‘Stressed’)

• Use Demand vs Consumed for Memory

Buffer The most a VM can get (Entitlement)

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Translate Your Operational ‘Knobs’ to vC Ops Policies

How would you like to

Manage Capacity Risk?

What are your goals to

Optimize your environment

Performance Higher utilization

Ignore Waste Higher density

safe

PRODUCTION TEST-DEV

Configure Out-of-Box Policies

Production/Test Dev/UAT/IT-Apps etc

12

Pick Your Visuals

Out of box

Custom

vSphere Dashboard Planning Views Canned Reports

Custom Templates Custom Heatmaps Custom Dashboards

13

Resources available for you

1. VMworld slides

from

VMworld site

2. Custom Dashboards

from

VMware Management

Blog-Tech Tips

14

Agenda: Tips and Tricks for vSphere Capacity Planning

Monitor & Analyze

Right-Size VMs Conclusion Improve Utilization

vC Ops – Overview Gilead’s Advantage

15

Agenda: Tips & Tricks to Analyze Demand, Utilization & Risk

VM Growth Infra Burn Rate Capacity Risk

Monitor & Analyze

16

How many of you have been tasked to

Monitor Infrastructure Utilization & Risk?

Audience Poll Question

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What Has Been My VM Growth Trend?

vC Ops vSphere UI Planning Vm Capacity View vC Ops Custom UI->VM Count & Trend –by Cluster

① Metrics:

Use Total/Powered on

VM count

② Visuals:

Forecast trend to view

Risk

③ View Growth

by Cluster, LOB, Geo etc.

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What Has Been My Infrastructure Utilization Trend?

② Visuals:

Breakdown

by cluster to view

Actual Demand

by Clusters

① Metrics:

Use Usable Capacity

vs. Total Capacity for

Planning decisions

(includes Buffers)

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How Well Is My Infrastructure Utilized Today?

③ Under-utilized

Clusters –

fill or consolidate

② Stressed Clusters

with high Count

of VMs

① Used,

Remaining?

Metrics: VM Count,

Usable Capacity

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Which Clusters are at Capacity Risk & Why?

① Which clusters are

at Capacity Risk?

③ Compare

Actual Demand

to Allocation

② Why?

- Out of Capacity?

- Will run out soon?

- Under-Sized?

- VM: Host Ratio

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Assess Risk Based on Your Policy

① Identify & Apply out of box Policies

• By Environment to manage Risk

• Production Policy

• Test-Dev Policy

• By Workload type for Right-sizing

• Ignore objects

• Batch Workloads

• Interactive/Server Workloads

• Optimized for 15/30 min SLA

② Translate your Knobs to Policies

• Allocation and Demand model

• Over-commit ratios(CPU, Mem)

• Thresholds for capacity risk

• Buffers

• Business hours

22

What Do These Settings Impact & When?

① Dashboard - Time Remaining

& Capacity Remaining

calculated daily

② Planning Views –

Capacity Risk Details

view updates in real-time

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Which Datastores Are at Capacity Risk & Why?

Datastores at capacity

risk –color coded

Which VMs

Causing most waste?

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Which Top N VMs Are at Capacity Risk & Why?

VMs out of Capacity? Undersized VMs?

VMs out of Guest FS? VMs running out of

capacity soon?

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Agenda: Tips and Tricks for Right-Sizing

Monitor & Analyze

Right-Size VMs Conclusion Improve Utilization

vC Ops – Overview Gilead’s Advantage

26

Agenda: Tips and Tricks for Right-Sizing

Right-Size VMs

27

Tips for Right Sizing VMs

① More vCPUs actually

slows down a VM

② (CPU Usage | Co-stop)

Trend this metric when

Usage is low but

Demand is high

Table for 2 – Just a minute please

Table for 10 – 20 minutes

28

How Do Right Sizing Analytics Work?

Time

% D

em

and

Stress % Threshold

Current Capacity

Moments of Stress Summed Up as %

of Stress Zone Area

If Stress > 1%, show in under-sized VM list

Area based Stress Analysis

• VM is considered

undersized/stressed when:

• Amount of CPU demand

peaks above 70% is more

than 1% of any 1 hour

70%

Time

% D

em

and

Current Capacity

Waste % Threshold

Moments of Wasted Summed

Up as % of Waste Zone Area

If Waste > 99%, show in list

• VM is considered oversized when:

• Amount of CPU demand below

above 30% is more than 1% of the

entire range(30 days)

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Step 1: Identify Over/Under Sized VMs/Hosts

① Under Planning Views

• Over/Under sized VMs,

• Under utilized/Stressed Clusters

30

Step 2: Profile Workload & Apply Policy

Server Workload Profile:

• E.g. Exchange, AD, Citrix

• 9-5 Usage pattern

• Account for many micro-

bursts in an hour

5 Minute CPU

Demand Average

Interactive Workload Profile:

• E.g. Web Servers

• Constantly busy

① Apply “Interactive Policy”

② (Optional)Tune Settings

• To catch peaks

• Enable “Stress”

• Use buffers for erratic peaks

• Set sliding window = 1 hour

vSphere UI Operations All Metrics

31

Step 2: Profile Batch Workload Type & Apply Policy

5 Minute CPU

Demand Average

Batch Workload Profile:

• E.g. Month end, Backup,

• Busy only for small bursts, idle most of the time.

Peak higher than avg

• Ensure sized for when it needs resources (4 hr SLA)

① Apply “Batch Workload Policy”

② (Optional) Tune Settings:

• Narrow down business period

• Set “sliding window” for

expected duration

③ If VM is idle for 28 days, it will

NOT be considered over-sized

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Step 3: Report Wasteful VMs with Usage Trends

Top N Over-sized VMs

Top N by Memory

Top N by CPU Usage Trend Memory Demand

Trend CPU Demand

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Agenda: Tips and Tricks to Improve Utilization

Monitor & Analyze

Right-Size VMs Conclusion Improve Utilization

vC Ops – Overview Gilead’s Advantage

34

Agenda: Tips and Tricks to Improve Utilization

Reclaim Waste Consolidate, Right-Size

Over-Commit

Improve Utilization

35

Audience Poll Question

“How many of you over-commit memory

in test dev but not in production”

36

Decide on Your Optimization Phases

1

20-50%

① Phase 1: Reclaim Waste

• Idle VMs

• Powered Off VMs

2

20%

② Phase 2: Increase Utilization

• Consolidate Under utilized

clusters

• Right-size Over-sized VMs

3

15%

③ Phase 3: Increase Over-Commit

or Density ‘safely’

• Assess potential density w/o

performance risk

37

Phase 1: Reclaim Unused Resources (Waste)

① View Wasteful VMs

breakdown (Dashboard)

② Identify list of Idle, Powered

Off VMs in Planning

Views/Reports

38

Phase 2: Consolidate Clusters

① Identify Under Utilized Clusters to Consolidate

② Run what-if scenario

Select VMs from Under utilized Cluster

Model if they will fit in target cluster

③ How many Small Medium Large VMs

can fit in target cluster?

39

Phase 3: Increase Over-commit Safely

① (Dashboard) Identify

optimal consolidation ratios

(Based on ‘Demand’)

② Increase Over-commit

• Use allocation model for Memory

Risk management

• Increase Memory over-commit

by 5-15% and observe

• Set this in the Policy Settings 3c

40

Conclusion & Takeaways

vCenter Operations Manager

enables you to improve your existing process to

Analyze, Optimize & Model future capacity needs

Gilead’s Advantage with vCenter Operations Manager

Realized value within 3 months in production with vCenter Operations

Identified reclamation opportunities to realize savings

Got improved insights to plan purchases for future growth

Gained more visibility into workloads to maintain performance & availability

41

Other VMware Activities Related to This Session

HOL:

HOL-SDC-1301

Applied Cloud Operations

HOL-SDC-1304

vSphere Performance Optimization

THANK YOU

Tips and Tricks for Capacity Risk Assessment,

Rightsizing and Planning

Kevin Denton, Gilead Sciences

Jim Medeiros, VMware

Monica Sharma, VMware

VCM4992

#VCM4992