Always run SQLIO on new servers!

When your vendor brings a new type of server on the market always check if the hardware is as good as they claim it is.

A while ago I did a test run and compared the IO results of a Dell server and an -almost- equal configured IBM server. Both were small configs with six internal drives. The tool I used was SQLIO.

SQLIO is a small .exe file (250KB) that mimics the SQL Server database engine. You don't have to install SQL Server for the tool to work. Only the Windows OS is enough, so you can also check the thoughput of your SAN filesystem.
You can download SQLIO and some documentation here

The Result? Guess what? The Dell server scored 10(ten!) times better on IO performance then the more expensive IBM...

Never take your vendors word for it, always test yourself. Because who gets the blaim in the end?

The test file was 25MB, but results were roughly the same for bigger test files.

Results for: sqlio -kR -s360 -frandom -o8 -b64 -LS -Fparam.txt

IBM server local drives:

throughput metrics:
IOs/sec: 1177.91
MBs/sec: 73.61
latency metrics:
Min_Latency(ms): 0
Avg_Latency(ms): 13
Max_Latency(ms): 919
histogram:
ms: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24+
%: 16 11 4 5 8 8 6 5 4 3 3 2 2 2 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 13

Dell server local drives:

throughput metrics:
IOs/sec: 11,292.99
MBs/sec: 705.81
latency metrics:
Min_Latency(ms): 0
Avg_Latency(ms): 1
Max_Latency(ms): 394
histogram:
ms: 0 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24+
%: 0 96 4 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0

See my post on disk configuration tips.