Monday, October 31, 2011

Set higher MTU for vSwitch and Virtual Distributed Switch

 Refer to KB: iSCSI and Jumbo Frames configuration on ESX 3.x and ESX 4.x for more details

**Any packet larger than 1500 MTU is a Jumbo Frame. ESX supports frames up to 9Kb (9000 Bytes).

 To set the MTU size for the vSwitch, run the command:

# esxcfg-vswitch -m (MTU_Number) (Vswitch)

where MTU_Number = 9000, Vswitch = Name of the Vswitch

This command sets the MTU for all uplinks on that vSwitch. Set the MTU size to the largest MTU size among all the virtual network adapters connected to the vSwitch.



Refer to KB: Enabling Jumbo Frames for VMkernel ports in a virtual distributed switch


Run this command to change the MTU size for the individual port group:

# esxcfg-vmknic -m 9000 -v (port number) -s (dvs Switch name) 

For Example:
# esxcfg-vmknic -m 9000 -v 115 -s "NewLAN-DVS"


To enable Jumbo Frames on a VMkernel port from vCenter Server:

1) Click Home > Hosts and Clusters > Host > Configuration > Networking.
2) Navigate to the vSphere Distributed Switch tab.
3) Click the VMkernel port (eg: vmk1)
4) Click Manage Virtual Adapters.
5) Select the vmk interface and click Edit.
6) Under the NIC settings, change the MTU value to 9000.
7) Click OK.

Saturday, October 29, 2011

Error in Compiling GotoBLAS2 in Westmere Chipsets

GotoBLAS2 uses new algorithms and memory techniques for optimal performance of the BLAS routines.

When I was tried compiling the GotoBLAS2 on my Westmere chipsets, I followed the "02QuickInstall.txt", I got this error

../kernel/x86_64/gemm_ncopy_4.S: Assembler messages:
../kernel/x86_64/gemm_ncopy_4.S:192: Error: undefined symbol `RPREFETCHSIZE' in                                        operation
...........
...........
...........

gcc -O2 -Wall -m64 -DF_INTERFACE_INTEL -fPIC  -DSMP_SERVER -DMAX_CPU_NUMBER=8 -D                                       ASMNAME=strmm_kernel_RN -DASMFNAME=strmm_kernel_RN_ -DNAME=strmm_kernel_RN_ -DCN                                       AME=strmm_kernel_RN -DCHAR_NAME=\"strmm_kernel_RN_\" -DCHAR_CNAME=\"strmm_kernel                                       _RN\" -I.. -UDOUBLE  -UCOMPLEX -c -DTRMMKERNEL -UDOUBLE -UCOMPLEX -ULEFT -UTRANS                                       A ../kernel/x86_64/gemm_kernel_8x4_sse3.S -o strmm_kernel_RN.o
make[1]: *** [sgemm_oncopy.o] Error 1
make[1]: *** Waiting for unfinished jobs....
make[1]: Leaving directory `/root/GotoBLAS2/kernel'


I was quite puzzled to why the compilation did not work. I googled and found a wonderful answer Trouble compiling GotoBLAS2 on newer CPU. Basically, you will need to

gmake clean
gmake TARGET=NEHALEM
Eventually yo will get something like

 GotoBLAS build complete.

  OS               ... Linux
  Architecture     ... x86_64
  BINARY           ... 64bit
  C compiler       ... GCC  (command line : gcc)
  Fortran compiler ... INTEL  (command line : ifort)
  Library Name     ... libgoto2_nehalemp-r1.13.a (Multi threaded; Max num-threads is 8)



According to Trouble compiling GotoBLAS2 on newer CPU, the problem appears to be that newer CPUs (Intel X5650 in my case) are not detected properly by the CPU ID routine in GotoBlas2.

The problem with gemm_ncopy_4.S arises because it defines RPRETCHSIZE and WPREFETCHSIZE using #ifdef statements depending on CPU type. There is an entry for #ifdef GENERIC, but that was not set for me in config.h.

Friday, October 28, 2011

IBM DS4000 (FastT) Storage Manager Client on Windows

Boy, this blog "How to Install IBM DS4000 (FastT) Storage Manager Client on Windows" is really helpful in getting information and the software on IBM DS4000 (FastT) Storage Manager Client. Even easier than finding on IBM Website.

......
1) Download the software.
For Windows XP, 2000, 2003, or 2008, on a 32-bit platform, click here.
For Windows Vista , 2003, 2008, on a 64-bit platform, click here
For Windows Vista 32-bit, click here.

If these links don’t work for you, try navigating IBM’s site:
www.ibm.com > support & downloads > fixes, updates, and drivers
Category > (under SYSTEMS) system storage
Product Family > disk systems, Product > DS4800 or whichever DS4000
Select Operating System and Click GO
Click Downloads on the Support and Downloads box.
.............

For more information do go to How to Install IBM DS4000 (FastT) Storage Manager Client on Windows

Wednesday, October 26, 2011

Comparison of File System

Wikipedia did a wonderful job in providing a comparison of various file system
Comparison of file systems. For those who are assessing various file system offerings, do read it.

Another shorter but not as comprehensive is File System Primer from Novell

Another comparison between Lustre File System and Panasas ActiveScale Performance comparison of the Cluster File Systems at the Intel CRT-DC

Monday, October 24, 2011

Looking for solution.... CPU soft lockup detected for CentOS 5 and IBM BladeCentre

One of my IBM BladeCentre node hangs and the log messages generated
"BUG: soft lockup - CPU#1 stuck for 10s! [rpciod/1:3646]"

I have been looking around, but found a reference but not a solution though. I have seen other forum that 
RHEL 5.X CPU soft lockup detected in PAGE_LOCK_ANON_VMA - IBM BladeCenter and System x 

Symptom
While running the Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5.x (RHEL5) family of products, the kernel may report the following error:
BUG: soft lockup - CPU#XX stuck for 10s!

Where XX can be the number of any processor in the system.
The associated stack backtrace points to page_lock_anon_vma as the code running at the time of the soft lockup detection.

Affected configurations
The system is configured with at least one of the following:
  • Red Hat Enterprise Linux 5, any update
This tip is not system specific.
This tip is not option specific.
Note: This does not imply that the network operating system will work under all combinations of hardware and software. Please see the compatibility page for more information: http://www.ibm.com/servers/eserver/serverproven/compat/us/

Solution
This behavior will be corrected in subsequent families of Red Hat products. For more information, contact Red Hat at the following URL:
http://www.redhat.com/about/contact/