RE: DSKBAL on V4R3

["Graap, Ken" <keg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

>I want to use the new DSKBAL command to have a balanced system.
>Did someone already try this command ?

Andre...

We added 4GB disk drives to our 9406-530 last month. Previous experience
with the V4R3 implementation of DSKBAL convinced us it just wasn't fast
enough. We couldn't have added our disk and balanced them within a weekend.
Adding the drives to an ASP with data and configuring RAID sets takes HOURS
and HOURS too!

So we decided to scratch the system and reload it after adding the disk
drives. This took about 28 hours but was much quicker that trying to use
DSKBAL (IMHO).

It is very important that you balance your disk drives though. We added 8
drives about 10 months ago and didn't balance them. We create an I/O
nightmare that we had to live with until we reloaded the system in March.

Here is a performance tool graph (I hope it comes out readable after it's
e-mail journey around the world...)
showing the dramatic difference after our system reload on 3/20/99:

            Utilization before and after system reload

                  Disk Arm Utilization vs. Time

 

Disk Arm Utilization

50.58   +        *

46.70   +

42.81   +

38.92   +

35.04   +

31.15   **                 *

27.26   +  **   *       * * **

23.38   *         **

19.49   +            *

15.60   +

11.72   * **  *  *     * * * *

 7.83   && &*   * &&**  & *&&&*               *     *

 3.94   &&&&&*& &&  &&*&*&&& &&********** ******  ***

  .06   +----&**---&--&-&---------&&&&-*&*&-&&&&**&&&-------     
        03/01     03/09     03/17     03/25     04/02     04/10  
                                     Time
                            * Maximum     & Average 

Our average response time dropped significantly too.  

I hope that the new disk balancing features of V4R4 prove to be faster and
easier to use.

Good luck to you. Let us all know how things work out and especially how
long it takes.

Kenneth

--
********************************
       Kenneth  E.  Graap
    IBM Certified Specialist
          AS/400   Professional 
          System  Administrator
 NW Natural - Information Services
           System Services
        503 226 4211 X5537
          FAX  503 721 2521
      keg@nwnatural.com
********************************


-----Original Message-----
From: Andre Toche [mailto:andre.toche@turboline.be]
Sent: Wednesday, April 07, 1999 1:34 AM
To: Midrange
Subject: DSKBAL on V4R3
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