vSAN I/O Trip analyzer task scheduling in vSAN 8 U1
The vSAN VM I/O trip analyzer was a great addition when it was introduced to vSAN 7 U3, as it helped administrators identify the potential source of a performance bottleneck on VM workloads.
In vSAN 8 U1, the VM I/O Trip Analyzer has been enhanced to include a new scheduler mechanism. This enhancement will be ideal for environments where a VM has been identified as having a repeated, albeit temporary performance issue. Customers will be able to schedule the VM I/O trip analyzer to run on a VM at a specific time of day, and a particular duration, and frequency. The collected diagnostics data can be easily analyzed in the VM I/O trip analyzer interface in vCenter Server.
Understanding potential performance bottlenecks in a distributed storage system like vSAN can be challenging. The VM I/O trip analyzer to help administrators to identify the primary points of contention more easily. With the ability to visually illustrate parts of the data path directly in the vCenter Server UI, the administrator will be presented with a simplified view indicated the likely cause.
Not only will it have a visual data path, but it will measure the variability (standard deviation) of the delay time (latency) of the system, which can help administrators not only answer the questions of performance but of performance consistency. This data is presented by allowing the vCenter operator to click into the individual drives and NICs.
This complements the existing vSAN performance service views, and IO Insight's ability to track IO profiles for specific virtual machines. For additional information on troubleshooting vSAN see the performance troubleshooting guide.