PowerVP Exposed!
Be sure to download the recently published Redbook: http://www.redbooks.ibm.com/Redbooks.nsf/RedbookAbstracts/redp5112.html?Open
PowerVP collects performance data directly from the Hypervisor, which offers the most
accurate performance information about logical partitions that are running on IBM Power
Systems. This performance information is then displayed on a real-time, continuous graphical
dashboard. Data collection is available for historical review.
PowerVP has these major features:
- Real-time monitor
PowerVP can collect, update, and display the performance information as frequent as one second.
- Easy to use GUI
PowerVP graphical monitor (dashboard) produces an easy-to-read display that shows an overall performance state of the Power server.
- Customizable GUI
PowerVP uses colorized heat technique to display the utilization metrics. It allows you to define the colors and the performance thresholds to modify the dashboard to match your monitoring requirements.
- Power platform support
PowerVP supports all Power virtualized workloads like AIX, VIOS, IBM i, and Linux. Background data collection PowerVP can collect the performance data in the background even when the real-time monitor is not active.
- DVR-like replay
PowerVP can play back historical data. It enables you to replay performance data sequences to figure out performance bottlenecks. During the play back, DVR-like functions, fast forward, rewind, pause, and stop are available to navigate through the data.
- Multiple dynamic views:
– System Level view
PowerVP system level view depicts overall performance status of virtualized workload of the entire system.
– Logical Partition view
PowerVP partition drill-down views portray performance details of individual virtual machines. Along with the CPU and Memory utilization, this view shows more details that include Disk transfer rate, Ethernet adapter transfer rate, and a detailed view of Load/Store Unit (LSU CPI).
– Hardware Topology view
PowerVP illustrates Power System hardware topology along with the resource
measurement views.
PowerVP is designed to compliment existing performance monitoring utilities. The
operating system performance monitoring tools can still be used to understand resource
utilization of the LPAR and applications running on it. PowerVP produces a visual that
shows overall utilization of a Power System.
PowerVP provides the following benefits:
- A simplified performance monitoring and analysis of physical and virtual workloads with a graphical user interface.
- An easy way to understand, manage, and optimize the performance of a Power System or group of Power Systems in Cloud computing.
- A means to view resource utilization of individual processor cores and their mapping to Logical Partitions that can be useful in effectively balancing system resources on a Power System.
- An approach to understand the affinity and optimize the performance of Logical Partitions using the utilization of internal buses.
- A graphical view into real-time workload that highlights possible contentions and overcommitted resources.
- A way to define user preferred performance thresholds, colors, and customize dashboard specific to a Power System.
- Understanding Memory Access Latency and Thread Locality A simple way to validate the performance improvement of Dynamic Platform Optimizer (DPO).
