Save Time, Rack Space, and Money—5:1 Server Consolidation Made Possible with the Latest AMD EPYC Processors
Download PDFThu, 20 Apr 2023 17:41:37 -0000
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Summary
The latest Dell PowerEdge servers with AMD EPYC 4th Generation processors, each with up to 96 cores, deliver exceptional value to our customers. The large number of cores coupled with the high-speed DDR5 memory and very high-speed PCIe Gen5 devices makes for servers that can run almost any workload with ease. These servers are especially well suited for virtualization workloads. These unprecedented performance enhancements enabled Dell Technologies to achieve multiple virtualization world records. The cluster-level benchmarks for virtualized workloads are an excellent example of the performance and power-performance world record gains that are achievable.
Running a mixture of architectures in your data center can be cause for some concern—especially if you are looking to upgrade to the latest AMD servers and you are currently running the workloads on legacy Intel® based servers. Even with the greatest level of planning, there is always the fear that some unexpected variable might turn everything upside down during the migration process. Now, there is a new tool for your toolbox to make such migrations easier. The VMware Architecture Migration Tool1 is a PowerShell script that uses VMware PowerCLI to eliminate the guesswork and complexity involved in migrating a virtual machine from one hardware architecture to another.
To fully test the tool, Dell ran a full migration scenario. We were able to consolidate 380 VMs running on five legacy Intel platform servers into one Dell PowerEdge R7625 with AMD EPYC 4th Gen processors. We describe our testing in more detail later in this paper.
Why migrate?
In today’s IT departments, workloads are always evolving. There is increasing pressure to support new workloads while keeping existing workloads to support existing business needs—all while also trying to reduce costs and meet corporate goals.
The latest technology tends to bring multiple advantages, driving the need to upgrade. Some of these advantages are:
- Higher performance
The latest Dell PowerEdge servers with 4th Gen AMD EPYC processors have class-leading performance with up to 121 percent higher scores than prior generations.2
- Better efficiency
The Dell PowerEdge servers with 4th Gen AMD EPYC processors are some of the first to achieve the EPEAT silver rating, indicating the highest level of environmental responsibility and efficiency. Dell has achieved 159 percent higher performance per kilowatt on the VMmark benchmark with the R7625 compared to the prior-generation model server.3
- More security
With Dell’s Cyber Resilient Architecture and AMD’s Infinity Guard, the PowerEdge servers with 4th Gen AMD EPYC processors offer top-class security to ensure that your data and infrastructure are protected.4
- Workload optimizations
The 4th Generation AMD EPYC processors have several optimizations, such as support for AVX-512, INT8, and BFLOAT16. The processors can deliver exceptional performance for workloads that can take advantage of such optimizations.
VMware Architecture Migration Tool
The VMware Architecture Migration Tool (VAMT) was developed jointly by AMD and VMware to automate the migration of legacy VMs from Intel architecture to AMD architecture, with the goal of delivering a better user experience and better business value. Freely available on GitHub, VAMT offers several key features:
- Architecture agnostic and open source
- Fully automated cold migration
- VM success validation
- Process throttling
- Change window support
- Email and syslog support
- Audit trail
- Rollback
The tool streamlines and simplifies the migration process in a trustworthy fashion.
Benchmarking
Dell leveraged the VAMT tool and the VMmark benchmark to achieve some remarkable consolidation on the PowerEdge R7625.
The VMmark benchmark allowed us to set up a workload in the form of tiles within each hardware cluster. Each tile consisted of 19 different VMs running a workload internally. The benchmark was deployed across five legacy Intel based servers and eventually migrated to a single AMD based PowerEdge server. A Dell PowerMax 2000 SAN was used for data storage. The following table shows the configuration details:
Table 1. Configuration of source and target servers
Component/specification | Source | Target |
---|---|---|
Number of servers | 5 | 1 |
Processor | Intel 8180 | AMD EPYC 9654 |
Cores per server | 56 | 192 |
Memory | 768 GB | 3 TB |
Tiles | 4 | 20 |
VMs per server | 76 | 380 |
Server | Server vendor A | Dell PowerEdge R7625 |
Storage | PowerMax 2000; 30 TB spread across 6 LUNs | |
Network | 32 GB FC network for storage, 25 GbE for data network on VMs through a 4-way splitter, 100 Gb switch |
We were able to run four tiles per legacy server for a total of 380 VMs. The VAMT was then used to migrate the VMs across to the target PowerEdge server.
The tool completed a cold migration of all 380 VMs to the target server in 57 minutes!
Achieving value
The Dell PowerEdge R7625 with 4th Gen AMD EPYC processors delivers significant technology advancements that can deliver value in any virtualized deployment. Consolidating from five servers to a single server is an example of the extent of savings possible. This kind of consolidation allows for significant license cost savings and fewer hours on system management. Decommissioning the five legacy systems also reduces power draw and operational costs by as much 64 percent,5 even while also running workloads on the latest architecture with security features like Secure Memory Encryption (SME) and Secure Encrypted Virtualization (SEV). AMD SEV helps safeguard privacy and integrity by encrypting each virtual machine.
1 https://github.com/vmware-samples/vmware-architecture-migration-tool
2 Based on Dell analysis of submitted SPECFPRate score of 1410 achieved on a Dell PowerEdge R7625 with AMD EPYC 9654s compared to the previous high score of 636 on a Dell PowerEdge R7525 with AMD EPYC 7763 processors as of 11/3/2022. Actual performance might vary.
3 Based on Dell analysis of published VMmark Server Power-Performance score of 21.0179@21 tiles achieved on a Dell PowerEdge R7615 cluster with AMD EPYC 9654P processors compared to the score of 8.1263@12 tiles achieved on a Dell PowerEdge R7515 cluster with the AMD EPYC 7763 processors as of 4/13/2023. Actual performance might vary.
5 Based on Dell internal analysis comparing the total CPU TDP of 2,050 W from five dual-socket servers with the Intel Xeon 8180 processors compared to the total CPU TDP of 720 W from a single dual-socket Dell PowerEdge server with AMD EPYC 9654 processors as of 4/13/2023. Actual performance might vary.