[Beowulf] GPFS on Linux (x86)

[Leandro Tavares Carneiro]

We have tested it using 24 nodes as NSDs servers, using a partition of 
the internal IDE (PATA) disk as storage.

It worked very well. The type of the disk doesn't hurt the performance 
and the load of the nodes are perfect balanced. It is a very good 
product, very viable in technical terms. It does a better work than 
Lustre...

The main problem with it is the IBM licensing type... At the time we 
tested it, the IBM guys told us it is licensed by CPU, and was very 
expensive. After that, they told us they have changed this licensing, 
but doesn't explain what changed.

If anyone wanna use a parallel file system, acquiring a commercial 
solution must evaluate Panasas. It is a hardware/software solution and 
is very robust and easy to deploy.

Regards,

Leandro Tavares Carneiro
Petrobras TI/TI-E&P/STEP Suporte Tecnico de E&P
Av Chile, 65 sala 1501 EDISE - Rio de Janeiro / RJ
Tel: (0xx21) 3224-1427


Brent Franks wrote:
> Hello,
> 
> We have been researching GPFS from IBM and are very interested in what
> looks like promising performance and scalability.
> 
> Does anyone use GPFS, we are looking at running it in a distributed
> mode, rather than using one central SAN.
> 
> Additionally, the sales information seems to be rather elusive.  We
> have contacted IBM, however the channels we contact have all been
> somewhat dissapointing as we have had to educate the sales people on
> what the product is.
> 
> We are very interested in setting up a trial of the software and then
> purchasing if it meets our needs.  Does anyone have a contact at IBM
> or solutions provider who is familiar with GPFS and could send out an
> eval kit?  30 or 60 day time bomb would be fine, we just need to
> justify to management that it will indeed work for our application.
> 
> Any help would be greatly appreciated.
> 
> Thanks and kindest regards,
> 
> - Brent
> _______________________________________________
> Beowulf mailing list, Beowulf at beowulf.org
> To change your subscription (digest mode or unsubscribe) visit 
> http://www.beowulf.org/mailman/listinfo/beowulf
>