Adaptec Snap Server 18000

iSCSI is growing in popularity (see iSCSI - behind the hype, p193), so it's no surprise that the 18000 supports this protocol. A wizard is provided to help create iSCSI targets, allowing you to pick a volume, decide how large the iSCSI disk should be, enable write cacheing and implement CHAP authentication. The appliance also supports iSNS servers, and you can block access from multiple iSCSI initiators.

To test iSCSI performance, we used a dual Xeon Windows Server 2003 system with Microsoft's Software Initiator 1.06 installed and logged onto a single 25GB target. We configured the open-source Iometer with two disk workers, ten outstanding I/Os and 64KB sequential read operations. For raw throughput, it returned an amazing 107MB/sec, which is currently the fastest performance we've seen from a single initiator connection to one iSCSI target. However, using the software initiator does hit local processing hard, with the test generating about 45 per cent CPU utilisation. We reran the same test using an Adaptec 7211C iSCSI host bus adaptor and saw similar speeds, but at a cost of only 7 per cent local CPU utilisation.

The Snap Servers may have been through a number of owners, but they've lasted the course and continue to offer a solid product line. The 18000 moves Adaptec firmly into the enterprise storage market and delivers a fine range of features that will give the latest Windows-powered appliances a good run for their money.

Author: Dave Mitchell