VMware recently released a white paper on
performance and best practices for vCenter Server in VMware vSphere 4.1. This
paper addresses four common areas of concerns regarding vCenter Server
performance:
- Performance improvements in vSphere 4.1 compared to vSphere 4.0
- vCenter Server sizing guidelines and software requirements
- Best practices in performance monitoring, tuning and troubleshooting
- Case studies demonstrating performance improvements in vSphere 4.1.
The vCenter Server in vSphere 4.1 supports a larger
inventory in a vSphere environment when compared with that supported in vSphere
4.0, both at the vCenter Server level and at the single cluster level. A table
is provided in the white paper to show the new supported limits. In addition,
in vSphere 4.1, vCenter Server can handle a larger number of concurrent tasks
at a time when compared with vSphere 4.0.
Significant performance improvements have been made in vSphere
4.1 compared to vSphere 4.0. The following list highlights some of the most
important performance improvements:
- Improved performance at higher vCenter Server inventory limits – up to 7 times higher operational throughput and up to 75% reduced operational
latency - Improved performance at higher cluster inventory limits – up to 3
times higher operational throughput and up to 60% reduced operational latency - Faster vCenter Server startup – around 5 minutes for maximum
vCenter Server inventory size - Better vSphere Client responsiveness, quicker user interaction,
and faster user login - Faster host operations and VM operations on standalone hosts – up
to 60% reduction in latency - Lower resource usage by vCenter agents by up to 40%
- Reduced VM group power-on latency by up to 25%
- Faster VM recovery with HA – up to 60% reduction in total
recovery time for 1.6 times more VMs - Better load balancing with improved DRS/DPM algorithm
effectiveness
For more information, please read the full paper: VMware vCenter
Server Performance and Best Practices for vSphere 4.1.