Datastores. Performance Heatmap

This report analyzes datastore performance and shows how latency and IOPS metrics have grown across a time range for every VM residing on the datastore.

Description

The Datastores. Performance Heatmap report helps identify datastores with heavy load, analyze IOPS and latency values for every VM and detect whether datastores can sustain the current workload.

Parameters

Date/time Selection: defines the time period to analyze in the report.

Scope: defines a list of Groups or Objects that will be analyzed in the report (by default, the VMware Datastores group is selected). The Add Group option returns a Group and all objects that a group contains (with all performance counter instances). The Add Object option returns only the selected object.

Threshold: defines the threshold value for the metric selected in the Threshold is For list.

Threshold is For: defines the measurement unit that you want to analyze:

Growth of IOPS (absolute/relative): select this measurement unit to analyze how the average number of IOPS on the last day of the reporting period has changed in comparison to the average IOPS number on the first day of the reporting period. You can choose to calculate the growth as an absolute value or as a relative value (in percent).
Latency: select this measurement unit to analyze last day Average value across all read/write operations and all disks that belong to that particular VM and are stored on that particular datastore
Growth of latency (absolute/relative): select this measurement unit to analyze how the average latency on the last day of the reporting period has changed in comparison to the average latency on the first day of the reporting period. You can choose to calculate the growth as an absolute value or as a relative value (in percent).

Cell Capacity (IOPS): defines the capacity of a single Heat Map cell in terms of IOPS in the report output.

Sample Usage

Analyze the IOPS load on the selected datastore during the week. Detect VMs for which the number of IOPS has grown by over than 30%.

Instructions

Open the Datastores. Performance Heatmap report.
From the From list, select This Week > Monday. From the To list, select This Week > Friday.
In the Scope section, include the necessary datastore in the report.

Click Add Object. In the Add Object window, click Options. In the Options window, click Add. In the Class Name search box, enter datastore and click Search. Select the VMware Datastores class in the list of search results, click Add and click OK. In the Options windows, click OK to apply the filter. In the Add Object window, click Search. The search will return a list of objects that belong to the VMware Datastores class. Select the necessary datastore in the list, click Add and click OK.

In the Threshold field, enter 30.
From the Threshold is For list, select Growth of IOPS (relative).
Leave the Cell Capacity (IOPS) field without any changes.
Click Run to view the report.

Report Output

The report will display 3 performance charts for the datastore IOPS, maximum read and write datastore latency.

The report will draw the Heat Map that illustrates the average number of IOPS for every VM for the last day of the reporting period. The number of IOPS for every VM is presented as a colored bar. The bar is comprised of cells, each cell indicates 10 IOPS.

The bar color depends on the IOPS growth rate:

Green: the average number of IOPS on the last day of the reporting period has grown by less than 30% in comparison to the average IOPS number on the first day of the reporting period.
Red: the average number of IOPS on the last day of the reporting period has grown by over 30% in comparison to the average IOPS number on the first day of the reporting period (that is, the threshold was breached).

Note

The Heat Map cells always indicate the average number of IOPS, regardless of the measurement unit selected in the Threshold is For list. The measurement unit and the threshold value are used to define the color of Heat Map bars and the sorting order for VMs on the Heat Map and in the report table.

The report table lists all VMs whose files reside on a datastore and shows the following metrics for every VM:

IOPS: the average number of IOPS for the last day of the reporting period and the IOPS growth (the average number of IOPS for the first day of the reporting period compared to the average number of IOPS for the last day of the reporting period)
Latency(ms): the average latency for the last day of the reporting period and the latency growth (the average latency for the first day of the reporting period compared to the average latency for the last day of the reporting period)

Note

The report does not include VMs with no collected IOPS or latency values (for example, switched-off VMs or VMs moved away from the datastore).

If a VM was moved to the datastore in the middle of the reporting period (and has IOPS and latency values), it will be included in the report. In this case, the “first day” for this VM will be the date when it started producing activity on the datastore.

You can click a VM name, a datastore name or a cell on the Heat Map to drill down to the Veeam Performance Details Report.