Windows Server 2012 File Server Tip: Make sure your network interfaces are RSS-capable

The new SMB Multichannel feature improves performance for network interfaces by using multiple TCP connections for a single network interface automatically. SMB will only do this if your network interface reports itself as RSS-capable, which means it can use Receive Side Scaling. You can check that with the Get-SmbServerNetworkInterface or the Get-SmbClientNetworkInterface PowerShell cmdlets. See … Continue reading Windows Server 2012 File Server Tip: Make sure your network interfaces are RSS-capable →

Windows Server 2012 File Server Tip: Switch to the High Performance power profile

When you install a fresh copy of Windows Server 2012 and configure it with the File Server role, the default Power Setting balances power efficiency and performance. For this reason, even if you have a few high speed network interfaces and the fastest SSD storage out there, you might not be getting the very best IOPS … Continue reading Windows Server 2012 File Server Tip: Switch to the High Performance power profile →

Windows Server 2012, File Servers and SMB 3.0 – Simpler and Easier by Design

1. Introduction I have been presenting our solution in Windows Server 2012 for File Storage for Virtualization (Hyper-V over SMB) and Databases (SQL Server over SMB) for a while now. I always start the conversation talking about how simple and easy it is for an IT Administrator or an Application Developer to use SMB 3.0. … Continue reading Windows Server 2012, File Servers and SMB 3.0 – Simpler and Easier by Design →

Talks at SNW Fall 2012 in October will cover SMB Direct, Hyper-V over SMB and SMB 3.0

I have three presentations lined up for the ComputerWorld/SNIA SNW Fall 2012 Conference, scheduled for October 16-19, 2012 in Santa Clara, California. Here are the details for each one, taken from the official event web site.Industry Perspective: High Throughput File Servers with SMB Direct, Using the Three Flavors of RDMA network adapters Wednesday, 10/17/2012, 11:40 … Continue reading Talks at SNW Fall 2012 in October will cover SMB Direct, Hyper-V over SMB and SMB 3.0 →

Compilation of my live tweets from SNIA’s SDC 2012 (Storage Developer Conference)

Here is a compilation of my live tweets from SNIA’s SDC 2012 (Storage Developers Conference). You can also read those directly from twitter at https://twitter.com/josebarreto (in reverse order) Notes and disclaimers These tweets were typed during the talks and they include typos and my own misinterpretations. Text under each talk are quotes from the speaker … Continue reading Compilation of my live tweets from SNIA’s SDC 2012 (Storage Developer Conference) →

SNIA’s Storage Developers Conference 2012 is just a few weeks away

The Storage Networking Industry Association (SNIA) is hosting the 9th Storage Developer Conference (SDC) in the Hyatt Regency in beautiful Santa Clara, CA (Silicon Valley) on the week of September 17th. As usual, Microsoft is underwriting the SMB/SMB2/SMB3 Plugfest, which is co-located with the SDC event. For developers working with storage-related technologies, this event gathers … Continue reading SNIA’s Storage Developers Conference 2012 is just a few weeks away →

The built-in SMB PowerShell aliases in Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8

1 – Overview Windows 8 and Windows Server 2012 introduced a new set of PowerShell cmdlets to manage File Servers and File Shares. If you're not familiar with them, I would recommend reviewing my blog on The Basics of SMB PowerShell. With the rule that cmdlets have to be written in a way that … Continue reading The built-in SMB PowerShell aliases in Windows Server 2012 and Windows 8 →

Test Hyper-V over SMB configuration with Windows Server 2012 – Step-by-step Installation using PowerShell

1. Overview In this post, I am sharing all the steps I used to create a Windows Server 2012 File Server test environment that I used for some of my Hyper-V over SMB demonstrations. My goal with this post is to share some of configuration details and the exact PowerShell scripts I used to configure … Continue reading Test Hyper-V over SMB configuration with Windows Server 2012 – Step-by-step Installation using PowerShell →

Windows Server 2012 Scale-Out File Server for SQL Server 2012 – Step-by-step Installation

Outline 1. Introduction 1.1. Overview 1.2. Hardware 1.3. Software 1.4. Notes and disclaimers 2. Install Windows Server 2012 2.1. Preparations 2.2. Install the OS 2.3. Rename the computer 2.4. Enable Remote Desktop 3. Configure the Hyper-V Host 3.1. Install the Hyper-V role to the server 3.2. Create the VM switches 3.3. Rename the network adapters … Continue reading Windows Server 2012 Scale-Out File Server for SQL Server 2012 – Step-by-step Installation →

Deploying Windows Server 2012 with SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA) and the Chelsio T4 cards using iWARP – Step by Step

1) Introduction We have covered the basics of SMB Direct and some of the use cases in previous blog posts and TechNet articles. You can find them at http://smb3.info. However, I get a lot of questions about specifically which cards work with this new feature and how exactly you set those up. This is one … Continue reading Deploying Windows Server 2012 with SMB Direct (SMB over RDMA) and the Chelsio T4 cards using iWARP – Step by Step →