Performance analysis and modeling of FCIP san traffic in mixed priority IP traffics

Abstract

Fibre Channel (FC) is a high-speed data transfer technology used in communication between storage subsystems and computing devices commonly called Storage Area Networks (SAN). A Fibre Channel over TCP/IP enables the connection of FC-SANs isolated by IP networks. This thesis examines the FCIP protocol which is used as FC SAN extensions for SANs geographically separated by Wide Area IP networks. The performance of synchronous mirroring is examined between two SAN islands when operating though an IP network. A mathematical model is developed based on a series of experiments which denotes the characteristics of the FCIP protocol under the presence of varying load mixed IP traffics such as voice and video. The author also investigates performance improvement mechanisms using Multi-Protocol Label Switching (MPLS) and IP Quality of Service (QoS). The application of IP QoS to classify data based on priority is used to differentiate mission-critical applications and to apply the appropriate priority schemes. The use of MPLS enables core networks to function with a packet exchange speed closer to that offered by layer 2 switching. This thesis presents a comparison of the real time values against the modeled values. The performance boost observed using IP QoS and MPLS is also presented in this study.