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  The File I/O Performance Monitor

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About hIOmon ---  The Big Picture

The following provides a quick and simple "big picture" overview of what the hIOmon™ File I/O Performance Monitor is, what it does and what makes it unique, how it operates, some practical examples of how you can use hIOmon, along with links for additional, specific information about hIOmon.  

What is hIOmon?

The hIOmon File I/O Performance Monitor is a disk I/O performance measuring and monitoring software utility that currently supports the Microsoft® Windows® 2000, Windows XP, Windows Server 2003, and Windows Vista™ operating system platforms.  It does not require any application, file, or file system modifications nor does it require operating system code changes.  hIOmon is an unique, licensed software tool that has been developed and is offered exclusively by hyperI/O LLC.

What does hIOmon do?

hIOmon enables you to easily and quickly determine exactly how your particular, individual files (and disks) are being accessed by your specific applications -- that is, a particular application's "I/O profile".

Beyond the basic read and write I/O operation counts, hIOmon provides you with a robust set of file and disk I/O operation performance metrics (including response times, throughput, data transfer sizes/amounts, system file cache metrics, plus much more) -- and all from the perspective of individual files, disks, and applications within your own particular computer system environment, and using your very own applications and files as you normally do!

Only hIOmon gives you the ability to easily, quickly, precisely, and reliably both measure and monitor the performance of your disk storage I/O operations upon an individual, specific file and device (and process) basis up at the application level.      

What makes hIOmon unique?

hIOmon is not another disk I/O benchmarking tool.  Rather, hIOmon allows you to take a "top-down" approach to evaluating disk I/O performance: you can now precisely determine -- with empirical metrics in hand -- the specific I/O performance that your particular applications and associated files/devices are actually experiencing within production environments.

One key hIOmon feature is its unique ability to collect, display, and export I/O operation performance metrics upon a summarized basis.  Rather than laboring over reams of data representing metrics for each and every individual I/O operation, hIOmon allows you to efficiently and automatically collect aggregated I/O operation metrics for only your particular files and devices of interest.  These aggregated metrics can then be offloaded for display and/or export either periodically (user-specified), when the file is closed/inactive, or when a user-specified "Alert" threshold (e.g., a particular total write I/O operation count, a maximum read response time, total amount of write data transferred, etc.) is detected.

Other unique hIOmon features include:

• "Process-based" file I/O operation performance metrics, where the real-time, summarized file I/O operation performance metrics collected by hIOmon for a particular process represent the combined sum of the performance metrics for all those files being monitored by hIOmon to which the particular process directed a file I/O operation.  hIOmon enables you to not only easily tell which specific files (along with their respective file I/O operation performance metrics) are associated with a particular process/application, but also the particular processes/applications associated with a specific file -- all within a summarized fashion.

• A comprehensive set of file and disk I/O operation performance metrics that goes far beyond basic read and write I/O operation counts to uniquely include such metrics as queue lengths, idle times, system file cache metrics (e.g., "hits" and "misses"), optional associated "physical device" I/O operation metrics (including "split I/O" operation information related to fragmented files) along with random/sequential access detection -- all upon an individual, specific file (or device or even process/application) basis.

• Support for "replay" as well as real-time mode displays (i.e., "replay" mode enables you to display, in chronological order, file I/O operation performance metrics that have been saved by hIOmon to a disk file).

• A variety of user-interfaces, including a Java™-based GUI, a Command-Line-Interface (CLI), Windows Management Instrumentation (WMI) support (including Microsoft Internet Explorer display and sample VBScripts), and Windows Performance/System Monitor support.

• Several Comma-Separated-Values (CSV) export file options, including MXG® Software support; you can also optionally specify the particular types of performance metrics that are to be included within the export files (so as to restrict the contents of the export files to only those particular metrics of interest to you).

• Support for precision (sub-millisecond) time stamps.

• And much more (see the hIOmon product information and features pages for additional information).

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How does hIOmon operate?

hIOmon promotes a flexible, adaptable, scalable three-tier architecture that is comprised of three (3) main software components:

• The hIOmon I/O Monitor.  This lightweight component performs the actual monitoring of the selected file and disk I/O operations up at the application/file-system level.  Based upon such passive monitoring (i.e., no changes are made to the file I/O operation), it collects the requested I/O operation performance information (which it maintains within its memory buffers until retrieved by the hIOmon Manager component).  The hIOmon I/O Monitor is very efficient and introduces negligible overhead into the overall file/disk I/O operation (especially when compared to the typical time durations of I/O operations).

• The hIOmon Manager.  This hIOmon component runs as an operating-system service (or daemon).  It manages the hIOmon I/O Monitor based upon control option requests set by the various hIOmon clients.  The hIOmon Manager also concurrently transforms, records, and transfers the collected file and disk I/O performance information (that is has retrieved from the hIOmon I/O Monitor) to the various hIOmon clients.  The hIOmon Manager allows the hIOmon I/O Monitor and various hIOmon clients to be much more simpler, faster and efficient in operation.

• The hIOmon Presentation Client.  The Presentation Client is a Java-based application that provides a standard windows-type graphical user interface (GUI) and communicates with the hIOmon Manager to set the various control and management options of the hIOmon I/O Monitor (such as which particular files are to be monitored and the particular types of performance information that is to be collected).  In addition, the Presentation Client can be used to display the collected file and disk I/O performance information in either real-time or "replay" display modes.

Please note that the hIOmon Manager also supports a variety of other user-interfaces (including a CLI, WMI support, and Windows® Performance/System Monitor support).

For additional information about architecture and operation of hIOmon, please see the hIOmon architecture page.

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How can I use hIOmon?

As an industrial-strength software tool, hIOmon provides the flexibility and wide range of features required to tackle a variety of disk storage I/O-related issues, including such fundamental tasks as:

• Identifying your "hot" files.  Use hIOmon to find those particular files that are best suited for Solid State Disk (SSD), RamDisk, disk-caching software, and other higher-performance disk solutions.  Base your decisions upon empirical metrics (such as actual read and write I/O operation counts, IOPS, responses times, data transfer sizes/amounts, system file cache metrics, and random/sequential access counts) that only hIOmon can provide upon an individual, specific file basis (and moreover, using your very own particular applications as you normally do).

• Evaluating proposed improvements.  Thinking about buying faster (but more expensive) disk drives and/or disk storage subsystems?  Or leveraging lower-cost (but lower-performance) SATA disk arrays and/or iSCSI?  Or adding additional system memory and/or faster processors?  Trying to determine the actual performance impact associated with the various "storage virtualization" approaches upon your particular computing system environment?
  
  Use hIOmon to easily and quickly obtain empirical, accurate file-specific (and disk) performance metrics to make better, more-informed decisions.  More appropriately configure benchmarking programs (such as IOMeter) based upon the hIOmon process-based I/O performance metrics (e.g., read/write I/O operation counts and random/sequential access counts) so as to better represent the actual I/O activity of your particular applications.  Substantiate the benefits in terms of actual performance metrics specific to key files and the associated applications.  

• Verifying and ensuring QoS?  Armed with the extensive set of file and disk I/O performance metrics along with sophisticated Alert capabilities that only hIOmon provides, users can validate and continually verify that those steps taken to maximize disk storage utilization and to achieve the Quality-of-Service (QoS) levels of file and disk I/O performance required by key applications are indeed of benefit.  This can also include such tasks as evaluating the actual performance impact of various paging and file-defragmentation approaches and policies.

• Other Use-Case Scenarios.  Please see the hIOmon use-case scenarios for other practical, real-world issues and concerns where the unique features of hIOmon can be of quick, easy, and cost-effective benefit to you.  

Where can I learn more about hIOmon?

For additional information about hIOmon, please see the following links:

• Background information about hIOmon.

• Overall product information about hIOmon, including product description, solutions, uses, operating system support, availability and pricing.

• Feature list and descriptions.

• Overall of the hIOmon architecture.

• Screen shots of the hIOmon Presentation Client, CLI support, WMI support, and Windows Performance/System Monitor support.

• hIOmon "Add-On" support.

• hIOmon documentation available for download (including datasheet, readMe document, overview presentation, licensing terms, user guide, and white paper) and tutorials.

• hIOmon support (including FAQs).

• hIOmon "Best Practices" and the "5 Storage Performance Questions".

• Information about downloading a full-function trial version of hIOmon.

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