Purchasing Power Triples VM Density onDatabase Using Proximal Data Autocache Software

Purchasing
Power LLC. provider of purchase programs for employees, has
selected Proximal Data Inc.‘s
AutoCache
software to improve application performance and report processing
in virtualized environments.

The company was able to triple the VM
density on its databases and reduce run times for its SAS data
analytics program and its monthly financial reporting by 85%.

Purchasing Power had been experiencing
issues with the processing time for its monthly reports, particularly
a financial report that took 36.5 hours to run. The report also
required keeping other VMs out of the system while it ran, since it
consumed all the host resources. The company needed a solution that
would support its Linux OS without having to use agents, improve its
application performance and availability, and reduce latency, all
without having to upgrade its back-end NetApp SAN hardware.

"The need to improve the report
processing performance, as well as other issues, led us to
discussions about caching at the server level," said Brian
DaPrano, manager of systems and security at Purchasing Power.
"AutoCache was the only product we found with the features we
needed and was the only solution that was both cost-effective and
transparent to our existing systems and application environments."

The company chose AutoCache for its
compatibility with existing hardware and software but also for its
ability to be flash device-agnostic, working with PCIe cards and
SSDs, including Intel’s 910 400GB PCIe card in its existing test
configuration. AutoCache proved to be easy to implement and use while
delivering results almost immediately after AutoCache evaluation
began.

Utilizing this product the company
tripled the VM density on its databases and reduced the original run
time by 85% for its SAS data analytics program. The monthly financial
report that took 36.5 hours to run now takes 6.5 hours, even while
running concurrent operations, including backup, with multiple VMs on
the same host. It eliminated the need to move VMs when running the
monthly financial report and improved the performance of each VM in
the process without any change to the internal processes or
procedures.

"AutoCache performs with an
amazing cache hit rate," said DaPrano. "Everything
we tested with AutoCache has benefited. We had a major software
upgrade and, thanks to AutoCache, the time to perform that upgrade
was cut by eight hours. Without question, we would recommend
AutoCache to everyone. This product just works."

Implementing AutoCache took Purchasing
Power a matter of hours, so the company had fully deployed the
software in its environment and on a test server used for trying
different software rapidly.

The company channel partner, Condre
Storage Inc. provided the transactional logistics support and
services necessary to deliver the AutoCache software to Purchasing
Power.

"By partnering with Proximal
Data to supply AutoCache to customers and resellers, we are offering
a complete solution that uniquely improves the efficiency of our
customers’ data centers," said Dennis Maetzold, president at
Condre Storage. "Customers get an enormous return on their
investment as a result of AutoCache’s ability to deliver greater VM
performance with higher throughput and lower latency."

Purchasing Power’s future plans for
AutoCache include deploying it to most of their virtual hosts in the
next year and deploying it in their test environment to resolve any
issues there as well.

To read the Purchasing Power case study