Clustrix benchmarks under tpcc-mysql workload

I’ve been working with Clustrix team for long time on the evaluation of Clustrix product, and this is the report on performance characteristics of Clustrix under tpcc-mysql workload.

I tested tpcc 5000W (~500GB of data in InnoDB) on Clustrix systems with 3, 6, 9-nodes and also, to have base for comparison, ran the same workload on HP ProLiant DL380 G6 powered by Fusion-io card, and on SuperMicro server powered by 7 Intel SSD 320 cards (this server is equal to hardware that Clustrix uses for its nodes).

The full report is available on our page with whitepapers, and in this post I would like to highlight the most interesting points.

The chart with comparison of all systems ( results in throughput per 10 sec, more is better)

So my conclusions from this benchmark:

• Clustrix shows very good scalability in the high concurrent workload by adding additional nodes.
  In fact the throughput improves more than by 2 times (3 times) by doubling (tripling) amount of nodes. This is possible Clustrix automatically distributes data around new nodes, and data/memory ratio decreases, which allows to achieve better throughput per node.
• Clustrix is able to handle such complex workload as tpcc, and automatically distributes load between nodes despite multi-statements transactions and foreign key relations.
• For a workload with a small number of threads, Clustrix does not perform as well as the system with Fusion-io cards.
• We also should take into account that Clustrix automatically provides high availability, maintaining redundant information on each node. Other systems in comparison are not fault- or crash-tolerant.

So looking on the results, Clustrix might be not your first choice for single-thread or low concurrency workloads from the performance point of view, but consider other factors such as high availability and transparent auto-rebalancing out-of-the-box. For high concurrent workloads, Clustrix provides great performance, and if you need better throughput, just add more nodes.

The other factor which would be interesting to compare, but I did not do that in this research, is the total cost of system. I need to ask Clustrix how cost of 3,6,9 nodes system is compared to other systems in comparison.

Standard dislaimer: this post is part of paid evaluation we perform for Clustrix, but is totally independent and fully reflects our opinion.