SUN outperforms Windows NT!
Tuesday September 10 6:18 PM EDT
Sun Beats Microsoft in Record Lotus Notes Benchmark
Sun's Solaris Platform on its Ultra Enterprise 2 Server Sets New Records in Best Over
All Performance for Lotus Notes
MOUNTAIN VIEW, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sept. 10, 1996--Sun Microsystems, Inc. today announced
performance results for Lotus NotesBench software beating Microsoft's Windows NT.
NotesBench is a Lotus benchmarking tool which provides a methodology for measuring Notes server
performance. The Solaris(TM) operating environment, running on the Sun Ultra(TM) Enterprise(TM) 2
workgroup server, produced the best overall performance and the highest capacity numbers for the Mail,
MailDB, and Idle Usage tests of any platform published to date.
Companies deploying Lotus Notes in departments with heavy workloads or a large number of users will see
significant increases in productivity with the Sun(TM) solution.
"Lotus and Sun focused significant development resources designing the Notes Release 4 Solaris server to
leverage Sun's powerful SMP platforms such as the Ultra Enterprise 2," said Eileen Rudden, senior vice
president, Communications Products Development, Lotus Development Corp. "Sun's record setting
NotesBench results will prove beneficial to customers evaluating platforms which leverage enterprise-class
Notes and internet architectures."
The Sun 2-processor Ultra Enterprise 2 achieved almost 4 times faster response time than the highest published
NotesBench results based on a 4-processor Compaq Proliant 4500 running Windows NT. The Sun platform
beat the Compaq platform running Windows NT on all 3 published results even though the Compaq results
were published on a 4-processor CPU, instead of a two-processor CPU.
Compared to an HP-NetServer LX Pro running Windows NT, given the same user load of 1750 users in the Mail
test, the Sun UltraSPARC server achieved a response time of 0.129 seconds compared to the HP-NetServer LX
Pro of 0.207 seconds. Similarly, for the Mail DB test, the Sun UltraSPARC servers were able to deliver a
response time of 0.330 seconds beating the next best time from HP of 0.438 seconds for the same number of
users.
In a separate test using the same configuration, Sun increased the number of Mail Users to 1925 with a
response time of 0.205 and increased MailDB users to 1700 with a response time of 0.598. This test still
provided the best overall performance with the highest numbers of users published to date.
"With the shift away from desktop to networked, distributed computing, as demonstrated by the Internet,
companies who plan to capitalize on this shift for business require a scalable, reliable enterprise class server
environment to support it," said Janpieter Scheerder, president of SunSoft, Inc. "With the performance and
ease-of-use of Lotus Notes on our robust and proven Solaris platform, customers can meet current demands as
well as those in the future."
Lotus Notes on Sun's Solaris platform meets customer demands for a comprehensive groupware solution on a
reliable, full-featured, secure foundation. With TCP/IP and IPX/SPX standard in the Solaris operating system,
the Sun server can transparently interoperate with existing systems found in most organizations today, such as
Novell Netware networks and PCs running Windows 95 and NT.
Higher performance and lower cost make Lotus Notes and the Solaris operating system, running on a Sun Ultra
Enterprise server, an extremely strong solution for companies searching for a more robust, but cost-effective
alternative to NT.
In addition, Sun offers a complete line of Ultra Enterprise servers with the Solaris operating system, scaling up
to 30 processors, allowing customers to easily expand their environments. The Ultra Enterprise 2, with only two
200 MHz UltraSPARC(TM) and 512 MB of memory, ran three of the published NotesBench workloads: Idle
sessions, Mail-only, and Mail and Shared Database (MailDB). On each workload, the Ultra Enterprise 2
produced the highest user load of any published NotesBench result, and the best response time at those loads.
Sun Microsystems achieved these results by marrying the power and performance of Lotus Notes Release 4
with one of the industry's leading reliable, scalable and secure platforms, Sun's Solaris Ultra Enterprise Server.
In developing Lotus Notes for the Sun Solaris operating system, Lotus worked directly with Sun engineering to
develop the Solaris version of Lotus Notes, taking advantage of its advanced features such as symmetric
multiprocessing and multithreading.
The NotesBench tests use a combination of driver systems and destination servers to place simulated work
loads onto the "System Under Test". Currently there are 6 different user workloads which are simulated in
these series of tests. The test results were audited by KMDS Technical Associates, Inc. The full report can be
retrieved from sun.com /ue2.apps.html.
Sun Microsystems, Inc.
With annual revenues exceeding $7 billion, Sun Microsystems, Inc. provides products and services that enable
customers to build and maintain open network computing environments. Widely recognized as a proponent of
open standards, the company is involved in the design, manufacture and sale of products, technologies and
services for commercial and technical computing.
Sun's SPARC(TM) workstations, multiprocessing servers, SPARC microprocessors, Solaris operating software
and ISO-certified service organization each rank No.1 in the UNIX(R) industry. Java(TM), Sun's platform
independent programming language, provides a comprehensive solution to the challenge of programming for
complex networks, including the Internet. Sun Microsystems was founded in 1982, and is headquartered in
Mountain View, California.
FACT SHEET
SOLARIS VS Windows NT LOTUS NOTESBENCH
BENCHMARK SUMMARY
September 10, 1996
Background: Lotus NotesBench is a benchmarking tool which
provides a methodology for measuring Notes server performance. The
tests use a combination of driver systems and destination servers to
place simulated workloads onto the "System Under Test". Sun ran
three different user workloads which are simulated in these in these
series of tests.
TESTS:
A. Idle Test: An idle sessions workload that establishes an
upper bound on the number of sessions that a Notes server can
support.
B. Mail Only: A server for mail users.
C. Mail DB: A server for active users who are performing mail
and simple shared database operations.
RESULTS:
Sponsor Compaq HP Sun
Model 4500 Proliant NetServer LX Pro Ultra Enterprise 2
OS Windows NT 3.51 Windows NT 3.51 Solaris 2.5.1
Notes
Ver. R4.0 R4.1 R4.1a
CPU 4 x 166Mhz P5 2 x 166Mhz P6 2 x 200Mhz
Memory 512 Mb 512Mb 512Mb
Data
Disk 7 x 2G 13 x 2.1G 11 x 2.1G
Striping HW Smart-2E SSA, Ver.VolMgr
Notesbench Test
Sun Competitive, (Sun Peak)
Idle 2000 3097 3750 (3750)(a)
Mail
Users 1800 1750 1750 (1925)(a)
Notesmark
(TPM) 2383 2327 2332 (2563)(a)
Response
Time 0.5 0.207 0.129 (0.205)(a)
MailDB
Users 1500 1550 1550 (17000(a)
Notesmark
(TPM) 3325 3603 3276 (3983)(a)
Response
Time 3.509 0.438 0.330 (0.598)(a)
(a) - The Sun numbers in brackets resulted from a second Sun test
using the same configuration, but with a higher number of users.
Note to Editors: Sun, Sun Microsystems, the Sun logo, Solaris, SunSoft, Ultra, Ultra Enterprise and Java are
trademarks or registered trademarks of Sun Microsystems, Inc. in the United States and other countries. All
SPARC trademarks are used under license and are trademarks or registered trademarks of SPARC International,
Inc. in the United States and other countries. Products bearing SPARC trademarks are based upon an
architecture developed by Sun Microsystems, Inc. UNIX is a registered trademark in the United States and
other countries, exclusively licensed through X/Open Company, Ltd.
CONTACT: SunSoft, Inc.
Judy Zimbelman, 415/786-4708
judy.zimbelman@eng.sun.com |
