C•CURE 9000 Virtual Machine Recommendations

Purpose
This document contains basic recommendations for VM configuration for optimal performance when
running the C•CURE 9000 server. It does not contain instructions for the configuration of any particular
VM. For information on the configuration of a particular VM, refer to documentation from your VM
provider. The focus of this document is ensuring that if you run several VMs on one host machine they
do not interfere with each other. This document applies to medium to large C•CURE 9000 servers.

Possible C•CURE 9000 Server VM Configurations

The C•CURE 9000 System can be configured in a variety of ways including:
- C•CURE 9000 Standalone:
o SQL Database Server and C•CURE 9000 Server are on the same machine:
 A single VM has both C•CURE 9000 Server and SQL Database Server
o C•CURE 9000 Server and the SQL Database Server are installed in different machines:
 A VM for C•CURE 9000 Server.
 A VM for SQL Database Server.
- C•CURE 9000 Enterprise:
o C•CURE 9000 MAS Server:
 SQL Database Server and C•CURE 9000 MAS Server are on the same machine:
• A single VM has both C•CURE 9000 MAS Server and SQL Database
Server.
 C•CURE 9000 Server and the SQL Database Server are installed in different
machines:
• A VM for C•CURE 9000 MAS Server.
• A VM for SQL Database Server.
o C•CURE 9000 SAS Server:
 SQL Database Server and C•CURE 9000 SAS Server are on the same machine:

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 • A single VM has both C•CURE 9000 Server and SQL Database Server.
 C•CURE 9000 Server and the SQL Database are installed in different machines.
• A VM for each C•CURE 9000 SAS Server.
• A VM for each SQL Database Server.

Recommendations for VM PC Instances Running C•CURE 9000

Server or SQL Server
Each VM must meet at least the minimum recommendations as specified in the C•CURE 9000 datasheet,
or from the System Specification Estimator tool on the Software House website.

The following information is minimum recommended settings for each VM PC that hosts both the
C•CURE 9000 server and the SQL Database Server, or each server individually.
- Operation System (OS): 64-bit OS.
- Memory: Minimum 32 GB.
- CPU: Minimum 4 cores depending on how much CPU is being utilized by the system. The more
CPU the system has, the better performance it will be.
- Drive Speed: Minimum 15,000 RPM. It’s highly recommended SSD for optimal performance.

Table 1: Minimum Recommended Specification for C•CURE 9000 server or SQL Database Server
Category C•CURE 9000 Server and C•CURE 9000 Server Only Remote SQL Server Only
SQL Server
OS 64-bit 64-bit 64-bit
Memory Minimum 16 GB for C∙CURE Minimum 16 GB for C∙CURE Minimum 16 GB for C∙CURE
9000 Standalone Server 9000 Standalone Server 9000 Standalone Server
Series L, M, N. Series L, M, N. Series L, M, N.

Minimum 32 GB for other Minimum 32 GB for other Minimum 32 GB for other

C∙CURE 9000 Server series. C∙CURE 9000 Server series. C∙CURE 9000 Server series.

Limit SQL to use ≤50%

available memory

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 CPU Minimum 4 cores for Minimum 4 cores for C∙CURE Minimum 4 cores for C∙CURE
C∙CURE 9000 Standalone 9000 Standalone Server 9000 Standalone Server
Server Series L, M, N. Series L, M, N. Series L, M, N.

Minimum 16 cores for other Minimum 8 cores for other Minimum 8 cores for other
C∙CURE 9000 Server series. C∙CURE 9000 Server series. C∙CURE 9000 Server series.
Drive Minimum 15,000 RPM. Minimum 15,000 RPM. SSD is Minimum 15,000 RPM. SSD is
Speed SSD is highly recommended highly recommended for highly recommended for
for optimal performance. optimal performance. optimal performance.

The physical VM server host should have enough resources such as CPU, memory and disk space for the
VM PC instances to be utilized.
The following estimates provide guidance on the minimum disk space requirements for the C•CURE
9000 server PC:
- Operation System installation, for example, Windows Server 2016:
o The Windows Server OS takes about 13 GB of disk space.
o Windows service packs and other security updates may take another 10 GB.
o The OS may also require more available disk space for the installation and operation.
o You may also need to allocate disk space for the Operation System pagefile. The typical
best practice from Microsoft is to set the pagefile size to equal 1.5 times of the RAM for
optimal performance. For example, if your system has 16GB RAM, the page file size
should be set to 24 GB.
o Please consult the Windows documentation for more details.
- SQL Database Server installation, for example SQL Server 2016, takes about 8 GB of disk space.
SQL Database Server may also require more available disk space for installation and operation.
Please consult the SQL documentation for more details.
- C•CURE 9000 server and its prerequisites installation will take about 7.5 GB of disk space, and all
initial empty database files will take about 0.5 GB of disk space.
- C•CURE 9000 configuration database (Core Db) is configured with Personnel, Controllers, Doors,
Events, etc. Once this is complete, normally not many more significant changes will be done.
However, space should be allocated for future growth and any addition of the objects will
require more space.

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 - C•CURE 9000 Journal Db will continually grow as it receives and stores all system activity.
Journal message transactions stored in the Journal DB. This database can be archived as the
database grows too large for the available disk space. End users have different policies
pertaining to on how many years of data must be stored local to the server or stored on backed
up media. This data provides historical reporting of all received activity. It is difficult to provide
an idea on the size for a journal and how fast its size will grow because the size of each C•CURE
9000 server’s journal will vary quite a bit depending on the size of the system and the number of
transactions per day. For example, if a journal report shows that the C•CURE 9000 system
produces on average 4 transaction per second, the journal database may take up to 700 GB of
disk space per year. You can estimate the amount of disk space required per day based on the
number of journal transactions per day by running a journal report and using the following
formula:

Estimated Disk Required per Year (GB) = 0.002 * Number of Transactions per Day
By using the estimated disk space requirement you can then manage the available disk space on
the server by scheduling regular Journal database maintenance to archive and backing up
journal data.
- SQL server also creates temporary “tempdb” database files for SQL transaction. The tempdb
database files grow as needed based on intensive SQL transaction such as reports, imports, and
large complex queries. Typically, these tempdb database files will take about 10GB to 20 GB of
disk space. However, you should monitor size of the tempdb files and shrink them when they
become too large.
- If the C•CURE 9000 system is using SQL Express, the database size cannot exceed 10 GB.

Degradation in VM system performance occurs where there are not enough resources on the physical
VM server. Consult with your VM provider for the specification of the physical VM server machine. See
the next section for recommendations for running several VMs on the same host machine.

If a separate VM is used for the SQL Database Server, network latency between C•CURE 9000 server and
the SQL Database Server should be less than 1 millisecond to avoid delays in data transmission and
system performance.

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Consult with your VM provider for a High Availability, Fault Tolerant, and Disaster Recovery solutions.

NOTE: Every C•CURE 9000 server requires a separate license.

Recommendations for Running Several VMs on the Same Host

Machine
The following rules apply as long two or more VMs are running on the same host. These rules still apply
even if VMs on the same host are running C•CURE 9000 servers, SQL Servers, or other software. These
rules help to prevent interference between VMs:

- Each VM needs an appropriate amount of dedicated memory. This memory must be dedicated
to the VM, it cannot be shared with other VMs dynamically.

- Each VM needs dedicated CPU cores. Just as with memory, these CPU cores should not be
shared with other VMs. This means that if you add all the CPUs used on all the VMs it should not
exceed the total number of physical cores for the host PC.

- Each VM which contains a combined C•CURE 9000 and SQL Server, or a standalone SQL server
that is used for C•CURE 9000 database needs to have a dedicated disk. This may be the most
important requirement of all. There are many cases where the C•CURE 9000 Server makes quite
heavy demands on the disk of the SQL Server machine. It is easy to overlook this when
measuring system performance. It can have a dramatic effect on the responsiveness of the
C•CURE 9000 server.
o This is especially important if the host PC is running more than one C•CURE 9000 Server
on it. When the C•CURE 9000 server startups, it uses the disk very heavily and having
more than one accessing the same disk at once hurts system performance. There are
other times, such as when the iSTAR controllers are downloading data or in an
Enterprise installation when the C•CURE 9000 servers are synchronizing with the master
server, there are heavy demands on the SQL Server disk.
o This requirement can be relaxed if the VM provider has a SAN solution that
automatically balances disk usage and ensures that each VM gets enough disk
resources. If a SAN is used, monitoring may still need to be done to make sure that the

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 C•CURE 9000 SQL Server VMs are getting the disk resources they need that do not share
the same RAID disk array. Please consult your VM documentation for more details.

Recommendations for VM Using VMWare

- When setting up the guest OS, change the number of cores and CPUs to reflect the native OS
expectation.
- Each C•CURE 9000 VM needs an appropriate amount of dedicated memory. This memory must
be dedicated to this VM only; it cannot be shared with other VMs dynamically.
- A share setting of high for memory reservations and CPU cycles is necessary.
- Hyper-threaded core sharing (HT) should be set to none.
- Memory Affinity should be (NUMA) set to none.
- See the “VMWare Best Practices for SQL” and “Best Practices for Virtualizing and
Managing SQL Server” reference documents for more information.

Recommendations for VM Using Hyper-V

- Change the number of virtual processors to reflect the native OS expectation when you set up
the guest OS.
- The CPU resource control settings reserve, limit, and weight should all be set at 100%.
- Each C•CURE 9000 VM needs an appropriate amount of static memory. This memory must carry
at least a 20% buffer and memory weight of High.
- See Microsoft’s “Best Practices for Virtualizing and Managing SQL Server” reference
document for more information.

Recommendations for VM Using Xen

- When setting up the guest OS, change the number of virtual processors to reflect the native OS
expectation.
- The VCPU resource control settings should all be set at to Highest Priority.
- Each C•CURE 9000 VM needs an appropriate amount of fixed memory.
- See Microsoft’s “Best Practices for Virtualizing and Managing SQL Server” reference
document for more information.

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About Software House
Software House security and event management systems from Tyco Security Products are now
part of Johnson Controls, a global diversified technology and multi industrial leader serving a
wide range of customers in more than 150 countries. Software House’s innovative C•CURE 9000
software portfolio combines with a suite of reliable controllers to provide the most powerful
security and event management in the industry. Add an unsurpassed integration platform that
allows customers to integrate seamlessly with critical business applications, and it’s easy to see
why Software House solutions are ideal for security-critical applications. For more information
about Software House products, visit www.swhouse.com.

APPENDIX A –References

VMWare Best Practices for SQL

https://www.vmware.com/content/dam/digitalmarketing/vmware/en/pdf/solutions/sql-server-on-
vmware-best-practices-guide.pdf

Best Practices for Virtualizing and Managing SQL Server

http://download.microsoft.com/download/6/1/D/61DDE9B6-AB46-48CA-8380-
D7714C9CB1AB/Best_Practices_for_Virtualizing_and_Managing_SQL_Server_2012.pdf

Microsoft Best Practices for SQL on Hyper-V

http://download.microsoft.com/download/d/9/4/d948f981-926e-40fa-a026-
5bfcf076d9b9/SQL2008inHyperV2008.docx

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